I live in London and I'm looking forward to 4 May. It's our next bank holiday. We have a total of eight of these in England and Wales. I'm planning to grab a beach towel, some suntan lotion¹ and go to the coastal² town of Brighton for the day. Some of my colleagues are happy just to go for a picnic in one of the city's many parks.

 

But at sunset after a day of leisure, no matter where we are, we will all be thinking the very same thing: why don't we have more holidays?

 

These collective days off work cost businesses a lot of money. A report by the Centre for Economics and Business Research in 2012 suggested that each bank holiday costs the UK economy £2.3bn and scrapping³ the lot of them would boost annual output by £19bn.

 

But they admit that this figure might be far from accurate. Actually, it's difficult to calculate the loss of productivity because some of us compensate⁴ by working harder and later. And holidays impact differently in different sectors⁵. A restaurant that caters⁶ for employees in the office complex next door will lose a day's trade, but supermarkets will have record sales of snacks on warm, sunny bank holidays. The zoo, cinemas, bars, hotels… they all stand to gain when people idle away the hours.

 

I think holidays are good for the soul. It's important to get away from the daily grind and on some occasions a holiday can unite a nation. Ask a Brazilian about their carnival⁷. It's an occasion in which everyone in the country seems to let their hair down. In Britain, there is sometimes an extra holiday for a royal event, like Queen Elizabeth's Jubilee⁸. There are street parties and a real sense of community on these special days. Thankfully, another royal baby's on the way. Maybe we'll get an extra bank holiday for this!

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