By this point, you've probablyconsidered moving to France. If not for the croissants, culture andcafes, then maybe for the country's view on round-the-clockwork.

You may have read the news item about a new French accord — itspread quickly in the United States. Here's the gist: In the landof wine (whine?) and cheese, labor unions and corporaterepresentatives agreed to limit after-hours e-mails and phone callson remote devices. They cited the importance of enough employee“rest time” and balance as the reason behind the move.

It's important to note that this does not apply to every workerin France — just to 250,000 employees of consulting, computing andpolling firms — but it's still an interesting piece of informationthat is representative of the French view on work/life balance —and, subsequently, on employees' health.

This new ruling is in addition to France's 35-hour workweek andgenerous amounts of vacation time.

Far be it from me to agree with French policy, but this stanceis something we could desperately use here. For the most part,we're a country full of paranoid, obsessive workers. Our mobiledevices, and our addiction to them, exacerbate this. According tothe Pew Research Center, 44% of Americans sleep with our cellphones next to the bed to avoid missing calls, texts or emailsduring the night.

I'm one of them, and I've realized that having work email on myphone can be a very bad thing. It's all too easy to constantlycheck it. It's even easier to respond right away, since it's oneless thing to do the next day — at least that's how I rationalizeit. Plus, there's the perception that waiting hours, or until thenext day, to reply can make you look like a slacker.

My recent issue: My new iPhone now vibrates every time I get anew work email. I'm pretty sure it's glitched, too, as I've triedto turn it off repeatedly and then it goes off again (awesome!).Basically, work haunts me at all hours.

Plus, in my job in news, I'm constantly scouring news itemsonline. Instead of reading about what I might want to during my offhours — you know, important subjects like literature, theater and,of course, celebrities — I find myself looking at everynews item about PPACA and health care.

Life-work balance is the struggle we all like to talk about. Butit's the struggle we don't like to fix. And it comes down toguilt.

My colleagues and I discussed working from home not too longago. All of us sheepishly admitting it made us feel guilty, likeothers would think we're slacking; though, a slew of evidence,including frequent story and blog postings, proved otherwise.

That's the thing, too: Working from home often makes each of usmore productive, not only because we're (seemingly) not interruptedand not wasting time commuting to and from work, but because wemake sure to work harder and longer so we don't lose theprivilege.

Essentially, it's about guilt.

Work guilt is all too common. It's one reason we feelcompelled to check emails at all hours of the night. Settingboundaries, as the French do, will not only keep us fromfeeling resentful about our workplace, but it's also vital to ourhealth.

I've writtenabout this before, but it's worth repeating: Researchshows that working long hours — and not disconnecting from theoffice — puts us at risk for heart disease, depression, mentaldecline, burnout and a host of other terrifying problems. Andwithout the health of employees, what good is the company?

Maybe it's time I took some French lessons, 'cause France issounding pretty good to me.

Or, at the very least, maybe it's time I visit an Apple store tofix my phone.

I really don't need to be reminded of my work emails all. the.time.

Kathryn Mayer is managing editor for BenefitsSelling magazine, a sister publication of CU Times. She can bereached at [email protected]