A 2.5-Day Weekend? It'll Never Happen, and Here's Why

The State Administration of Tourism is apparently considering a plan that it first attempted to float during the summer of 2015: that to relieve traffic congestion in major cities and boost tourism spending, China should implement a 2.5-day weekend during the summer months.

No way this will ever happen, and here's why.

It wasn't so long ago that China had three, week-long holidays per year: Spring Festival, May 1 week, and October 1 week. Now we're down to two, as the country realized it can't really just bring everything to a halt for a week every fourth month. Instead, we have three disruptive long weekend holidays in April, May, and June, respectively, and one more single-day holiday in September for Mid-Autumn Festival.

Another reason the government wanted to limit these long vacations is that the wear-and-tear on China's tourism infrastructure, including damage to irreplaceable monuments like the Great Wall and Forbidden City, was worsened by having massive groups of tourists all visiting at the same time.

This Saturday, February 6, is a working weekend, a holiday make-up. Because unlike every other civilized nation on the world, China doesn't like it when people have too many days off, so it's ok to have a week-long vacation, but let's not lose any productivity caused by pesky weekends.

So here comes this idea to offer people a 2.5-day weekend. "Under the plan, government institutions, state-owned companies, joint-ventures and privately-held companies are to be given incentives to allow their workers to take off at noon on Friday before coming back to the office on Monday," China Radio International (CRI) reports.

This is a country where people must work weekend days before and after major holidays to make up for lost productivity. Now they'll just get an extra half-day off for three months?

Also, while that's lovely for workers, it may not be such a thrill for employers, who hired people to provide products or services to customers based on at least a 40-hour week. How should they react?

Finally, even though the plan is partially designed to encourage "family time," students aren't necessarily off for the entire summer, the way they are in North America or parts of Europe.

The reality is contained in this statement from the CRI report: "Under the provisions, a 40-hour work-week is still required, meaning employees who get a 2.5-day weekend are going to have to make up the hours somewhere else during their week." Uh-huh.

We've seen plans floated before, and just because they appear in official media doesn't mean they will happen, the winter odd-even rule that January's blue skies stopped cold.

Sorry folks, but your weekends will be two days again this summer, same as they ever were.

More stories by this author here.

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Photo: Beijing Holiday