Countries With the Most Holiday Entitlements

It's that time of year again, when workers go on leave, businesses shut down and the general work-life balance scale dips toward "social." But employees in some countries have it especially good, with generous government-mandated holiday entitlements.

With that in mind, we've put together a list of the top 10 countries with the highest number of mandated paid holidays per year, according to a 62-country report "Worldwide Benefit and Employment Guidelines" released by the human resources consulting firm Mercer.

The rankings are based on the minimum mandated holidays an employee is entitled to per year, not counting national holidays. (In cases where countries have the same number of statutory holidays we sorted them alphabetically.)

Some of the results may surprise you and some of the benefits may make you envious. Click ahead to find which countries give their workers the most time off each year.