Four to five weeks of vacation is pretty standard in Europe and I don’t think it has anything to do with productivity. AFAIK, a German or Belgian would pretty much get the same amount of vacation. I’m in Montreal and the standard by law here is two weeks but my contract with a local employer is giving me four weeks. And, I’m still working when I’m working, even if I have some vacation time at some point?!
I took eight weeks this year. So you’re saying I (or a French person?) am not getting anything done when I work, because I took some extended vacation time?
It’s not just the vacation. Culturally the French are just slow movers at getting anything done. In a multinational company it seems like France is always playing catch up. Thats isn’t to say France is slowest either. Germany has always been the at very bottom levels of productivity.
Yeah France remains one of the most productive countries in the European Union, so they must be doing something right
Here’s an interesting report on France productivity from 2019: https://economy-finance.ec.europa.eu/system/files/2019-11/en_1errapportcnp-10july-final.pdf