Is Good Friday a Holiday in the USA?

[JSCOOK]

FWIW, my OP was not intended to be "religious" or "politicial" ...

Just really surprised today to learn that it appears that it's not a holiday south of our border like we had thought it would be ... why we didn't know this before now is beyond me ...

[linear]

Eh, back on the topic, I had a work holiday today (since the markets clsoed) and my kids did go to school. So I went to work and got something done while it was ever so quiet.

[scorrpio]

Stock market closed = day off for me.

OTOH, we work Veteran's Day and Columbus Day - I hear many people are off on those.

[Rob3100]

We closed our business and told our onsite employees there was free to take the day off. Contacted our customers and told them our onsite folks were free to take the day off from our point of view, but we could schedule around that if there was need. This is the same story we've had for several years.

Most of our customers were open, all of our employees got the day off.

[soapbox]
On a side note, we believe a fresh and happy employee is a better representation of our ideals rather than one who's billing 60-70hrs/week for months; but then, we're in it for the long haul, not this quarters numbers.
[/soapbox]

[430752]

East yes, others no.

It seems that, at the risk of sepculation and generalization, that the east coast, or at least north of Virginia, say, recognizes Good Friday much more than the rest of the country. My wife even commented after she returned home from work on Friday (see, its a generalization, not all east coasters get it off), that a vendor from Seattle expressed surprise that she was working Friday and said (the Seattle woman) that she thought the East Coast got it off.

Now, the reason, I believe (again, I strongly state that this is not meant to start a debate on the various strains of Christianity, only an observation), is that the East Coast, and again particularly the North East (D.C. on up) is generally more Catholic than other parts of the nation (likely due to our immigration patterns). Why Catholics may insist on Good Friday off more than Protestants, who knows and that is not the subject here.

I only make the above observations since you asked. And I can add that having grown up in the Midwest (Chicagoland), I can say that I believe the above is true from experience. I never knew Good Friday was a day off until I moved out here (Jersey). I now get it off, and always have since my move here.

Again, not a thread on one version of Christianity over another or even whether Good Friday is a holy day, just responding the OC's question of whether it is a recognized Holiday in the USA.

EDIT: oh yeah, and here's another interesting thing. My wife didn't get it off, and she works for a swiss company. Yet in Switzerland, the home office has Maundy Thursday off, Good Friday off, Something Saturday off, Easter Sunday off, and More Monday Off. And not just off, the Home office is closed, like no receptionist, no receiving, like Ghost Town off. Perhaps more interesting is that my soon-to-be Brother-In-Law does Chinese translations for various Wall Street houses. He deals with Chinese, Hong Kong and Taiwanese Companies. He mentioned that the Hong Kong clients were closed all last week and again today, Monday. So I asked we he had to go to work over the weekend. he said because the Chinese and Taiwanese were not off at all, not even for a minute. So, this got the natural questiosn of didn't Hong Kong revert back to China, to which he said yes, but there's no way in you-know-where that they're giving up their days off!!!).



Curt J.