On January 26, parliamentary sessions in Japan began with one goal in mind: **To pass legislation that will ensure that workers take all of the vacation days that they are entitled to.** Japanese people work notoriously long hours: **22 percent of Japanese work more than 49 hours per week.** In America, only about 16 percent of workers do the same. More troubling is the fact that most Japanese people **don’t even take most of their vacation days.** In fact, the Japanese have coined a term for the situation, “*karoshi*,” which literally means “working oneself to death.” These might be troubling statistics, but one expat in Japan tried to find a way to smile about the situation. YouTuber **Stu in Tokyo** wrote this on his YouTube page: > There are definitely people in Tokyo who do this all year round in order to support their families. I couldn’t imagine having to do this if I had those kinds of responsibilities as well. Big salutes to all you hard workers out there, winning bread for your loved ones! Check out Stu’s average week of work in Japan below. **You’ll definitely start to feel sorry for him around the 1:30 mark.**
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