Anyone who has ever told me to "just travel for a year in your 20's!" has obviously never lived outside the United States.

I've been to 3 continents, over a dozen countries, and a whole lot of states. I've lived on both sides of the country, on a military base and on a remote island, in a small town and in a big city. I've backpacked countless miles, scuba dived in the middle of the ocean, and been elected to public office before the age of 25. <br><br>This is the reality: Americans don't get enough paid vacation. Most people can barely take a week off to go do anything cool and get back to work to gear up for another year of earning PTO. And the ones who get fully reimbursed for their vacations are few and far between. Traveling is expensive. If you're young and in college, the last thing you can afford to be doing is spending thousands of dollars on a long term travel trip. And if you're not young and in college, you've probably got a mortgage or a family or a commitment to your employees or a hundred other reasons you can't just take a year off work - especially in the US. <br><br>I worked in sales for a while and made really good money. But I also had to work really hard for that money, and lost a ton of vacation time when I switched jobs. I've got a friend who gets a full month paid every year, plus generous profit sharing and benefits from a good tech job. If anyone can travel for a long time, it's her, but she's got a husband, 2 kids, a mortgage, and also works in tech in the Bay Area (where a 1 bedroom apartment is $3,000 a month). She doesn't get to travel a whole lot.<br><br>Maybe this is just the buddies I run with, but most people are either too busy making money, too busy spending money, or too busy at work to take a year off to travel. If you're in your 20's, you are probably too busy figuring out how to be an adult to have the money, time, or luxury to quit your (probably entry-level, probably underpaying) job to travel the world. Your 30's will be busy too, and your 40's will be busy with kids, and anyone who gets to travel a lot is either a) living on a small island in the USA, or b) independently wealthy enough to travel without taking time off work.<br><br>Traveling is awesome. I'm so glad I have friends who have been able to do it. But nobody should ever tell anyone that they *should* travel, or that in order to have a fulfilling life, one must take extended vacations. The reality is that most people barely get a few days off at a time.