79 percent of private industry workers had access to paid vacation leave in March 2019

The summer of COVID-19 might have many wishing for a vacation, so let’s take a look at the latest available data on paid vacation leave. In March 2019, paid vacation leave was available to 79 percent of private industry workers. Within occupational groups, 90 percent of workers in management, professional, and related occupations had access to paid vacation leave, the highest for any occupation group. Sixty-percent of workers in service occupations had paid vacation leave the lowest of any occupation group.

Among industries, workers in the information industry were most likely to have access to paid vacation leave at 93 percent. Eighty-four percent of workers in the education and health services industry had access to paid vacations.

Full-time workers were more than twice as likely as part-time workers to have paid vacation leave available to them.

Eighty-nine percent of union members had access to paid vacation leave, compared with 78 percent of nonunion workers.

These data are from the National Compensation Survey — Benefits program. To learn more, see Employee Benefits in the United States, March 2019. For definitions of the terms related to employee benefits, see the Glossary of Employee Benefit Terms.