4 ms·

There are many positive things about living in the US, but having a child here absolutely blew my mind. Not only is the act itself incredibly expensive (I'll sp

by untog 7y ago

There are many positive things about living in the US, but having a child here absolutely blew my mind. Not only is the act itself incredibly expensive (I'll spare everyone yet another health insurance rant...) but leave for both mother and father are woeful. Did you know there isn't even a federal requirement for maternity leave at all? In some states women get to claim disability for six weeks and that's it. Anyway, to get a little more on-topic: lots of us tech company employees are incredibly blessed when it comes to parental leave. Take. Every. Day. Not only is it practically a physical requirement (I don't care what you think, if you're heading into the office with a two week old baby at home you're not getting enough sleep to do anything productive) it's also an amazing opportunity to bond with your child. Your coworkers might moan or judge you. If they do, they're assholes. And who cares, you will move jobs in a few years anyway. You don't owe your employer anything. Take the leave.

mysterydip 7y ago
This goes doubly true for multiple births (having had a single then twins, it was more than twice the difficulty). You have enough to worry about with just keeping them alive and all the questions on early development. Work can wait.
whiddershins 7y ago
I feel like you are completely ignoring the FMLA. It mandates 12 weeks unpaid leave within the first year of childbirth.
- untog 7y ago
  Unpaid is a huge qualifier. A lot of people simply cannot get by taking three months off with no pay.
  - mendelmaleh 7y ago
    Probably a lot of small businesses can't get by with paying people who aren't working.
    - zamfi 7y ago
      That would be why in many other systems a public entity picks up the tab, not the employer.
      - AdrianB1 7y ago
        There is no public entity, it is the taxpayer. Just say it so, "that's why you pick the tab".
        mlevental 7y ago
        and so what? the tax payer pays for a lot of things that it makes sense for the tax payer to pay for. at least with health insurance you can bemoan paying for other people's irresponsible lifestyle but with maternity leave almost everyone withdraws from the trust in the same way?
        AdrianB1 7y ago
        Presenting facts: reality in my country tells that universal maternity and paternity leaves are the most abused systems and tax payers are not happy with this. The low income people have a huge number of children (2 sisters with 33 kids in total were most discussed) just to live on taxpayers money, they never worked between childbirths. Also there are so many people pay huge taxes and never qualify to get anything in return (have no kids). Many people here believe that caring for your kids should be the parent's responsibility, not anybody else's.
        mlevental 7y ago
        >Presenting facts: reality in my country tells that universal maternity and paternity leaves are the most abused systems and tax payers are not happy with this. googling "canada paternity maternity leave abuse" gets no matching hits. show me >The low income people have a huge number of children (2 sisters with 33 kids in total were most discussed) just to live on taxpayers money, they never worked between childbirths. average number of children in canada in 2011 was less than 2. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-630-x/11-630-x2014002-eng.htm https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-630-x/11-630-x2014002... how many standard deviations away from that mean is ~16 children? so you're talking about decrying a social policy that overwhelmingly improves outcomes for women, children, and communities https://www.milbank.org/wp-content/uploads/mq/volume-96/september-2018/NANDI_et_al-2018-The_Milbank_Quarterly.pdf https://www.milbank.org/wp-content/uploads/mq/volume-96/sept... because some poor person somewhere once had a bunch of kids. these are distorted facts (or what we in /my/ country, like to call fake news).
  - usaar333 7y ago
    To be fair, in America, if you haven't been able to save enough money before having a kid to last three months unpaid, I'm not sure how you plan to survive after having a kid.
- Broken_Hippo 7y ago
  Well, yes and no. Not if you work for a small company - I can't remember the numbers, but x employees within x range. I'm pretty sure some larger companies wind up not having to follow FMLA. And as others have said, it is unpaid. If you are poor, unpaid leave is basically no leave, even if it is protected. You can be too poor to take leave. I'll also mention that FMLA is only for full time employees, so part time workers can still get fired for attendance, though they are likely to get some unemployment.
VladimirIvanov 7y ago
I worked for a company in America in the past that had a woman that came to work the next day after giving birth as their was no parental leave whatsoever. We were at a lunch after a charity fundraising event and the CEO laughed about it and said that "she was born to breed."
CalRobert 7y ago
Someone from the states came on to our local tech slack to try to recruit and bragged about their 16 weeks' maternity. Didn't have a great response to "you realize the legal minimum is 6 months, right?"

by untog 7y ago

mysterydip 7y ago

This goes doubly true for multiple births (having had a single then twins, it was more than twice the difficulty). You have enough to worry about with just keeping them alive and all the questions on early development. Work can wait.

whiddershins 7y ago

I feel like you are completely ignoring the FMLA. It mandates 12 weeks unpaid leave within the first year of childbirth.

untog 7y ago
Unpaid is a huge qualifier. A lot of people simply cannot get by taking three months off with no pay.
- mendelmaleh 7y ago
  Probably a lot of small businesses can't get by with paying people who aren't working.
  - zamfi 7y ago
    That would be why in many other systems a public entity picks up the tab, not the employer.
    - AdrianB1 7y ago
      There is no public entity, it is the taxpayer. Just say it so, "that's why you pick the tab".
      - mlevental 7y ago
        and so what? the tax payer pays for a lot of things that it makes sense for the tax payer to pay for. at least with health insurance you can bemoan paying for other people's irresponsible lifestyle but with maternity leave almost everyone withdraws from the trust in the same way?
        AdrianB1 7y ago
        Presenting facts: reality in my country tells that universal maternity and paternity leaves are the most abused systems and tax payers are not happy with this. The low income people have a huge number of children (2 sisters with 33 kids in total were most discussed) just to live on taxpayers money, they never worked between childbirths. Also there are so many people pay huge taxes and never qualify to get anything in return (have no kids). Many people here believe that caring for your kids should be the parent's responsibility, not anybody else's.
        mlevental 7y ago
        >Presenting facts: reality in my country tells that universal maternity and paternity leaves are the most abused systems and tax payers are not happy with this. googling "canada paternity maternity leave abuse" gets no matching hits. show me >The low income people have a huge number of children (2 sisters with 33 kids in total were most discussed) just to live on taxpayers money, they never worked between childbirths. average number of children in canada in 2011 was less than 2. https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-630-x/11-630-x2014002-eng.htm https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-630-x/11-630-x2014002... how many standard deviations away from that mean is ~16 children? so you're talking about decrying a social policy that overwhelmingly improves outcomes for women, children, and communities https://www.milbank.org/wp-content/uploads/mq/volume-96/september-2018/NANDI_et_al-2018-The_Milbank_Quarterly.pdf https://www.milbank.org/wp-content/uploads/mq/volume-96/sept... because some poor person somewhere once had a bunch of kids. these are distorted facts (or what we in /my/ country, like to call fake news).
- usaar333 7y ago
  To be fair, in America, if you haven't been able to save enough money before having a kid to last three months unpaid, I'm not sure how you plan to survive after having a kid.
Broken_Hippo 7y ago
Well, yes and no. Not if you work for a small company - I can't remember the numbers, but x employees within x range. I'm pretty sure some larger companies wind up not having to follow FMLA. And as others have said, it is unpaid. If you are poor, unpaid leave is basically no leave, even if it is protected. You can be too poor to take leave. I'll also mention that FMLA is only for full time employees, so part time workers can still get fired for attendance, though they are likely to get some unemployment.

VladimirIvanov 7y ago

I worked for a company in America in the past that had a woman that came to work the next day after giving birth as their was no parental leave whatsoever. We were at a lunch after a charity fundraising event and the CEO laughed about it and said that "she was born to breed."

CalRobert 7y ago

Someone from the states came on to our local tech slack to try to recruit and bragged about their 16 weeks' maternity. Didn't have a great response to "you realize the legal minimum is 6 months, right?"