Work (?) Week

I have a 3 day work week this week - it’s pretty rad. Monday was President’s Day (ok, technically it's called "Washington's Birthday", thank you very much section 6103(a) of title 5 of the United States Code). So obviously as a Fed I didn’t have to report to work. And this Friday is my day off (compressed work schedule rules!). Tuesday, my boss was out sick so I had very little to do. Today and tomorrow I’m in training. If you’re keeping score at home, I guess technically you could argue that this is a 1 day work week for me, sandwiched by two 3-day weekends and a 2-day siesta (training = mental naptime). It feels like I’m barely working this week!

I love having days like President’s Day off. In college, the ONLY holiday we observed was Martin Luther King Jr. Day. None of this “Columbus Day” foolishness. Veterans Day? Yeah right! Having President’s Day off got me thinking about all of the other days off that Federal employees get.

For example, there are 10 Federal Holidays (sometimes 11 if Christmas falls on a Tuesday like in 2007). Additionally, every Fed gets at a minimum of 4 hours of vacation time each pay period (26 pay periods a year = 13 vacation days). Once you’ve been a Fed for 3 years, this jumps up to 6 hours per pay period (19.5 vacation days annually). And if you make it to 15 years of Federal service, you get 8 hours of annual leave per pay period (26 vacation days a year!). On top of that, my compressed work week schedule gives me one Friday off every 2 weeks (another 26 days off!). If I choose to work on my “day off”, I can bank the hours as “comp time” and use them whenever I want.

Right off the bat, an entry level employee working a compressed work week schedule has 49 days off in their first year. And that’s not even counting sick leave (an additional 13 days, bringing the total to 62 days off). If you used it all (plus sick leave) in one year, you’d only actually be working for 9 months out of 12… as an entry level employee! Stick around for 15 years, your total jumps to 75 days off earned per year (the equivalent of 15 five day work weeks). Can it possibly get better?

If you’re like my boss, you like to save your vacation days instead of use them. At the end of any given year, you’re only allowed to carry over 240 hours of vacation (30 days). He carries this full amount over every year – he’s simply gets so much leave that he cannot possibly get rid of it all. But, if he were to take all of his days off in a 12 month period, here’s how ridiculous it would be:

30 banked vacation days + 26 earned vacation days + 10 Federal holidays + 26 compressed work days + 13 sick days = 105 days off in one year. That’s the equivalent of 21 five day work weeks. He could essentially take over five months off in one calendar year! And he wouldn’t miss a penny of his GS-15 salary ($142,227). Feels like barley working indeed…