Majority of Americans Work During Vacations

Vacation is a time to take a break, relax, and get away from responsibilities for a while, however a new study shows that work still follows employees during their vacations. A majority of Americans do work during their vacations.

According to a new survey conducted by Harris Interactive for TeamViewer, a German company that makes remote control and online meetings software, most Americans still work during their "breaks." The survey included 1,309 working Americans and 52 percent of them said they will work during their summer vacations this year. This is a 6 percent increase from a similar survey last year, according to Smart Planet.

With new technology, employees can constantly be connected to their work emails, devices, and the internet, which may put pressure on them to continue to do work even when they're on a vacation.

The workers who are employed full-time, part-time, and self-employed said that there are several work related tasks that they will continue to do on vacation. Of the respondents, 30 percent said they would read work-related emails. Twenty-three percent said they would receive work-related calls and 18 percent will receive work-related text messages. With computers is many households, 19 percent said they will access documents on their home computers but 13 percent said they will access documents on work computers. Thirteen percent said that their boss, clients, or colleagues will ask them to do work during their breaks.

Despite employers not being able to catch a break, vacations may be a good time for workers to catch up with things that they haven't had a lot of time to work on during business hours. However some people won't even take vacations out of a fear that stuff will build up at work and be waiting for them upon their return. In a survey conducted earlier this year by Harris Interactive, they found that 57 percent of Americans had unused vacation time at the end of 2011.

One boss fully supports vacations. A Denver startup company pays its employees $7,500 to take a vacation, on top of paid vacation days, and the boss requires his employees to be absolutely disconnected from work so they can enjoy their break without disruptions.