Should pregnant women be assured paid maternity leave and their jobs?
- Thread starter aelf
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Yes, I do think paid maternity leave is a good thing. The scandinavian countries seem to have it right in this regard.
can't it be both?
not in the first few months after birth, there the mother still has more responsibilities than the father. But you bring up a good point: I actually do think that paid paternity leave is a good thing as well
in most systems for paid maternity leave I've seen the employer can get the wage paid to the mother on leave refunded. so it's not the company paying for it but all taxpayers, effectively eliminating the financial risk of hiring a woman.
In Switzerland whether or not you're eligible (and for how long) depends on how long you've worked for that company before getting pregnant. And yes, quitting right after maternity leave is acceptable and common.
Paid parental leave should be available, at minimum wage levels or some other fixed and modest level, equally to either parent, for a period of about 20 weeks after birth.
I don't buy the argument that it's regressive and therefore shouldn't be available - you have to consider over-all benefits and how equity is achieved through the social welfare system as a whole. Is higher female participation a benefit to productivity and over-all standards of living? It surely must be since higher female participation a higher proportion of the population in paid work. Does the absence of support for new mothers in the work force lead to lower female participation? Almost certainly. Does the lack of support similarly lead to other women choosing to delay or forgo children altogether? Yep again.
I'd argue that in a system absent adequate support for keeping new mothers in work, it's a case of "family, children, work: pick two", and that it's unfair to force that decision on women.
If we want women to work, and to advance in their jobs, then it's gotta be the government facilitating that, within reasonable limits. A few months of minimum wage level payments is not unreasonable, and it's less unreasonable than forcing employers to pay (since forcing employers to pay has all sorts of other bad incentives).
Regressiveness? Sure, yeah, paid maternity leave is of greater benefit to working mums than single mums. But if you do it at minimum wage instead of pegging to salary you eliminate a lot of the regressiveness. And you can do other things to mitigate the regressiveness, such as child payments for non-working mothers.
Beyond that, though, some other individual welfare measures are regressive, such as student payments, when viewed in isolation. Hell given that most health care is obtained by people who need it less (ie, richer relatively healthy, but health-conscious people) and people with higher incomes stay in school longer, even education and health can be viewed as unfairly regressive.
But there's the thing - tax and welfare aren't designed so that you get out what you put in. They're a complicated system of inputs and withdrawals based on different life circumstances, and no individual measure should be viweed in isolation. Individually regressive measures are fine as long as there's overall benefits and as long as the system as a whole is progressive.
I don't buy the argument that it's regressive and therefore shouldn't be available - you have to consider over-all benefits and how equity is achieved through the social welfare system as a whole. Is higher female participation a benefit to productivity and over-all standards of living? It surely must be since higher female participation a higher proportion of the population in paid work. Does the absence of support for new mothers in the work force lead to lower female participation? Almost certainly. Does the lack of support similarly lead to other women choosing to delay or forgo children altogether? Yep again.
I'd argue that in a system absent adequate support for keeping new mothers in work, it's a case of "family, children, work: pick two", and that it's unfair to force that decision on women.
If we want women to work, and to advance in their jobs, then it's gotta be the government facilitating that, within reasonable limits. A few months of minimum wage level payments is not unreasonable, and it's less unreasonable than forcing employers to pay (since forcing employers to pay has all sorts of other bad incentives).
Regressiveness? Sure, yeah, paid maternity leave is of greater benefit to working mums than single mums. But if you do it at minimum wage instead of pegging to salary you eliminate a lot of the regressiveness. And you can do other things to mitigate the regressiveness, such as child payments for non-working mothers.
Beyond that, though, some other individual welfare measures are regressive, such as student payments, when viewed in isolation. Hell given that most health care is obtained by people who need it less (ie, richer relatively healthy, but health-conscious people) and people with higher incomes stay in school longer, even education and health can be viewed as unfairly regressive.
But there's the thing - tax and welfare aren't designed so that you get out what you put in. They're a complicated system of inputs and withdrawals based on different life circumstances, and no individual measure should be viweed in isolation. Individually regressive measures are fine as long as there's overall benefits and as long as the system as a whole is progressive.
Leifmk
Deity
Social democrat, actually. But more to the point: Says the father of two. Basically if you've never been around small children you don't know what goes into taking care of them and your pontification on the matter is pointless.
It doesn't matter. Why should a company be on the hoof for an unacceptable period of time after the birth? It wasn't the company that got pregnant and decided to have a kid. I see nothing wrong with capping paid maternal leave at 3 months, or even 2 months, but okay 3 if that makes you happy. If that's just too much of a burden, then either the father or mother can just quit and stay home full time.
Leifmk
Deity
No, this is not what you said. What you said is that there is no reason to stay home any longer than three months after birth. It is this that is absurd and wrong.
Mise
isle of lucy
I think companies should be allowed to sue any man that knocks up a female employee for consequential losses. Surely that is the "libertarian" response - afterall, the company didn't get her pregnant, so why should it lose out on a valuable employee? Start suing men for consequential losses and see how quickly the law gets changed...
aelf
Ashen One
Blah blah. More ideological harangues. Although I do think there should be mandated support for pregnant women, I don't see why you have to assume that the OP is trying to sell a position rather than focusing on arguing your own. As it is, you're doing a pretty poor job of the latter.
If employers are going to lower all wages slightly (distributed amongst everyone, it shouldn't amount to a whole lot, also because I don't see employers as necessarily being able to pass on the whole cost to employees) for this reason, I think that's fine. It would be equivalent to paying slightly higher taxes for a benefit paid for by the state. If you really care about fairness (and not the idiotic libertarian kind) then that's not too large a price.
Anything to say about the relative negotiating powers of employers and female employees? What if the latter lack it?
I think many jobs out there differ significantly from yours. I can see how burning a lot of leave at once makes sense during certain periods in your line of work, but in other jobs there may, firstly, not be so many leave days to burn (certainly not amounting to a few months). Secondly, it may be difficult to take an extended block leave such that pregnant women may be forced to quit their jobs.
Why? You're fine with women being forced to quit their jobs if they choose to get pregnant?
metatron said:
Why? Do you think higher risk of ovarian cancer doesn't affect choice in any significant way?
I think that's a pretty good idea, and it should address the concerns that this would increase costs for businesses and lower everyone's wages. I suppose the trade off is possibly higher taxes, but I think this is a pretty essential benefit.
You are entirely correct. That is why it's the government´s job to provide this "paid leave".
Over here, women who have given birth receive so-called "mother´s salary" from the state for 18 months. It´s the mean of what she received as salary during the year before going on leave; calculations based on social security tax paid on her behalf during that time. There's a minimum (bit above minimum wage; for those who didn't work at all) and maximum (relatively high, about 3 average wages) threshold although.
I like the phrasing above. We're basically now 'forced' by society to be two-income homes for most people. So, it's certainly not 'fair' (imo) to force companies to give paid maternity leave (or to hold positions), but I think it's a compromise that's necessary to allow people to reproduce without additional poverty being caused
dIZZyBlIZZy
Batteries not included
Actually, it's not forced. My cousin quit her job in 02 so she could stay at home with her three kids, and they live very well with her husband making the same income as me. They just chose not to buy frivolous things and stay in a budget. They can on one income vacation every year and the kids are kept happy (they are heavily involved extracurricular activities).
My family is a one-income family, and that works out fine too. But the mortgage was paid off years ago (when it was a two-income family), and property prices have rocketed since. I don't know how it'd be possible for a family to buy and pay off a house on a single income. At least here.
dIZZyBlIZZy
Batteries not included
I can't speak for Aussies, and if I implied that I apologize. Jen lives in Oklahoma City, and the price of living may be lower than Sydney (I'd bet it is). They are still paying their mortgage, but unlike me are not making a 13th payment each year, so I'll finish mine first.
Yes, but apparently they have to pretend right up until the last week of maternity leave that they intend to come back and work at the job that their employer is holding open for them and with everyone else in the office chipping in some to help out, and only then belatedly decide that they are not coming back, and only at that point can the month-long process to hire a replacement begin.
Yeah, that's the difference. Australian real estate is, in a word, mental. According to the latest Demographia report, housing affordability in Oklahoma City is much higher. The median house price (US$144,100) is 3.2 times the median household income (US$45,400).
In Sydney the median house price (A$634,300) is 9.6 times the median household income (A$66,200), second highest ratio in the world after Hong Kong.
(For comparison, the Australian and American dollars have been pretty close to parity recently, between about US$0.95 and US$1.10 to the Australian Dollar)
FWIW, where I live the median house price is almost as high ($A$558,100), but our median house hold income is about A$100,000 so the affordability ratio is lower.
aelf
Ashen One
Yes, but apparently they have to pretend right up until the last week of maternity leave that they intend to come back and work at the job that their employer is holding open for them and with everyone else in the office chipping in some to help out, and only then belatedly decide that they are not coming back, and only at that point can the month-long process to hire a replacement begin.
I'd be fine with some measures to prevent that kind of thing. I think there should be a good understanding of what can be expected on both sides.
dIZZyBlIZZy
Batteries not included
@Arwon
Thanks for the numbers.
But this does not imply it is easy for them just because it is easier. Like I said, they live on a very strict budget (even moreso than me). While in some areas it may not be possible on one income, it also doesn't help that too many people are incapable of budgeting in a world were people think they are entitled to 60" plasmas and androids.
Thanks for the numbers.
But this does not imply it is easy for them just because it is easier. Like I said, they live on a very strict budget (even moreso than me). While in some areas it may not be possible on one income, it also doesn't help that too many people are incapable of budgeting in a world were people think they are entitled to 60" plasmas and androids.
Interesting report (though I would like to see it for other countries as well).
Seems to me that the US is much more affordable than Australia, Canada and the UK. While I can see an obvious reason for the overcrowded UK to be more expensive, why does that happen to empty Canada and Australia? Housing regulations, perhaps? (California and NY seem to be the worst in the US, and I know for a fact at least NY has some messed up housing regulations).
