Americans are burned out. After navigating covid, child-care emergencies, mental health crises, a recession, supply-chain scarcities, surging prices and (tiring!) TikTok trends, many have been in survival mode for three years. More than 50 million workers quit their jobs last year to hunt for something better. While many quickly found new jobs, an important trend has taken hold: Americans are finally embracing career breaks.
The idea of taking a few months or even a year off work used to be largely taboo in this country. But the pandemic altered Americans’ views of work. There’s a greater tendency now to prioritize health and happiness — and less loyalty to companies that were quick to fire people in the 2008-2009 recession and again in the pandemic downturn.
Taking a sabbatical is becoming popular across industries and the workforce. In an analysis for The Post, payroll processor Gusto found that employees taking leaves of absence for more than a few weeks accelerated since covid hit. In January 2022, about 6 percent of employees started a sabbatical — nearly double the January 2019 rate. Gusto found that 25- to 34-year-olds were the most likely to take a sabbatical, followed by 35- to 44-year-olds. Women were also more likely than men to take this kind of break, which differs from parental leave. Since LinkedIn launched a career break option last March allowing people to check a box to show their status, more than half a million people have used it.
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Some have mistaken this as an “end of ambition” among younger workers. But interviews and research suggest that’s wrong. This isn’t an end of ambition. It’s a redefining of it.
Follow this authorHeather Long's opinions“I’ve regained control over what is important to me and what I should be working toward,” said Tricia Cuna Weaver, who has been on a nine-month sabbatical after selling her stake in a digital finance company. “It’s time for me to be my own boss. If not now, when?”
Weaver, 39, is among dozens of people I’ve interviewed who have taken two months to a year off from work since 2021. Many describe similar experiences: They worked nonstop since their teens or early 20s, often moving rapidly up the job ladder. They faced deep stress during covid, but it took something snapping to make them step away from the grind. A nurse described weeping for the first time in her 30-year career after she had to tell a patient awaiting surgery there were no more beds. A cook realized he was becoming depressed and an alcoholic. Several people described major health scares, panic attacks and deaths of parents or siblings.
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A two-week vacation wasn’t enough.
Some asked their employer for a few months off. Others just quit and lived off savings. Tellingly, no one I talked to regretted their break. All said some variation of the same thing: The time away forced them to reflect on who they were outside their job and what they wanted out of life.
“I could have gone higher as an executive, but I don’t think I would have been the best version of myself,” said Elizabeth Rojas Levi, 35, who has traveled since leaving an executive corporate affairs job last year. She called me from the beach town of Ayampe, Ecuador. “We need these breaks to be better contributors to society.”
Lately, sabbaticals aren’t just for the wealthy. Some young restaurant workers I interviewed managed about two months off between jobs thanks to savings they built up from pandemic relief aid and opportunities to stay with family or friends. In this tight labor market, they were confident they could find new positions.
While many white-collar workers worried that taking time off would harm their careers, feedback has been unexpectedly positive for some. Weaver said she has been flooded with messages from business connections seeking tips on how to take a sabbatical.
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As popularity grows, some employers are starting to view sabbaticals not as a detriment but as a way to fight burnout. Roughly 5 percent of companies offer paid sabbaticals and 11 percent offer unpaid options, according to the Society for Human Resource Management. Julia Pollak, chief economist at ZipRecruiter, said it’s “very much on the rise” as a perk in job ads. Bank of America and Habitat for Humanity Philadelphia are among those that launched new paid sabbatical programs for 2023. Research by DJ DiDonna, founder of the Sabbatical Project and a senior lecturer at Harvard, found that 80 percent of people who take sabbaticals returned to their company refreshed.
It takes six weeks just to de-stress from a job, DiDonna says. Then people start to explore who they are and what’s important in their next chapter.
“If you take six months off every 10 years, that’s 5 percent of your working life,” DiDonna said.
The time can have an outsize impact. GLAAD chief executive Sarah Kate Ellis told CNBC taking a sabbatical was the “best three months of my career.” More workers across the economy may find that a career break is key to making their jobs work better for them.
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