I’ve been following a discussion online about someone who’s accumulated 400 hours of annual leave and is now facing resignation - that’s roughly 10 weeks of leave sitting there, waiting to be cashed out. The whole situation got me thinking about how we’ve created this bizarre system where taking time off becomes a financial puzzle rather than, you know, actually resting.

The original poster was looking for ways to avoid the tax hit on their leave payout, wondering if they could funnel it into superannuation or find some other creative workaround. The responses were a mix of practical advice and stories that honestly made me shake my head at the state of our work culture.