> If the restaurant has to pay, it's a cost like any other and they charge accordingly. Restaurants have way too few employees so it would not "even out". > T

> If the restaurant has to pay, it's a cost like any other and they charge accordingly. Restaurants have way too few employees so it would not "even out". > They can do that because all restaurants are charging a bit more because they all have to pay That is not what will happen. I'm sorry, that would be nice, especially here in Germany food quality comes way after trying to save a penny (not my random Internet opinion, an Italian friend of mine representing Italian food makers arranging sales here in Germany said they sold the good stuff to Spain and France and only then to Germany - not because of bias, but because to German buyers the price matters more than anything else). I've got some money and quite a few diverse contacts in the restaurant and hotel business here. What do you base your argument on? It sounds idealistic but not very realistic. Even if you could avoid those small businesses not hiring anyone that could be a "danger", somehow, which restaurants would be impacted would be extremely uneven, only a few would have to pay. Their margins, at least here, are already atrocious. Germans just stay home and get the cheapest stuff even if it's objectively bad food. I lived abroad, for example in the Bay Area for a few years, and that was paradise for going out (ignoring all the posh restaurants that want to appear to be better, when a lot of "ugly" places have far better food and atmosphere) for food, now I'm in the 3rd food world. > Personally I'd prefer it to be funded via taxation. Yes, indeed. But your idea that trying to force the small restaurant would work even remotely as well - no, it won't. In large companies the laws of large numbers start to work and it averages out, the variations in tiny businesses, who ends up with a parent that has to be paid, who doesn't, are different. Only a few will end up with that cost but much of their competition will not. Those are not exactly life-long employments when it would even out over time because most employees would be impacted at one time or another. Maybe you can Google-translate, it's in German, how it works here in Germany for small businesses: https://www.personal-wissen.de/7414/arbeitsrecht-in-kleinbetrieben-schwangerschaft-und-elternzeit/ https://www.personal-wissen.de/7414/arbeitsrecht-in-kleinbet... -- The business does not have to pay it, it is paid by the state, in summary (also see - again in German - https://www.arbeitsrechte.de/elternzeit-gehalt/ https://www.arbeitsrechte.de/elternzeit-gehalt/). Over a third of workers only work part-time though.