Travel insurance policies for workaholics

Sweden's known for massages and meatballs, ja? TheVacation Notice US has them beat with the newest brilliant idea for travel insurance - a work-related cancellation policy.

AIG and Access America have both added additional insurance that covers work-related cancelations. For $20-$25 you can guarantee a full refund when your boss yanks the chain on your vacation.

Lisa Belkin summed it up nicely in a recent New York Times column:

"What sobers me is the symbolism," she writes. "The fact that scotching vacation for work has become so common, there is money to be made on it. We need those vacations. And now we can be $24 closer to leaping whenever work calls."

I'll admit to my Blackberry addiction and even to stealing time away from my vacation to answer emails. I'm not alone, but that doesn't make it right.

But sometimes things happen and that vacation you pined over for months goes up in smoke - and it's often no one's fault. A death, an accident, a report that the entire company is riding on - the list of possibilities is endless.

Still, I have to agree with Belkin's grief over this last bastion of escape from work. And the fact that it's so North American saddens me even more - we really do need all the vacation days we can get.

Maybe I can move to Sweden. Not only can I get a killer massage there, 32 legally mandated vacation days would be mine for the taking. Now das is good. Ja.

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