Thoughts on maternity and sick leave

[KingFlorez]

I'm a supporter of them, I wanted to see if people here thought about this. Are they good or bad ideas?

[theboz]

1. Good ideas, but need to be distributed equally

I think that men as well as women should be given an equal amount of time off for maternity leave. Yes, I know women are the ones that go through the actual birth process, but husbands should be able to have an equal amount of paid time off to help out.

As far as sick days go, I don't see how anyone could be against them, unless you were to convert all of it to "personal days" and let people use them whether they're sick or if they want to pad their vacation days.

[Nye Bevan]

2. That's actually an interesting idea

Maternity leave is obviously a great idea, but the only potential downside is that it may lead companies to subtly discriminate against women of childbearing age in the hiring process. If men received equal leave this should eliminate this discrimination. However, I think there is a cultural barrier to overcome before we see men taking 3 months off work for the birth of a child.

[StellaBlue]

5. Subtly?

Are you a 26-year old woman like I am?

[Nye Bevan]

8. "Subtly" in the sense of

not telling the job applicant that they weren't hiring her because she might become pregnant. In other words they would come up with some pretext to avoid legal problems.

[Bunny]

3. Are you aware of the Family and Medical Leave Act?

It already allows for fathers to take up to 12 weeks a year in unpaid leave to care for a new baby.

[Dora]

9. There's a caveat.

If the mother and the father have the same employer, the father's 12 weeks of leave is not in addition to the mother's 12 weeks of leave. It's the same twelve weeks

We just went through this. My husband and I both work for the same university, and I recieved a letter before I went on leave saying that my leave had been approved and if my spouse was also eligible for leave, it was to be used in conjunction with my leave, not in addition to. In other words, if he claimed FMLA and stayed home for three weeks with us, it reduced my twelve weeks to nine. As it was, he did stay home for two weeks and he used vacation leave (later to be held against him by a hostile supervisor).:eyes:

[Bunny]

12. Wouldn't your twelve weeks have been reduced to nine anyway,

if you were home with the baby?

[Dora]

14. I don't understand your question. n/t

[Horse with no Name]

26. I don't think that is what the law states

It may be the way your employer enforces it, however, laws are not designed for married couples, they are designed for individuals and the law individually would apply equally to you both. As long as you both individually qualified, being married isn't mentioned in the law.
If it is important to you--I would pursue this, but employers can't re-write federal law, no matter how much they would like to.

[Dora]

27. Actually, I looked it up.

I was feeling pretty pissy about it, so I went to the FMLA website and looked it up. Employers do have the option to combine spousal family leave.

*snip*

(f) SPOUSES EMPLOYED BY THE SAME EMPLOYER.--In any case in which a husband and wife entitled to leave under subsection (a) are employed by the same employer, the aggregate number of workweeks of leave to which both may be entitled may be limited to 12 workweeks during any 12-month period...

http://www.dol.gov/esa/regs/statutes/whd/fmla.htm

[Horse with no Name]

29. That really sucks

and is inherently unfair.
What if you had a dying child--you would have to take turns at the hospital instead of both getting to spend precious time.:(

[Dora]

30. Exactly. It's discriminatory.

Two parents with the same employer are not allowed the same amount of leave they would have if they had different employers. It's punishment of the employees, and protection of the employer's interests.

I thought about pursuing the fairness of it, but I didn't have the energy, and we seemed to be doing okay without it. In fact, I still have two weeks of leave that I haven't used. Not that I didn't want to - but the unspoken pressure to be at work is pretty strong.

[MostlyLurks]

4. Re; sick days v. sick leave

I think the OP was talking about extended sick leave, as opposed to sick days. The sort of leave you have to take if you have a heart attack, stroke, etc. Equivalent to materinity leave, but for illness rather than birth.

Mostly

PS Personally, I think both are moral imperatives in a just society.

[LostinVA]

7. And I think they should both be paid time

Maternity leave should be paid, up to a certain amount (three weeks? A month?) for businesses with over a certain number of people. And yes, I think fathers should get some time off, too.

I can't tell you how many times I've come to work deadly sick, because a case of the flu in February ate up my whole five sick days, with ten whole months of the year left. So, instead, I get to come in and make everyone else sick... if you're truly sick,a nd a doctor says so, you should get to stay home.

[Pretty_in_CodePink]

13. The problem with paying for extended maternity leave

is the inequity it presents to those employees not getting paid leave. I once worked for a company where we got a specific number of "personal days" to be used in any way we wanted sick or not sick. They were considered "wellness" which could mean a day off to go to the beach to rejuvenate. Anyway they weren't 3 weeks worth but the thinking is on the right track. Days for dealing with human needs........

[McCamy Taylor]

6. In Europe they get way more than 12 weeks.

[Southpaw Bookworm]

10. And it's paid leave

One of the central problems with FMLA is that most Americans can't afford to take 3 months from work without working, especially if they've got a new baby or are caring for a sick family member.

[rbnyc]

11. yup!

I had to go back to work after 6 weeks. That's WAY TOO EARLY. It was awful. And especially hard if breast feeding.

I think Americans need more paid sick leave, more paid family leave and more paid vacation days as well as a shorter work week. Perhaps instead of having me here doing the work of 6 people, we could hire 5 other people. Perhaps if health-care were provided to all, companies wouldn't be paying $200-$800 per month per employee for health insurance and could afford to hire 5 additional employees.

[Sabriel]

15. No breastfeeding allowed!

How are the formula companies going to increase their profits if women are allowed to stay home to breastfeed?

Sheesh.

[Southpaw Bookworm]

16. Book recommendation time

I was speaking with one of the authors of this book last week, helping her answer a reference question regarding her newest work (about Nazi doctors, medical ethics, and typhus).

[rbnyc]

18. LOL

I hadn't thought of that. I'm so selfish.

;-)

[Southpaw Bookworm]

17. Amen rbnyc!

But don't you know that things like ensuring everyone can get health care, offering paid sick leave and family leave, are what Commie Pinko Wuss European countries do?!!

Besides, it would be stealing food out of the mouths of people like Jenna Bush, Paris Hilton, and Donald Trump.

:sarcasm:

Seriously though, if a job came open, I would move abroad in a minute if it was to a place where I could raise a child in a culture that supported such activities and where I would have to worry about losing my retirement security by doing so. (Another perk of the same cultures: They don't leave the poor elderly to freeze to death in their homes, or miss medications they can't afford.)

[rbnyc]

20. When I first came back to work after having Garrison,

I had a temp assistant who was getting her Masters in something like Comparative Social Benefits. She would tell me every day how much better off I'd be if I'd been pregnant and had Garrison in this country or that.

I thought the U.S.A. was supposed to be proud of its standard of living?

I guess we're just supposed to be proud, and if we ask "proud of what?' then we're traitors.

:(

[Southpaw Bookworm]

28. Standard of living?

If you take into account disparities between rich and poor, and hell, even averages, the U.S. is at the back of the pack of the "developed world." Teen pregnancy, infant mortality, care of the elderly, people dying of preventable diseases: We suck.

[Ravenseye]

19. I hear you, but

I'm a small business owner. We're all overworked here. We're all underpaid here. Our health insurance costs went up to the point where we got rid of it. I don't even have health insurance now. It was costing us 600 bucks a month per employee.

If we had a woman who worked for us, in a trained or skilled position, leave for say 6 months and we were forced to pay her, as well as hire someone to replace her, we probably couldn't make payroll. Things are that tight right now. Forcing companies to pay for longer maternity leave might be ok if the company is larger than a certain number of employees, but there MUST be exceptions for small businesses.

It sucks, because I personally think that people should have that or more. The first year is very important. If I could aford to I'd provide health insurance for everyone, plus an onsite day care. Maybe one day, but right now we just can't afford it. If we hired a woman who got pregnant, I'd pay her for 6 weeks happily, and help pick up the slack in her absence, but any more than that would probably kill the business.

There must be exceptions for small businesses or so many of us would go under. I hate it, but it's true. A friend of mine was part of a family business, had gone for about 30 years. Other than secretaries, they had basically three main employee's. One went off on extended disability leave, and my friend and his father picked up the slack. Then his father was in a non-work related accident breaking his hip and putting him in bed for a long period. Both the two were still getting paid and my friend tried to keep the ship afloat alone. Guess what happened.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

22. Your situation is a textbook example of why we need

national health care.

I'm self-employed, and my health insurance is just at the edge of affordability. Even with the high premiums, I have never used up my deductible, although I have postponed tests and procedures that I should probably have had simply because I couldn't afford the cash up front.

I'd like to hear from some of the European DUers about who pays for family leave in their countries, the employer or the government.

[rbnyc]

23. That's why these need to be funded mandates.

First, if we all had health insurance, you could eliminate that cost without eliminating health insurance.

Next, for companies that can't afford to meet minimum paid leave standards, the government could offer grant money, tax insentives, all kinds of things to offset costs.

If the larger corporations actually paid their share of taxes, and if everyone were insured so that tax money didn't end up covering people through emergency services which are far more expensive, or if the government had its priorities in order in general, programs to help small businesses afford to pay their employees leave would be affordable.

There shouldn't be exceptions for small business, there should be options and help for small businesses.

[GreenPartyVoter]

21. In Denmark they do it like this

"Pregnant women may take leave four weeks prior to giving birth, and they are obliged to take the first two weeks after giving birth off. A medical certificate stipulating health reasons can ensure a pregnant woman the right to take leave earlier than four weeks before giving birth. After giving birth, the mother is entitled to 14 weeks maternity leave, and the father is entitled to two weeks paternity leave during the first 14 weeks after the birth of his child. When the child is 14 weeks old, the parents are entitled to an additional 32 weeks leave between them."

http://www.workindenmark.dk/Maternity_leave/0/4/0

[Lydia Leftcoast]

24. It looks as if the local government pays for or subsidizes maternity

leave in Denmark, according to the link.

[GreenPartyVoter]

25. Yep. That's what I call real family values in a gov't.