Seriously, just take a look at this. [0] United States has 0 days off. Over half the list is >15 days. Those people have time off to go on a 2 week vacation.
You might note that US workers can "earn" up to 20 days. Taking off those days is usually looked down upon and can hurt chances of promotions. Being fired shortly after returning from an "extended leave" is not unheard of.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_statutory_minimum_empl...
I work for a nonprofit here in the states. I make roughly half of what my friends who work for large companies make.
On the other hand, I recently spent 2 weeks of vacation in Europe, followed by a professional conference at a large European university. (20 days total). I was not expected to work or check email while on vacation, and my supervisors viewed my job at the conference itself to be to present my research and network with professionals who can assist with our mission, not sit around in a hotel room catching up on email.
As a bonus, I know my work helps people instead of lining the pockets of the upper classes.
Frankly, it astounds me that so many people fixate so much on salary. (Hourly rate is a better heuristic. Talk informally to your friends about their salary and hours, and do the math yourself.)
That sounds steep to me. On a lark I checked out Norwegian's [1] prices for 2 adults, 2 children roundtrip on dates around winter break:
LAX-CPH: $1,550
JFK-OSL: $1,400
Both non-stop. Of course, if you not near one of the larger transportation hubs, there'll be some additional cost.
As for the link, try this one: https://www.norwegian.no/us. (I just copied it from Google, works if you from there, but not if from anywhere else — weird.)
Median income in the US is around $50,000. $7-8k is a family car, most of somebody's student loan balance, the entire electronics budget for ~5 years. You want them to piss it all away on a week or two? Fuck no.
International travel is a luxury for the extremely privileged. Hell, I was pretty privileged - my parents made a total of around $110k in a low-cost-of-living city - and $3,500 for New York City was a once-in-a-lifetime treat.
Granted, there are ways to do it outside of the family, like study-abroad programs. But then in addition to the cost of the vacation you're paying full tuition to not take real classes and (if you're in a field like CS) delaying graduation by a semester or more because you're not making any progress on your major.
Analysts say current airline prices are hilariously, unsustainably low. It's only going to get far, far worse.
EDIT: I should say that vacations are important and we do take them. We drive 10-15 hours and stay at AirBnbs in other 3rd-string US cities that, while pleasant, are not high-end tourist destinations. Nashville, Lawrence, Raleigh-Durham, Cape Cod, far-flung D.C. suburbs, etc. With a Prius and more than 2 people, driving far is cheaper than flying pretty much everywhere in the continental US.