5 ms·

This is so extremely weird for me. I'm currently on parental leave in Canada, for the next 17 weeks, paid. You get 50 weeks of leave here to split between mom &

by soperj 11y ago

This is so extremely weird for me. I'm currently on parental leave in Canada, for the next 17 weeks, paid. You get 50 weeks of leave here to split between mom & dad. It seems so ridiculous these articles saying that it'll be hard for the company to deal with the loss of the employee for that long. Hire someone for a 1 year term... done. There's really no excuse when so many other countries have been doing it for so long.

marssaxman 11y ago
That is an extremely weird idea for me. How can that possibly make financial sense for the employer, in the 21st century? I can see it working out a couple generations ago when people used to stick with one or two jobs for their entire career, but seriously, I've had three jobs in my career that barely lasted more than 50 weeks start to finish, and in only one case - a job I had for seven years - does it seem at all likely that the company could have amortized out the cost of a year-long vacation and still come out ahead. Amortized across an entire society, sure, it could work, but unless I'm totally misunderstanding the way Canada's system is set up, it seems like it's really bad luck for whichever employer gets stuck with the hot potato when someone decides to have a kid.
- aianus 11y ago
  The government pays the benefits, not the company. So it is 'amortized across the entire society' in Canada. This Microsoft/Netflix way of doing it themselves is silly.
  - marssaxman 11y ago
    Oh, well that makes sense then.
  - bbcbasic 11y ago
    How does it work in Canada with respect to your salary. Is it a fixed amount for everyone? Or does it match your salary?
    - aianus 11y ago
      55% of your salary up to a maximum of CAD$524.00 a week for 15 weeks.
      - soperj 11y ago
        15 weeks? you mean 50.
      - bbcbasic 11y ago
        Interesting. The way to go as a parent then is to to live somewhere cheap away from the city where 524 a week goes further, and make sure you have a job just before giving birth.
        soperj 11y ago
        You have to have worked for 6 months prior.
        bbcbasic 11y ago
        That's not much of a catch. Think about it. 9 - 6.
someear 11y ago
Not countering your point (since it speaks to the loss of an employee for time), but a primary difference between Canada and the US is who pays. I think that is a point many articles fail to mention when comparing, and they put too much focus on the loss of time. In Canada the parental leave money comes from the government. For Microsoft and in the US, the company is paying 100% of it. If the government pulls the plug on this benefit in Canada, I predict you'd see significantly fewer parental benefits offered by the companies.
beambot 11y ago
What if that 1-year term person has a child shortly after joining and takes their 50 weeks paid leave too. Then you'd need to hire a second 1-year term person... who could have a child and take leave. And another. And another. Stack overflow.
mikekchar 11y ago
Now, I'm very much in favour of parental leave, especially something that allows paternal leave as wells as maternal leave. I think it has huge societal upside. Having said that, it is naive to think this isn't a fairly large burden on a company -- especially for a software company. First, assume that the company is paying the benefit -- say 50% of salary. That's an expense. Then you have to hire a contractor for a year. The rule of thumb is that a contractor costs double. So you have the same overhead cost (same number of desks), but you are paying 250% of the salary (plus applicable taxes). Then consider the domain knowledge that the worker on leave has. How long will it take for the contractor to get up to speed? So you have a loss of productivity. And the hiring process itself isn't cheap. In the end with all of the costs, you will probably be paying up to 3 times the original salary for the person on leave. I leave this for the end because I know it is a potential sore point with many people given typical gender based roles. Without wanting to get into that discussion, there is always the chance that the person who goes on parental leave (whoever it might be) will decide not to return to their former career. A year of child care is a long time and many people (for many good reasons, IMHO) decide that this should be their new career. So a company, having paid nearly 3 times the employees salary in costs and lost productivity, may end up simply losing that employee anyway. It is hard for the company to deal with -- especially small companies that don't have a lot of excess money/time to afford the expense. Again, I'm not saying it shouldn't be the norm, but closing your eyes to the very real hardships of the company in this case will not help it expand.
- ux-app 11y ago
  > "It is hard for the company to deal with" Shouldn't this be considered the cost of doing business? Here in Australia we have mandatory employer retirement contributions of 9.5%. I'm sure small business would love not having to pay this, but that is the cost of employment.
  - toomuchtodo 11y ago
    That's a hard concept to swallow in America. Bootstraps and all that jazz.
  - 11y ago

by soperj 11y ago

marssaxman 11y ago

That is an extremely weird idea for me. How can that possibly make financial sense for the employer, in the 21st century? I can see it working out a couple generations ago when people used to stick with one or two jobs for their entire career, but seriously, I've had three jobs in my career that barely lasted more than 50 weeks start to finish, and in only one case - a job I had for seven years - does it seem at all likely that the company could have amortized out the cost of a year-long vacation and still come out ahead. Amortized across an entire society, sure, it could work, but unless I'm totally misunderstanding the way Canada's system is set up, it seems like it's really bad luck for whichever employer gets stuck with the hot potato when someone decides to have a kid.

aianus 11y ago
The government pays the benefits, not the company. So it is 'amortized across the entire society' in Canada. This Microsoft/Netflix way of doing it themselves is silly.
- marssaxman 11y ago
  Oh, well that makes sense then.
- bbcbasic 11y ago
  How does it work in Canada with respect to your salary. Is it a fixed amount for everyone? Or does it match your salary?
  - aianus 11y ago
    55% of your salary up to a maximum of CAD$524.00 a week for 15 weeks.
    - soperj 11y ago
      15 weeks? you mean 50.
    - bbcbasic 11y ago
      Interesting. The way to go as a parent then is to to live somewhere cheap away from the city where 524 a week goes further, and make sure you have a job just before giving birth.
      - soperj 11y ago
        You have to have worked for 6 months prior.
        bbcbasic 11y ago
        That's not much of a catch. Think about it. 9 - 6.

someear 11y ago

Not countering your point (since it speaks to the loss of an employee for time), but a primary difference between Canada and the US is who pays. I think that is a point many articles fail to mention when comparing, and they put too much focus on the loss of time. In Canada the parental leave money comes from the government. For Microsoft and in the US, the company is paying 100% of it. If the government pulls the plug on this benefit in Canada, I predict you'd see significantly fewer parental benefits offered by the companies.

beambot 11y ago

What if that 1-year term person has a child shortly after joining and takes their 50 weeks paid leave too. Then you'd need to hire a second 1-year term person... who could have a child and take leave. And another. And another. Stack overflow.

mikekchar 11y ago

Now, I'm very much in favour of parental leave, especially something that allows paternal leave as wells as maternal leave. I think it has huge societal upside. Having said that, it is naive to think this isn't a fairly large burden on a company -- especially for a software company. First, assume that the company is paying the benefit -- say 50% of salary. That's an expense. Then you have to hire a contractor for a year. The rule of thumb is that a contractor costs double. So you have the same overhead cost (same number of desks), but you are paying 250% of the salary (plus applicable taxes). Then consider the domain knowledge that the worker on leave has. How long will it take for the contractor to get up to speed? So you have a loss of productivity. And the hiring process itself isn't cheap. In the end with all of the costs, you will probably be paying up to 3 times the original salary for the person on leave. I leave this for the end because I know it is a potential sore point with many people given typical gender based roles. Without wanting to get into that discussion, there is always the chance that the person who goes on parental leave (whoever it might be) will decide not to return to their former career. A year of child care is a long time and many people (for many good reasons, IMHO) decide that this should be their new career. So a company, having paid nearly 3 times the employees salary in costs and lost productivity, may end up simply losing that employee anyway. It is hard for the company to deal with -- especially small companies that don't have a lot of excess money/time to afford the expense. Again, I'm not saying it shouldn't be the norm, but closing your eyes to the very real hardships of the company in this case will not help it expand.

ux-app 11y ago
> "It is hard for the company to deal with" Shouldn't this be considered the cost of doing business? Here in Australia we have mandatory employer retirement contributions of 9.5%. I'm sure small business would love not having to pay this, but that is the cost of employment.
- toomuchtodo 11y ago
  That's a hard concept to swallow in America. Bootstraps and all that jazz.
- 11y ago