Report Decries Lack of Paid Parental Leave in US

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2011/02/23/us/AP-US-Paid-Parental-Leave.html?hp=&adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1298437952-xW48XsBA8EWjD0bsDp9p1Q&pagewanted=all

Americans often take pride in ways their nation differs from others. But one distinction — lack of a nationwide policy of paid maternity leave — is cited in a new report as an embarrassment that could be redressed at low cost and without harm to employers

"Despite its enthusiasm about 'family values,' the U.S. is decades behind other countries in ensuring the well-being of working families," said Janet Walsh, deputy director of the women's rights division of Human Rights Watch. "Being an outlier is nothing to be proud of in a case like this."

Human Rights Watch, based in New York, focuses most of its investigations on abuses abroad. But on Wednesday, with release of a report by Walsh on work/family policies in the U.S., it takes the relatively unusual step of critiquing a phenomenon affecting tens of millions of Americans.

The report, "Failing its Families," says at least 178 countries have national laws guaranteeing paid leave for new mothers, while the handful of exceptions include the U.S., Swaziland and Papua New Guinea. More than 50 nations, including most Western countries, also guarantee paid leave for new fathers.

http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/2011/02/23/failing-its-families-0

I have lots of right-wing acquaintances, classmates, etc., and nearly ALL of them support the idea of paid maternity leave. Their reasoning is mostly morality-based and sexist, of course--to them, it's just another tool to use in the battle to convince women to stay home with their babies. However, their elected talking-heads in DC flat-out refuse to support it. Oh, they say the right words. They give lip service to the right-wing masturbatory fantasy of a world run solely by men while the women stay home where they "belong". But when it comes to actually DOING things that allow women to make the choice to stay home--even temporarily--they balk.

And why? Because it's a "burden" on business, of course. And even though all right-wing politicians claim to be servants of the people and "traditional values", the truth is that they only serve the interests of "the people" when those interests are petty, mean, and of no real consequence to the wealthy. When the interests of the wealthy and the "moral" clash, the wealthy win every time.

As for me, I'm fully supportive of voluntary paid leave for people who have kids--but I'd rather see it gender-neutral (give a set amount of leave time and let the parents of the baby decide how to allocate it). Every family's situation is unique, and there are times when it's a better option for Dad to stay home than Mom. Families should have the right to make those decisions for themselves, based on their own superior knowledge of what would work best for them. Maybe they want Mom to stay home the whole time. Maybe they want to split the time equally. Maybe Dad staying home the whole time is what works best. Who knows better than the people who are actually IN that situation?

:shrug:

From the article: "More than 50 nations, including most Western countries, also guarantee paid leave for new fathers."

It'd be even nicer if families didn't have to choose which parent took leave.

I want a system where the parents can choose for themselves whether to have Mom, Dad, or BOTH stay home. It doesn't always HAVE to be both--and indeed, sometimes there are situations in which a particular family might not WANT both parents to stay home. That's why they should have the power to decide between themselves how best to work it out.

:shrug:

when I had my son a year and a half ago. I don't get any paid vacation time so I couldn't afford to be on maternity leave longer than that.

I can't tell you how many sick kids spend an entire day in our health office because their parents can't afford to leave work to come get them. It's so sad.

http://www.huntingtonnews.net/columns/100807-kinchen-columnsbookreview.html

"Geoghegan tells us that the average number of paid vacation days in the U.S. is 13, compared with Germany’s 35. New mothers in the U.S. get three months of unpaid job-protected leave and only if they work for a company of 50 or more employees, while Germany mandates four months’ paid leave and will pay parents 67% of their salary to stay home for up to 14 months to care for a newborn. U.S. life expectancy is 50th in the world, compared to Germany’s 32nd."

In Germany, Geoghegan finds the true "other"—an economic model with more bottom-up worker control than that of any other country in the world — and argues that, while we have to take Germany’s problems seriously, we also have to look seriously at how much it has achieved. Social democracy may let us live nicer lives; it also may be the only way to be globally competitive. His anecdotal book helps us understand why the European model, contrary to popular neoliberal wisdom, may thrive well into the twenty-first century without compromising its citizens' ease of living — and be the best example for the United States to follow.

OK, some facts about Germany, the largest economy by far in the European Union and the fourth largest in the world, measured by gross domestic product per person (GDP), with a thriving export-oriented manufacturing sector -- like the kind we used to have when we manufactured goods that were desired around the world.

Germany, with 83 million people and few natural resources, is the world's second largest exporter, with $1.170 trillion exported in 2009. You know who is the largest exporter and it ain't us. Hint: It begins with C and ends in A. and has more than 1.3 billion residents. Germany's service sector contributes about 70 percent of the total GDP of Germany, with industry another 29.1 percent and agriculture less than 1 percent. Most of the country's exports are in engineering, automobiles, machinery, metals and chemicals. Germany is the world's leading producer of wind turbines and solar power technology.