Strollerderby : paternity leave

Pregnant Cop Denied Light Duty Sues Department

JeanneSager — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 20:22:00 GMT

If you're getting pregnant on your own time, is it up to your employer to provide lighter duties during your pregnancy?

In general, I think most of America (especially us mothers) would say "absolutely." But a case in a Long Island court puts a unique twist on the age-old "is pregnancy really a disability" argument between moms and their employers.

The Suffolk County Parks Police do not provide light duty to any officer who is "injured" while off duty (in other words, limited duty is provided only for officers injured on the job). The department says that extends to female officers who get pregnant - it's either work your regular duties or take leave during the pregnancy.They're claiming that means they treat the sexes exactly the same.

But Tara Germain will be in court this week, claiming her civil rights were violated. As a woman, getting pregnant, she could not apply for any form of disability payments like her male counterparts, leaving her to face her pregnancy with no income coming in unless she decided to remain on full duty with the department.

Germain's lawyers contend that the grueling duties required by her job were not appropriate for a pregnant woman, and although I'm not a police officer, I can see how running down a perp is not easily done with an eight-months-along belly. I worked up until the evening before I was induced - more than a week after my due date - and I can tell you that while being a reporter is different from being a cop, it's another non-desk job which requires a lot of flexibility (try lying on the ground to get a good shot with a camera when you're nine months along) and is hardly cushy. I speak from that experience when I say light duty of some sort is in order for pregnant women.

But I can't totally blame the police department here. I blame the federal government. What do businesses do in a country where they have to keep running with the staff they have, but the government is doing nothing to provide their employees relief? The fix to problems like Germain's doesn't seem to be in suing the employers but in making the family medical leave act stronger - providing PAID leave for mothers, providing a funding source other than disability insurance (which not every employer carries) because pregnancy is not a disability. Employers need to play a role too; jobs should be protected (which they currently are - to a point) and pregnancy should be respected as something women do not to anger their employer but to enhance the world in general.

What do you think Babble readers? In the Germain case, who is in the right?

Image: NJ Blog

Planned Change to UK Maternity Leave Give More Time to Fathers

Shannon LC Cate — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 14:30:00 GMT

U.S. moms looking at 6 weeks of unpaid maternity leave will have to pinch themselves when they read about the U.K.'s proposed changes to their current 9-month, partly paid government guaranteed maternity leave. After complaints that such a long maternity leave shortchanges fathers and potentially makes women of childbearing age less appealing to employers, while the small percentage of pay made it difficult for families with low incomes to take the leave, some changes have been proposed.

The new plan would give mothers 28 weeks of leave at 90% of their pay before the leave. It would retain the current 2-week leave for fathers, but add another 4 months, also at 90% pay. Then another 4 months of parental leave would be available for either parent to take up to the child's fifth birthday.

Many employers offer more than the government-mandated leave options as well.

The plan is expected to cost about 5.3 billion pounds or $7.5 billion. To give you a sense of how that fits into the U.S. budget, the first economic industry bailout last fall was over $700 billion.

The plan, while not pleasing everyone in the UK--from those who don't want a penny of their tax money to go to anyone with kids (huh?) to those who think mothers should get a round 12-months to encourage that amount of full-time breast feeding--and to give employees filling in for someone's leave time to build a better resume--it still sounds like a fantasy world to most US American parents.

My only suggestion is to take gender out of the equation entirely. Children of single parents will get less parent time if leave is assigned by gender. And rather than 90% of someone's paycheck, why not a single pay amount for all families taking leave? Maintaining a tie to someone's current pay is more likely to maintain the current discrepancy between the poor and the middle class, as to who takes advantage of available leave.

What are the conditions of your parental leave if applicable? How would you feel about a plan more in line with European plans (most of which are even more generous than the U.K.'s.)?

image: guardian.co.uk

French Politician at Work 5 Days After C-Section

Miriam Axel-Lute — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 22:31:00 GMT

Rachida Dati, French justice minister, attended a cabinet meeting last week five days after giving birth by c-section. It might not be giving a speech while leaking amniotic fluid, but the move sparked a lot of outrage across France, with a majority of the public saying it was "too soon" and she should have used more of the four months (six weeks before, ten after. swoon.) she had coming to her.

In fact, another minister has proposed a measure in response to explicitly state that expected practice is that a deputy will step in for a politician on maternity leave to increase the number of people in those kind of jobs who actually take their leave.

I'm of mixed minds on the whole reaction. Of course I would dearly love to be in a country where we are arguing over whether someone should take maternity leave that we assume is available to us, especially after the heart-wrenching stories people put in the comments to my last post on maternity leave. And the additional proposal sounds dandy.

But then we get to the whole mommy police thing. Sure, I personally cringe at the thought of anyone popping off to a meeting five days after either giving birth or having major abdominal surgery, let alone both. But is it the end of the world? Is one woman making that choice really going to constitute dangerous pressure on other women to do the same, as French women's groups are suggesting? I guess I can see it might make some employers feel more free to push for short use of leave, but I'm still inclined toward the "Lay off!" side of this one. It's just not going to work the same for everyone.

And, of course, it needs to be said that fathers don't get the same kind of treatment.

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Miriam Axel-Lute — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 20:00:00 GMT

Women who worked up until their due date had four times the rate of c-sections as women who started their maternity leave at 35 weeks, a new study from UC Berkeley has found.

Now, I'm not sure how you can control for self-selection in that kind of study. I imagine that women starting their maternity leave early are both more likely to be placing a priority on their birth experience and better off financially, each of which could affect their outcomes. (I'm assuming they excluded people with scheduled c-sections from the study.)

On the other hand, the results were is four times as likely, not a titchy 10 to 15 percent or something. That, as Dr. Seuss might say, is a whopping number, and it makes me inclined to think there really is something going on here.

It's not really hard to imagine what either: On the one hand, there's the stress of trying to do your job with an open-ended question of whether you might have to leave at a moment's notice, trying to have things ready and yet still work, with bosses and people who are going to step into your shoes watching you anxiously. And other hand, there's the stress of trying to decide when/if you have to leave when contractions start, whether you're up for driving yourself home, when to call the family, and then changing gears in an instant from worker to woman-in-labor. Hardly optimal conditions.

I was lucky: Since I was leaving my job instead of taking maternity leave, it was easier for me to choose to set my last day at 35 weeks. And I have to say, since my daughter came early (37 weeks and 2 days), I'm extremely glad I did. Even though you never exactly feel prepared, having tied up loose ends, cleared out my desk and said my goodbyes and then taking those two weeks free of deadline pressure and office details to sleep/nest/prepare felt wonderful. It may be the closest thing to taking a complete vacation without traveling I've ever done. Can I prove that that helped with my fairly uncomplicated birth? Of course not, but I wouldn't be surprised.

I know how much of a luxury that sounds like to so many people. I sure as hell couldn't blithely skip five (or even two) weeks of work now. In general, it's hard enough to get maternity or paternity leave at all, and the UC Berkeley researchers, while advocating strongly that maternity leave start earlier, note that people who choose to work up to their due date (or up to their labor as the case often is) are usually doing so because they can't afford maternity leave after the birth otherwise, and clearly that trumps.

I guess for now we can add the health advantages they've identified to the list of casualties of our work-over-family culture.

Image from Take Back Your Time.

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Canada Nixes Parents' Request for Dual Leave At Twins Birth

JeanneSager — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 20:02:00 GMT

Some say twice the kids means twice the works. That's what Christian Martin and Paula Critchley are expecting anyway . . . along with twins, due to be delivered in May. To get ready, the couple both put in for the thirty-five weeks of leave afforded Canadian parents after a baby is born. They've been denied.

Well, one has anyway. The Canadian government has said its rules for twins (and ostensibly any other multiple birth) are the same as those for a single birth: thirty-five weeks of paid leave to be split between the two parents. One parent can take the full thirty-five weeks, or each can take leave periods that - when added together - are equal to that two-hundred forty-five-day allotment. According to research by Canadian newspaper the Globe and Mail, the country's Employment Insurance Act spells out that one person cannot apply for additional benefits for multiple births. But, they say, it does not "specifically address multiple claimants making claims for multiple births." In other words - two parents, two paychecks, right?

Martin says he's not looking to make money off of the government because his wife is carrying two babies. But with twice the work at home, he says it's only right that two parents be there to handle the burden. That means twice the work not being done outside the home - or twice the income not coming in the doors. And with twice the number of mouths to feed . . . well, you do the math.

It's a sticky wicket. I have no doubt that multiples ARE harder than most single births. But what about premie single births that require both parents to take extensive amounts of time off to spend in the NICU? What about parents who have other children already at home and find their new baby exhausting? Or the single mom of the multiple children - however she ended up single and pregnant - should she get that extra money to hire someone to help? What about the parents of a single child who suffers from one of hundreds of disorders that require more than the usual round the clock care of the average newborn? What about the mother of a single child who is suffering from postpartum depression so severe she doesn't even want to see her baby, nonetheless care for him? Should they get extra pay for the extra parent?

Either way, I confess I'm jealous. Nothing like the U.S. where you get six weeks of "disability" payments for a vaginal birth that come nowhere near your regular salary and one of which is taken away (for some reason I could not ever get clear with my company's insurer).

Image: Twinsurance

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The Unkindest Cut: Paid Time Off Gets the Ax

Madeline Holler — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 22:04:00 GMT

Just when we started making progress on things like paid maternity leave (we were making progress on that, right?), the economy goes in the shitter. Now, companies are having to cut back on family-friendly benefits like paid time off for having a baby/adopting a baby/raising a baby.

Sucky!

In fact leaves and pay for time off for both parents are at lower levels than they were a decade ago.

From WSJonline:

Only 16% of employers offer full pay for childbirth leave, down from 27% in 1998, based on a nationally representative sample of 1,100 employers by the nonprofit Families and Work Institute. The average maximum length of job-guaranteed leaves for new mothers shrank too, to 15.2 weeks from 16.1 weeks a decade ago; leave for dads fell to 12.6 weeks from 13.1.

It's not that The Man is evil (I guess). Instead, it's the growing cost of disability insurance, which is what covers most maternity leave costs in the U.S. So moms are taking much, much less time off after baby. Parents are also having to take on more debt, or plan very carefully (and hope for no glitches) when deciding whether and when to have a baby.

Photo: WSJonline.com

Spain's Preggo Defense Minister

Madeline Holler — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 19:01:00 GMT

Do you ever get the feeling that the whole world is leaving the U.S. behind? Oh, only everyday? Good, then I'm not alone.

Here's what's got me all in a knot today: Spain's Minister of Defense is seven months pregant -- and, in general, that's pretty OK with the country (if not somewhat surprising).

Carmen Chacon, 37 (God, I know ... what am I doing with my life?), was recently appointed defense minister, adding her to socialist prime minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero's cabinet, which, in his second term, now includes more women than men.

Sure, some in the conservative military are like, "what the hell? A pregnant woman?!!!" Others see her as a symbol not only of the Socialist Party's ideal of gender equality but also of a more humanitarian armed forces. True, Chacon lacks military training. But she's a leader in a country where half the citizens want to pull out of Afghanistan and put the military to work on humanitarian missions.

Here are a few other mind-boggling (for this weary American) changes the prime minister has made:

In his first term, he passed a sweeping law against domestic violence, legalized gay marriage, eased divorce laws, and required political parties to practice gender parity. He also appointed equal numbers of men and women to cabinet positions, and named María Teresa Fernández de la Vega as his deputy prime minister.

Now the big question is whether Chacon will take the full 16 weeks (here's the math: FOUR MONTHS) of maternity paid (!!!!) leave guaranteed her by national law. Most think it's doubtful, but that her situation now highlights the need to up paternity leave, which is now only (only!) 15 days for men.

Photo: Time.com

Family Issues B-I-N-G-O

Madeline Holler — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 23:57:00 GMT

Tonight's Democratic debates (which won't include candidate Jesus, whose platform is yet to be determined) should be some good, old-fashioned fun. Only two candidates and loads of acrimony.

However, will Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton get the chance to talk about issues? They won't, say the organizers over at Moms Rising, the grassroots organization that works to get family matters at the top of every political leader's agenda. They've even made up a Moms Rising Presidental Debate Bingo cards, a kind of check list for you to verify which, if any, of these issues gets addressed.

The group also encourages everyone to cast a vote for the following question to be asked at tonight's debate:

All developed nations except for the USA provide paid time off for mothers who give birth. As a father living in Spain, I even get 2 paid weeks off when I have a new child born. I believe this reflects a larger problem where we have not reconciled life/work balance in a 2-income-household economy. What would you do as president to begin reconciling our 21st economy with our 20th century approach/options to family care?

Go here to vote.