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> Could this become a "don't hire married people in their late 20s and early 30s" incentive? Not for a good company. I've had several employees go on maternity

> Could this become a "don't hire married people in their late 20s and early 30s" incentive? Not for a good company. I've had several employees go on maternity and paternity leave. I've given them respect, and time, and money, in order to make this time of their lives as unstressful as possible. I've done it because it's the right thing, but these people remember being treated well. They've come back to work and done very well. They feel safer knowing that their day job explicitly supports their families. The time someone needs off work to care for a new family is a drop in the bucket compared with a whole career, or even a few good years spent at one company. Optimize for the humans, and for the long term.

lbriner 7y ago
So you had good people that you wanted to get back? Great. A lot of us employ people who are just average and cannot afford to pay them multiple thousands while they are on leave, paying someone else to cover them, and then they could always decide to leave anyway.
- durandal1 7y ago
  If you can't afford an employee going on paternity/maternity leave, you have an unsustainable business.
  - legostormtroopr 7y ago
    Or you have a small business. Not every company is a 10,000 headcount multinational. Over 90% of small business employ fewer than 20 people and small businesses make up 30% of the economy. Realistically, 1 person missing from a small business can mean 10% of their workforce is gone - and due to the size of the company they may not have people to cover the missing staff.
    - growse 7y ago
      You don't need to have 10,000 people working for you to be able to afford to hire cover for when people going on parental leave. 10 people or 10,000 people, if you can't afford your staff going on parental leave / long term sick / vacation, you don't have a sustainable business.
      - legostormtroopr 7y ago
        > if you can't afford your staff going on parental leave / long term sick, you don't have a sustainable business You've never run a startup or small business. At the beginning margins can be razor thin, and unplanned or extended leave can have a huge impact.
        dragonsngoblins 7y ago
        Parental leave shouldn't be unplanned though, there should be several months of notice surely
        growse 7y ago
        There's plenty of small business owners who are perfectly capable of managing the risk of losing staff for whatever reason without it sinking the company. Many business run at a big loss when starting up, never mind razor thin margins. The ones that survive manage their investors, debts, cashflow and staff risk properly. If you run a business on the assumption that you're going to have all your current employees working for you continuously for the foreseeable future, you're going to have a bad time.
    - bashinator 7y ago
      If small businesses in general can't afford an employee going on [mp]aternity leave, that seems like an argument for socializing the cost.
- seszett 7y ago
  The company doesn't pay employees while they are on leave, social security (or some equivalent) does.

lbriner 7y ago

So you had good people that you wanted to get back? Great. A lot of us employ people who are just average and cannot afford to pay them multiple thousands while they are on leave, paying someone else to cover them, and then they could always decide to leave anyway.

durandal1 7y ago
If you can't afford an employee going on paternity/maternity leave, you have an unsustainable business.
- legostormtroopr 7y ago
  Or you have a small business. Not every company is a 10,000 headcount multinational. Over 90% of small business employ fewer than 20 people and small businesses make up 30% of the economy. Realistically, 1 person missing from a small business can mean 10% of their workforce is gone - and due to the size of the company they may not have people to cover the missing staff.
  - growse 7y ago
    You don't need to have 10,000 people working for you to be able to afford to hire cover for when people going on parental leave. 10 people or 10,000 people, if you can't afford your staff going on parental leave / long term sick / vacation, you don't have a sustainable business.
    - legostormtroopr 7y ago
      > if you can't afford your staff going on parental leave / long term sick, you don't have a sustainable business You've never run a startup or small business. At the beginning margins can be razor thin, and unplanned or extended leave can have a huge impact.
      - dragonsngoblins 7y ago
        Parental leave shouldn't be unplanned though, there should be several months of notice surely
      - growse 7y ago
        There's plenty of small business owners who are perfectly capable of managing the risk of losing staff for whatever reason without it sinking the company. Many business run at a big loss when starting up, never mind razor thin margins. The ones that survive manage their investors, debts, cashflow and staff risk properly. If you run a business on the assumption that you're going to have all your current employees working for you continuously for the foreseeable future, you're going to have a bad time.
  - bashinator 7y ago
    If small businesses in general can't afford an employee going on [mp]aternity leave, that seems like an argument for socializing the cost.
seszett 7y ago
The company doesn't pay employees while they are on leave, social security (or some equivalent) does.