Paid Leave: Good for Employees, Bad for Business?

[flashl]

Source: WSJ

After a contentious debate, New Jersey’s senate yesterday narrowly passed legislation that would give employees the right to take paid leave to care for a newborn or a sick relative. (Read the New York Times article.)

Those taking the leave would be eligible for two-thirds of their salary — up to $524 per week — for six weeks. It would be financed by payroll deductions, costing every worker around $33 a year, the article says.

Currently, the federal Family and Medical Leave Act guarantees most workers time off for the same reasons, but unpaid. New Jersey isn’t the first state to offer a paid version; California offers $917 per week for employees needing time off for family reasons, and Washington state will start providing a much lower weekly sum next year, according to the article.

Opponents to the measure, says the Times, have argued companies will suffer “exorbitant expenses” and that small businesses will be particularly hard hit.

WSJ

Read more: http://blogs.wsj.com/juggle/2008/03/04/paid-leave-good-for-employees-bad-for-business/?mod=googlenews_wsj

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I wonder if those MBAs have calculated the "exorbitant expenses" of a distracted employee at work?

[SteppingRazor]

1. Every company I've worked for offers paid maternity/caregiver leave anyway...

but at least this law will guarantee it for employees of companies that don't.

[JuniorPlankton]

2. These are large companies you are talking about, right?

For most offices (including the ones I have worked at) this stuff doesn't matter "much": at the end of the day roughly the same amount of work gets done. Things are a lot more fungible when you have a lot of people around.

Still, no one can say that a paid leave of 12 weeks is exhorbitant!!!

[ikojo]

12. Where I work maternity leave is paid out of the employee's

sick days and then vacation days. Few people have six weeks of sick days built up. When sick days and vacation days are exhausted then the time is unpaid.

In more civilized parts of the world, maternity leave is paid. PERIOD.

[SteelPenguin]

3. Don't forget small business

I own a small business with less than 10 employees. Paid leave is a killer for us. There needs to be some way for these kinds of laws to not punish both the small business owner as well as the small business worker.

What often happens is that they'll just exempt the small business under a certain size from being required to offer it. This might be fairer to the small business itself, but to the person who works for the small business, it's not. They get screwed for working for a smaller business.

Family and Medical leave should be done how it is in Europe. It should be taxed from everyone, but heaviest on larger corporations without hurting the small corporations, and then everyone gets decent FULL pay while on leave, and not losing their job. Maternity leave in particularly in this country is just ridiculous. It should be at least 6 months PAID time off, with a year job protection.

There are ways to do this to not screw the small business or the workers for small business, I just wish we'd see some of those alternatives show up in this country.

[ikojo]

13. Most laws of this sort apply only to those businesses

subject to ERISA regulations as well as to businesses of a certain size, generally over 25 or 50 employees.

[SteelPenguin]

14. Exactly

Which means the small business doesn't get hurt, but the EMPLOYEES of those businesses get hurt. They need to recieve the same benefits and protections no matter where they work, while at the same time not hurting the small business.

[InkAddict]

4. Pink slip to follow use.

Employers in my state don't need a reason to terminate--just sayin'.

OTOH - Will employers still need to pay unemployment insurance on leavetakers--the amount the worker collects would be similar to unemployment compensation.

The Family Leave Act requires a full year's senority, continuous employment with same employer. "Only" adult children in job transitions fall through cracks.

Edit for add:

One past employer of spouse, a large computer consultant corp, did not even have a policy for "dead" immediate family either. Absolutely no written HR policy on time off for funeral planning/attending. It was unclear if it even could be an excused absence taken under vacation or sick pay. OUTRAGEOUS.

[halobeam]

5. that's right.

Although they say they can't by law, fire you for taking family leave, many wind up losing their jobs anyway within a short time period after returning. The employees are given the job responsibilities of the worker who is out, without increase in pay. They are PISSED.

That's what happened when my husband took family leave when I was in the hosp. for three months. We had two small kids at the time. We got no pay and when he returned the employees and immed. supervisors were so distant to him and p.o'd. They sabotaged a job he did on his own workstation which got him canned. We were bankrupt within a few months. This was New School University in NYC. I'm not afraid to name names, lol. If I wasn't so damn sick, I would've sued the crap out of them. Shortyly after that, 9/11 happened. He changed careers at that point. Now the job he used to do is mostly in India anyway.

What a world.

[susanna]

19. DH and I were talking about that today...

I'll just say that working at an international corporation that it amazes me how many women are laid off soon after maternity leave. His experience, at a different multinational, is the same.

Every company finds ways to get around this stuff. Those that think they'll follow the "proposed" rules are dreaming.

[frebrd]

6. No one ever seems to mention

how discriminatory this is. What about other employees who don't have relatives? Are they offered some alternative form of "leave", or are they just screwed because they aren't part of a family?

:grr:

Edited for spelling.

[rinsd]

8. You're comparing paid leave to take care of sick relative with vacation time?

:mad: indeed.

[frebrd]

9. Just try geting time off to

take care of someone in your household who's important to you, but to whom you're not related.

[LostinVA]

25. In NJ, where this legislation is, that wouldn't be a problem

[LeftyMom]

20. You're honestly upset that you don't need time to tend a colicy baby or cancerous elder?

Damn, with your head that far up your ass, can you lick your own tonsils or what?

[axollot]

21. Hello - did you not read their post?

They would like EQUAL RIGHTS TO TAKE CARE OF THEIR SIGNIFICANT OTHER - but in a world that doesn't recognize gay men and women - he/she is po'ed that if his/her partner became sick - they could not get the same time off to take care of them. Although, an understanding doctor (I've used FMLA several times since becoming disabled in a car accident) will fill the FMLA forms out for you to look after a significant other. I was able to look after an HIV room-mate before he passed.

I hope this country changes it's views on the many gay/bi men and women that are discriminated against every damn day. My son who is only 14 came out to me a year or two ago - although I knew since he was 3 - I want a world where he gets the same rights as a hetero-sexual person.

Cheers
Sandy

[LostinVA]

26. Hold on a minute -- don't you dare school LeftyMom on equal rights

She's one of the best straight allies to the GLBT community on this board.

Secondly, the law is in NJ. In NJ, same-sex couples would be covered under this. It should the same everywhere, but it's a NJ law being discussed at the moment.

[Deja Q]

7. Bill Clinton signed the FMLA in the early/mid 1990s.

And I'm sorry. While businesses are important, so is time to raise the next generation of business makers.

Where am I wrong?

[hollowdweller]

10. You're not. Your Right

Look at the truly liberal benefits many of our european brothers and sisters have. I don't see it ruining their business and people seem less stressed there.

[flashl]

11. You have to wonder. What's the prob?

American workers work more hours than other nations and take less vacation time. :shrug:

[Winterblues]

16. A small business with ten or less employees could be put out of business

Is that what you are suggesting. Only Wal-Mart size business's should be allowed to exist. In a small business every person is crucial to the operation of the business. When one person is out that throws the load onto someone else which almost always correlates to overtime which is a business killer. It is hard enough to pay just normal pay roll let alone have to pay somebody that isn't there plus extra to the one's that have to do the other person's work plus their own..

[Xithras]

17. I own a small business with less than 10 employees. I'm not concerned.

This is already something that's offered to my employees. Generally, expenses like this are very infrequent and can be countered with a little planning. My company has a rainy day fund that accrues money every month. I roll roughly 2% of my monthly payroll costs into an interest bearing account. That account can be tapped to cover everything from unplanned overtime to extended leave pay. These needs are so infrequent that the account tends to accrue a lot of money over time, so that expenses like these don't cost the company anything extra. You might argue that I'm sacrificing a little bit of profit, but the monthly hit is small, and in return I can offer my employees a valuable benefit and ensure that sudden absences won't leave the company holding the bag.

As for filling the labor holes, I find that temp services do well in a pinch. Temps are also cheaper than contract workers, and much cheaper than paying my other employees overtime.

[Tiberius]

18. Awesome!

That is excellent, and I hope your employees appreciate your foresight and planning. Any enterprise should, with the proper planning, be able to cope with an employee departure - because, after all, one of them could win the lottery and disappear.

I have been lucky to generally have jobs at companies that are like yours. A little flexibility goes a long way, and if my current employer asks me to go "above and beyond", stay a few hours extra here and there, or go the extra mile, I always do it without complaining... because there's goodwill built up. I know that I'm lucky in that regard, and I wish everyone saw it the way you do - take care of your people, and they'll generally be better teammates.

It's not rocket science, but I also realize that sadly it's not the norm since the bean counters seem to run most corporations nowadays.

[Thor_MN]

23. The US could use more business owners like you.

:applause: :yourock:

Thank you for your common sense approach. I wish that more companies had the same ideas and would apply them. Most companies I have worked for would raid that fund to squeeze out another half percent of profit, simply because they forecasted an unattainable number.

[Xithras]

24. I think there are a lot more business owners out there like me than most people get.

As a business owner, I'm also a member of several local business groups and frequently talk with other small business owners. In my experience, most small business owners want to do right by their employees simply because we know them so well and become friends. When revenue permits it, I've never met a single small business owner who didn't give his employees some sort of vacation or benefits. I've met the husbands, wives, and children of everyone who works for me. We have company picnics, and last summer we shut the company down for a week and did a company hike from Tuolumne Meadows through the Immigrant Wilderness (those who weren't hikers just got an extra paid week of vacation).

The problems occur, I think, when companies get bigger and the ownership becomes disconnected from the employees. Once that happens, employees simply become resources and numbers to be shuffled. Work becomes impersonal, and company owners are more reluctant to engage in un-needed expenses.

The problem is corporatism and the mega-companies it tends to spawn.

[axollot]

22. As mentioned European countries

are able to provide sick leave/vacation time etc - I moved here from OZ and was shocked at the amount of time off here - I was used to 6 weeks paid holiday.

There are tax exemptions etc to protect small businesses so they aren't crushed when giving that kind of time off. Of course the way things are set up in this country the small business would go broke giving paid leave. Even providing health insurance - which I think is the most backward policy - is damn near impossible to provide when your a small business in this country.

I do not believe health insurance should rest on the shoulders of the employer but paid for with your taxes - so everyone has it.

Having lived under a system very similar to the European one - Its frustrating how things are run here in the US.

Cheers
Sandy

[raccoon]

15. Paid leave? what's that? Haven't had it since early 90s. nt