ALso DEPENDING on the job, some will require approved weeks or months ahead of time, and you cant just use the pto whenever you want, except for amazon(despite how bad they throw employees away theya re quite lenient on pto usage). a NOSY manager might question or ask for specifics and deny "leave, pto" based on it.

You can infer quite a bit from the countries we share a color with on the map. I think that’s DRC, Mozambique, and Nigeria in Africa. I don’t generally associate those governments with robust workers rights.

If I just don't learn how much better others have it, I won't feel as bad.

I'll help you out - you're dead last

Do you need to use your pto days if you are sick and can't work? Here in the nordics we get 25 days paid vacation and if we are sick it is reported as sick day/s and we keep all vacation days. And if you have planned vacation and gets sick you can report it as sick days and use your vacation later.

Edit: My tone/intent is not to be critical of your comments, but to add additional context.

The US has no mandatory time off. PTO is uncommon, but also a "benefit", not mandatory.

Washington State has mandatory sick time accrual (1 hour per 40 worked), which is paid time off. But that equates to less than 12 days per year.

I agree with you that we need to do better, but with everything else going on, I'm inclined to change countries if/when i can afford to.