With a growing sense that the US is being left behind by a lack of family-friendly policies, and as more evidence shows that there are advantages to families when such programs are in place, there’s some movement at the federal and local levels, but states are driving change
Ale Tierra-Williams, a San Antonio-based cook, says the issue is not only a professional concern but also a matter of public health. “The thing is that I work in the service industry so I cannot be at work if I’m sick,” she says. “So that will be, for me, it’s losing hours, losing money and possibly getting fired. It’s that serious.”
The U.S. can’t afford outdated policies that reduce the growth of the economy; working mothers can no longer accept a situation that creates stress and leads to lost income.
We are one of the few countries in the world where maternal mortality rates are rising, rather than falling, and black mothers die at three times the rate of white mothers. We are the only high-income country without any provision for paid family and medical leave.
This spring, as workers’ rights advocates began their push for mandatory paid sick leave for every worker employed in Dallas, one of the biggest questions that bubbled to the surface is just how many people in the city need paid sick leave.
“We want to be the voice for babies that aren’t able to speak for themselves,” [Jessica] Tolbert said. Like many of the parents at the rally, Tolbert mentioned paid family leave, health care, and affordable childcare as some of the major reasons they had come to lobby members of Congress.
As Americans, we like to think every opportunity should be available to everyone, no matter where you live or who you are. Unfortunately, that’s not true when it comes to the supports our country provides for babies.
While there will be some cost to employers, research shows that the benefits of paid sick leave laws far outweigh the costs. Benefits include reduced employee turnover (and the subsequent reduced cost of hiring and training new employees), higher productivity and morale, and better public health.
[National Alliance for Caregiving CEO Grace] Whiting outlined some public sector solutions, which include providing benefits to caregivers, expanding services to caregivers and allowing for paid family leave. Not only can the process of caregiving be an emotional burden, it also places a great financial strain on many.
“No one should be forced to choose between earning a living, or safety for oneself and children,” wrote [New York City] First Lady Chirlane McCray, a co-chair of the Commission on Gender Equality, in an emailed statement to Refinery29.
Statement of Debra L. Ness, President, National Partnership for Women & Families
A survey by the National Partnership for Women and Families found that nearly one quarter of U.S. adults have been fired or threatened with job loss for taking time off to recover from an illness or caring for a dependent.
After delivery, parents are torn between providing the best care for their child versus earning money to keep a roof over their head and food on the table. Mothers push through postpartum pain and ignore doctors’ recommendations by returning to work too early.
Several organizations and two council members are pushing for paid sick leave to be mandatory for workers in Dallas.
“It’s mostly healthy moms and healthy babies, so these costs are pretty shocking from that point of view,” Carol Sakala, director of Childbirth Connection Programs at the National Partnership for Women & Families, told MONEY.
The numbers are astounding: 37 million people get no sick days. And that applies to 6 in 10 lower-income workers. Only 14% of people have access to paid family leave at work. A third of working mothers don’t have access to any paid leave.
[D]elaying Social Security translates into a real financial loss; the authors [of the Urban Institute analysis] reckon that parents who took a single 12-week leave would lose about 3% of their future retirement benefits, and those who took four leaves would lose 10%.
Registering “strong objections,” the National Partnership for Women & Families warned in comments filed today that the Trump administration’s proposed rule on short-term, limited-duration insurance plans will result in millions of women and...
Few in the audience had blue-collar jobs like [Carolyn] Davis’s; she spends her workdays tracking inventory and stocking shelves. Still, as a shareholder, Davis, who goes by Cat, had a right to speak. She’s also a mother of two, and she had come to deliver a petition—signed by more than 100,000 associates—to urge Walmart to give workers like her the same family-leave benefits that executives get.
Workers aren’t scheduled for as many hours as they’d like, sick-day policies are unforgiving, and shifts are inconsistent, meaning paychecks vary considerably from week to week. All these factors lead to high turnover rates in jobs that are typically part-time and low-paying to begin with.
