Women Without Kids Want Maternity Leave Too

People who want maternity leaves without having the baby are seeing the time away from work as “time off”, the mother opting out of society to “follow their bliss”. Opting out? Far from opting out of society, the mother is continuing it. Without all those women “selfishly” “following their bliss”, the human race would die out in one generation. Parenting has its undeniable joys, but it’s also a whole lot of work for, all in all, uncertain personal gain. But as far as the betterment of society? There is nothing more critical than that next generation.

Your statement:

“In the U.K., mothers are entitled to a year of maternity leave, 39 of those weeks paid. (Raise your hand if you’re jealous — a whole year!)”

is misleading. The ‘pay’ is not regular pay, it is 6 weeks of 90% pay and then 33 weeks of ’statutory maternity pay’ which maxes out at $200 a week before tax. The remainder of the year is unpaid.

See what happens when you DO give something for nothing? People get jealous and want theirs. Sorry, but it’s not all that hard having a kid and staying with them. It *is* kind of like a vacation. And, I can see why working people would want the same benefits, actually. I guess the only thing I’d have to say to them was that they are helping contribute to the good of society as a whole by supporting these moms with tax dollars, and that in the end, they will all live in a better world if moms can better take care of their kids. However, I still can see how some folks who are opting not to have children could see this as unfair. What is wrong with just planning ahead and saving up so you can take a few years off when your kid is born? You choose to have a kid, so you choose how to manage your affairs without being on the dole.

SO NOT a vacation. Not even in the vicinity of “vacation,” at least not how we define the word in my house (i.e., rest, relaxation, rejuvenation). Also, curious as to how these working women are “supporting these moms with their tax dollars,” I am not sure what that means, considering that most maternity leave in this country is unpaid, and if it is paid in part, it is paid through the employer.

Yikes…maternity leave beyond the six weeks to recover from birth and/or provide care for an especially fragile child (either newborn or newly adopted, they are especially fragile) should be determined by how much the employer values the employee’s contribution. Paid vacation is the same way, in my book and in my business. If you make 40 weeks of working at your salary a real bargain for me, you just might get the 12weeks paid time off you want, so that I can count on that same 40week bargain again next year, whether you want to climb a mountain or have another baby in that time is none of my business.

Oh, and anyone who goes on about how much leave the government mandates in the UK and most of Europe should look up their unemployment numbers (which are abysmal) , too, and look and see how many major innovations have come out of there in the last forty years. We have something like 9% unemployment now in the US, and we are shouting “Crisis! Somebody stimulate something!” but these “enlightened and progressive” countries have had plenty more people doing nothing or nearly nothing and getting the dole for years.

If you sleep with the baby and breastfeed, you get sleep. You can shower when the baby is napping or when your husband is home. You certainly CAN leave the house. All this, of course, is unless you have a sick or special needs kid, in which case, my heart goes out. BUT, having a regular baby is not a medical condition that is going to handicap you for more than a few weeks. All that said, I think people should plan on taking time off to nurture the kid…like 3-5 years. Plan, save, and don’t expect a hand out.

Good golly, did I read that right? Thirty-nine weeks of pay, and you only have to be working 26 weeks to qualify? I’m not jealous of my working contemporaries in the UK, I’m feeling sympathy pangs for my business-owning contemporaries in the UK. Come to think of it, what is the status of the UK’s glass cieling? It seems like the best way to keep women from rising in the ranks of business would be to pay them to stay home, which would lower their real contributions and give employers an excuse to avoid hiring women and placing them in responsible positions.

“real contibutions”

Oh dear, that is problematic.

Americans who don’t have kids will likely have their own chance at unpaid FMLA someday when their parents or spouse get seriously ill, perhaps on the way to death. (They’ll also have plenty of opportunities to “waste” their employers time by making worried phone calls, leaving early, taking unexpected time off, etc.) The big difference that it’s an unhappy occasion, most likely with an unhappy outcome. Nobody snaps photos or throws you a party. But it is still good to have a chance to take care of someone you love. Birth, sickness, infirmity and death are real equalizers.

I think the jobs that are truly so fast-paced and in-demand are also not as common as the mid-level boring jobs where nothing much changes in a few years…I work communications for an industry and its just the same issues that cycle over and over and over…I also am in the IT/design side of it and while I am keeping in the game by working from home, I don’t see alot of crazy wild changes I am not keeping up with or couldn’t get up to speed on pretty quickly when I do want to go back full time. No, I don’t expect to make what I’d make if I kept working these years, but after getting back in the game, I’ll recoup in another few years. It’s better than having some minimum wage worker form my child in her most tender years and me lose the chance of getting attachment right. I think the whole, “you won’t be up to speed and you’ll lose your place in the rat race” line is true for some but not nearly all jobs. Get over yourselves!

Anyway…I see the point of the childless folk.

I’m in Canada - we do have federal EI for 37 weeks, but it isn’t the same as a salary…it maxes out at $400/week (depending on what you usually earn - if you earn very little, the amount is less). So $1600/month - and then the gov’t considers it taxable income and taxes it. Which in Cda means you end up with quite a bit less. My biggest issue with mat leave is discrimination against adoptive parents. My employer (a large university) gives 16 weeks of paid maternity leave, then 37 weeks of unpaid leave (which is where the EI from the gov’t comes in). For adoptive parents, there is no maternity benefit, it is an unpaid leave (and they cut off our benefits) for 37 weeks (and again you get the EI). So whether adopting a newborn, or a sibling set of older, special needs children from foster care, you don’t get the same benefit. And you definitely need the time to work on attachment and other issues.

I’d like veterans benefits, but I’ve not so much as enlisted, so I guess I’ll either have to join up or shut up.

That’s pretty much what I did…what’s the problem?
While our pals were out drinking $10 martinis at happy hour, my husband and I were drinking beer and eating bean burritos watching TV and saving 3k a month in preparation for our ONE child. Why should society pay the price for everyone’s wants? Having children is not a right…it’s a privelege.

GP: So, let’s say a woman has three children over her childbearing years, spacing them three years apart, and staying home with them until they are all in school full-time. You are suggesting that this woman save fifteen years worth of income BEFORE ever beginning her family. Let’s pretend for a minute that she has her first child at the median age in the US for a first child - 24.9. We’ll round that to 25 to make the math easy. I guess she better enter the workforce by the time she’s ten, and start saving EVERY PENNY until the moment she delivers that first baby. I’m sorry, but that is just not practical for most people, and suggesting that one should simply not have children if they can’t do that is beyond smug and self-righteous. I am certain you will reply “Then just have ONE kid, I did, and it rocks,” but come on! A family actually needs to have two to keep it nuclear, to keep population from stagnating or declining, and if everyone had one, this country wouldn’t be able to sustain its population for very long. Not to mention that neither you nor anyone else should be able to dictate the size of someone’s family - if they can provide for, love, nurture and protect two or three children - and desire to have them - more power to them! And should a woman immediately get sterilized if she can’t do it “your way?” Because, let’s face it, we all know a couple or two who have had that “Whoops!” second or third pregnancy. Is abortion the answer then? By the way, my husband and I don’t drink $10 martinis (or beer, for that matter), we STILL eat bean burritos (ramen noodles, too), and don’t even MAKE 3K a month, so we certainly wouldn’t be able to save that much. However, that does not mean that we can’t provide for, love, nurture, and care for a child. In fact, our son is thriving. Through many of your comments on this site, you seem to be sending the message that only the well-to-do should be able to produce or adopt a child, and that women should just shut up about a more family-friendly leave policy for pregnancy/childbirth. Don’t even get me started on how the current system marginalizes women on the basis of BEING women (the only ones, so far, who can deliver a child!), on how we would lose population pretty damn quickly if only the wealthy reproduced (no new workforce, society, sorry!), and how this country does nothing but pay lip service to being “family oriented,” but actually makes policy which makes creating a family a hardship…oh, it goes on and on.

What on earth do you do if 2 adults don’t make 3k a month? So, I am supposed to bust ass and support people who don’t want to work hard, and yet feel entitled to having all these children? I would love to have another child, however, my husband and I have decided that we would like to pay for our ONE kid’s college, take her to see the world and also be able to SAFELY (that means having money in the bank for emergencies) enjoy our own lives without having to depend on the government, so we are making the choice to just have one.

All the things you describe, a woman having kids at 24, having 3 and all that are fine. Hell, its fine if you want to try and live on less than 3K a month, too, but don’t ask me to pay for your lifestyle. It is so insulting. By the way, I am not well-to-do and in fact have no parental support and have been supporting myself since the age of 18. My husband, the same. We just work HARD, plan and don’t expect things to be given to us.

I would be much more comfortable with being “all for one and one for all” if I didn’t hear about people like this who just want to live their lives however they please and expect someone else to foot the bill.

Voice of Reason, the UK Jobseeker’s Allowance numbers don’t include women on this mandatory maternity leave, even if they don’t go back to their previous position at the end of the thirty-nine weeks. I believe, though I may be mistaken, that the Jobseeker’s Allowance doesn’t apply to women who have a child under one year, who didn’t qualify for the maternity leave, because they didn’t work the 26 weeks required, or some other reason. The US unemployment numbers do include these women, so it’s hard to compare the two. I don’t mean to imply that raising a child is “doing nothing or nearly nothing”, I meant “doing nothing or nearly nothing” in terms of contributing to the economy. I hardly think the people on council estates (UK version of housing projects) are working with a “all for one and one for all” mentality, so spare me, please. These women asking to be paid to not work ON TOP OFF the already mandated paid holiday leave are not exactly putting the collective first, either. Self-interest is natural in all creatures, Europeans included, and that’s why regulated capitalism can be credited with one of the highest standards of living and the greatest number of life-improving innovations.

GP, I thought you were going away. Why are you still on here? Clearly you’re so much better than those of us who work outside of the home and send our kids to daycare. Here’s your cookie. Now go away!

Interesting! From Pregnancy Today: ‘The benefits to making family-friendly policies go far beyond your personal health or your own child’s well-being. While social benefits in the United States often are viewed as an intrusion into families and business or a step toward socialism, in Europe they are considered an investment in the future stability and well-being of a nation. Family benefits are important because they encourage family growth and allow a child’s parents to raise their children, as well as helping to distribute wealth and curb poverty. Sociologically, this makes for a stronger economy and a stronger, healthier social structure with lower crime rates and higher levels of education.’

Apparently, in the U.S., The Sloan Foundation does research into the real economic and social costs of not providing paid maternity/parental leave.

Again, this really is comparing apples to oranges. It seems that what Europeans and to some degree, Canadians, see as investing their countries’ futures, many Americans still see as handouts to lazy underachievers. I also think there seems to be a significant difference in what many Americans and many Europeans would consider to qualify as regulated capitalism! If you look at the U.N’s 2009 Human Development Index, the U.S. once again places well behind some of the very countries that make paid parental leave a priority (Iceland, Finland, Canada, Norway, Sweden, France to name a few).

However, the U.S, comes out ahead of the U.K. which I find really interesting!

I do think there is room for GP’s point of view and I don’t want her to go away. She has some really interesting things to say about homebirth and midwifery! However, while I think her ideas probably work well in her own micro-economy and transfer unsuccessfully into the macro-economy, as puasamanda clearly demonstrates.

GP, a few questions:

Your notes here just don’t resonate for me. I would genuinely like to know what you have to say to those of us, like me and my husband, who contribute greatly to society everyday (my opinion, I realize), in the form of literally saving lives (we are ER doctors) who have monumental student loans to pay off and were not earning income above $40K until after residency at age 30? (In case you don’t know about how medical education works in the US, doctors have to go through 12 years of schooling minimum, if you include college. In our case, we, as self-sufficient adults, funded ourselves without your or our parents’ handouts…to the tune of about $175K of debt each)

Are we lazy slackers who are not contributing to society at all? Somehow I would rather ask that question to the 5 people I helped through major traumas and 26 people I helped through minor health incidents last night instead…

For the record, we certainly could not have afforded for me to have had an unpaid maternity leave when we finally had our daughter two years out of residency, despite being in the top 5% income bracket now that we are finally Attending Physicians. I suppose, per your argument, instead we should have saved and waited until I would have needed IVF and fertility treatments and was nearing 40 to procreate (which is also MUCH cheaper for the health care system to fund - NOT!), I mean, we are after all pitiful leeches to the system, right?

Please don’t get me started on how much harder it must be for the thousands of other folks funding post-graduate educations in professions who are not in medicine and do not have the security we were lucky to have in knowing there would one day be a financial light at the end of our tunnel…(artists, writers, historians, engineers, MBAs in this economy, and numerous others who contribute greatly to the advancement of our society and culture…)

What say you to us? How does your argument apply here? I would sincerely like to know your response.

Hmm…these comments are strangely out of order since the other day (?)

I don’t think people should NOT have kids based on x, y or z…just don’t ask me or other taxpayers to subsidize you. To the docs, why not have your kid when you’re 35, you will have (presumably) paid your loans and saved a little by then. The rest of your lives you will earn more than my husband and I, so you are making your choice to do that NOW, which is great. We made the choice to have mid-level, mid-wage careers that we will always have, pretty much, never making stellar salaries, but doing OK. Still, we waited til he was 40 and I, 35, before having kids. Of course, we didn’t meet til we were in our 30s. Point is not to do everything like me, point is do what you want, but don’t expect me to pay for it. We all make sacrifices in certain areas to fulfill wants in others. That’s all I’m asking people to do. You can’t have everything you want just because you want it, and you’re certainly not entitled to it.

My issue with this whole thing is that it’s (for the most part) not the TAXPAYERS picking up the tab for the maternity leave or the follow your bliss leave—-It’s the BUSINESS OWNER, a private individual. You can make a case for society supporting the parent-child bond, but calling on one group of people, because they’ve had the gumption and the talent and the risk to start or purchase a business to subsidize another individual’s choice to do ANYTHING is just ridiculous. It’s not selfish of business owners to want to avoid paying ALL their employees to take time off. After all, in most instances, the business owner must then hire someone else to do the job while the employee is out. Money doesn’t come from the air, after all, so the business owner can cut expenses to an extent, let their profits slide a bit, but eventually he or she must raise prices in order to stay in business.

I don’t know how I could do what I feel is my calling and a great service to my community, offering low-cost funeral services, under such constraints. I run a tight ship, and have profits under 5%. If I had even just two employees taking mandatory paid time off I would either have to shut down or raise prices, because my entire profit margin would be eaten up paying them, plus the temps doing their jobs, plus benefits for all four. Then what happens after a year? If I have to give the first two employees their jobs back after a year, what do I do with the two who were working in their stead? Do I have to pay four funeral directors when my business only needs two? Or should I fire two perfectly good workers as soon as they update their predecessors, now successors, about what has changed with the business in the past year?

I do take issue with the thought that I am selfish and narrowminded if I want to make a profit. I don’t expect to make a profit while I am not working, after all, even if I’m doing something great for my kids. Who should get paid for taking care of his/her own kids? I’m not heartlessly saying everyone should have kids at the exact right time and never ask for help—social programs, charitable and government run, exist for that purpose and I happily contribute to both kinds. But don’t expect to be considered an employee and paid as such when you are not contributing to the business.

Rant over…

GP, yes, your ideas may be unpopular with some, but it’s the manner that you present them that is so toxic. On many issues, I agree with you, but your comments are so insulting and sometimes mean-spirited that I want to tell you to chill out. You say that you feel blessed? Your attitutde says that you feel right, all the time, and everyone else is wrong. From your posts above, I can only guess that you think that only wealthy people should reproduce, and probably only the smart ones, too. You’re bordering on eugenist beliefs, so step back and take a deep breath, please.

Yeah, I’m with you on self-reliance and staying at home with one’s children, but I hope you recognize the limitations. I think we are mostly on the same wave-length that help to people who cannot meet the ideal of self-reliance and family prioritization should come primarily from free-will charity than causes the beneficiary to feel grateful and obligated to “pay it forwad” rather than gov. entitlements (or in this case, gov. mandated employer-provided entitlements) that cause the beneficiary to feel, well, entitled.