Making the Case for Paid Family Leave [ChildTrends.org]

As I move full steam ahead into my 30s, friends all around are beginning to start families and have babies.  Watching them go through pregnancies is exciting, observing them as they bond with babies is special, and experiencing them letting me bond with their babies is something I have no words for sometimes.  This past weekend I visited a friend in the hospital and snuggled her 28-hour-old little one.  It was mesmerizing.

Yet one thing that is not fun to watch them do is try to figure out how to physically recover, survive on little sleep, and manage with little or no income while they prepare to go back to work too quickly. Family leave laws in the United States lag behind those in other countries . Ninety eight countries around the world offer at least 14 weeks of paid family leave , while the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), a federal law, guarantees 12 weeks of job-protected leave for families in need of a medical leave from work (e.g., for their own health, the birth of a baby, adoption of a child, or to care for an ailing spouse, parent or child).  However, this provision is only required for employers with 50 or more employees and does not guarantee income during the 12 weeks.  The United States and Papua New Guinea are the only two countries in the world to not provide any income coverage during maternity leave, thereby not meeting the International Labor Organization’s (ILO) recommendation of providing at least two thirds of a woman’s income while she is on maternity leave.  In addition, only 59 percent of workers report meeting all of the eligibility criteria for FMLA, leaving over 40 percent of U.S. employees uncovered.  This results in only one half of American women taking five or more weeks of paid maternity leave after the birth of a child, based on data published by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services in 2011.