Most Americans Would Choose 5% Raise over More Vacation Time

Steve Cole/Getty Images(NEW YORK) — Taking time off from work to recharge your batteries is vital, but a new survey reveals a majority of Americans  — 56 percent — put more value on earnings and would choose a 5 percent raise over two weeks’ vacation.

The finding comes from a new Job Happiness Survey of 26,000 Americans by Yahoo! Finance and Parade magazine.

Additional findings:

• When asked what age they expect to retire, 28 percent said they’d finish up at age 66 to 70.  Just 15 percent think they’ll actually retire at 65; age 66-70: 28 percent; age 60-64: 20 percent; age 65: 15 percent; younger than 60: 13 percent; older than 76: 13 percent
• If respondents could do it all over again, 59 percent say they would not choose the same career they work in now.  Forty-one percent say they would.
• Fifty-one percent of respondents say they would be friends with colleagues if they didn’t work with them.
• If respondents lost their jobs tomorrow, 27 percent say they’d have no savings to tide them over.  Twenty-six percent have only one to three months of savings.  Fifteen percent have four to six months of savings squirreled away, while 13 percent say they have more than two years.
• Fifty-one percent of respondents say workers get ahead because of internal politics, while 27 percent believe it is hard work and initiative that move them forward.

Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio