Should the Start of Chinese New Year Be a Federal Holiday?

First time accepted submitter CarlosF writes "Does Lunar New Year belong alongside those other red-letter days? Efforts to recognize Lunar New Year at the state and local level have been afoot for years. In 1994, San Francisco decided to close public schools on Lunar New Year, but this was largely a response to demographic reality rather than political pressure."

It is a federal holiday

[sunderland56]

Shouldn't your question be "should it be a federal holiday in the USA"? It is already in China.

Re:No, it shouldn't

[Anonymous Coward]

The argument likely aims at the fact that storming of Bastille was the event that launched chain that resulted in creation of modern democracy, modern Western power structures and Napoleon Code.

The storming of the Bastille happened years after the American Revolution, and unlike the American Revolution, which resulted in (relatively) liberal democracy right away, the French Revolution resulted in the Reign of Terror (hardly a model for democracy), and the re-establishment of monarchy several times (Napoleonic and Bourbon kings and emperors). In fact, the French Revolution scared a lot of other countries from liberalizing and becoming more democratic (see Edmund Burke's writings, for instance)

Also, the Napoleonic Code also has nothing to do with the common law practiced in the US (outside of Louisiana and Puerto Rico to some extent) or other Anglophone liberal democracies.

There are more Celts than Chinese

[Grayhand]

What about Beltane, May 1st, Lamnas August 1st, Samhain October 31st? They are all traditional Celtic holidays. May day was the beginning of the planting season. Lammas was the wheat harvest and was celebrated with bread, Samhain was a combination of Thanksgiving and New Years Eve. It was called the season of death because it was also the time animals were slaughtered for winter meat so they didn't have to feed them all winter. Far more people in this country grew up with May Day and Halloween celebrations than Chinese New Year. We already celebrate a New Year so how many redundant new years do we need to have to keep everyone happy?

Re:No, it shouldn't

[smooth wombat]

We would probably get more done as a country if we had more time off.

Funny you should mention this. Just this morning on CNBC there was a guy who talked about this very subject. His main point was that people should get roughly 10 hours of sleep each night, not the recommended 8 and certainly more than whatever the national average is.

He also mentioned that people should take naps in the afternoon to recharge as well as take more vacations as they are more productive afterwards.

Finally, the blurb across the bottom of the screen said according his book, most people work in 90 minutes bursts of creativity then have to recharge for the next round.

Overall, working more hours does not produce more work and people who think they can be more productive by working more and sleeping less are actually doing the opposite.

This is the link to the interview [cnbc.com] from this morning and this is a link [cnbc.com] to a related story from last year saying the same thing.

Having said all that, do I want Chinese New Year to be a holiday? No. Holidays should be reserved for unique events, such as our Declaration of Independence, not some general celebration such as New Years (Chinese or not).