Whenever I'm in a discussion about the problems with our education system and how to fix them, I can be sure someone's going to bring up the decay of the family. "How can we expect kids to learn," this person will ask, "when we have all these broken homes? Even in two-parent families, things aren't the way they used to be."
There's a good deal of truth in this. We've seen rapid and radical changes in the way American families operate, and some of the results don't look very good. But like it or not, we're not about to go back to the way things were in the 1940s and 1950s. What we can do is offer families that are struggling to fulfill their responsibilities now as much support as possible.
The Family Medical Leave Act, which would ensure unpaid leave and job protection for employees with new babies and family medical emergencies, is a modest step in that direction. The bill passed in both the House and the Senate. Unfortunately, President Bush, who talked up family medical leave during his presidential campaign, now says he will veto it.
Exactly what does the bill call for? Employers with more than 50 employees would need to allow their workers up to 12 weeks a year of unpaid leave, to be used after the birth or adoption of a child and to care for family members who are seriously ill. People who took this unpaid leave would continue to receive their usual health insurance coverage, and they'd be protected against losing their jobs. In other words, American workers wouldn't have to choose between looking after a new baby or an elderly parent who had been taken ill and keeping their jobs (or lying about why they're not at work in order to keep them).
If this makes the bill sound like an expensive giveaway, just the opposite is the case. It would cost the government, and therefore taxpayers, nothing. And since the leave is unpaid, the law wouldn't involve big, new expenses for employers, either. In fact, a General Accounting Office study estimates the cost at about $4.50 per employee per year. This is a very modest increase, particularly if you consider how much it costs to look for and train new employees to replace the experienced ones who might quit -- or be fired -- if family leave is not available.
The U.S.'s big competitors, Japan and West Germany, seem to realize the importance of providing this kind of support for families. Both guarantee at least three months of paid leave, with additional unpaid leave, as well. And we are the only industrialized nation -- except for South Africa -- that has no family leave legislation at all.
Many of our most successful companies realize its importance, too. For instance, IBM permits its employees up to three years of unpaid leave for any "serious" reasons, like looking after a newborn or newly adopted child or a sick family member. During the leave, IBM continues company-paid benefits and assures the employee a job when he returns to work. The Travelers permits employees to take up to one year of unpaid leave to care for a family member and, like IBM, continues company- paid benefits. U.S. West also offers up to a year of unpaid, job-guaranteed leave to care for a new baby or newly adopted infant, and so does the Southern New England Telephone Company.
Does this mean most workers are already protected by company family leave policies? Unfortunately not. Big companies are more generous with this benefit than smaller ones. But according to the AFL-CIO, only half of the nation's 1,500 largest companies offer unpaid and job-protected maternity leave, never mind leave for new fathers or for looking after sick family members. So the bill would provide important protection to a much larger number of American families.
What's the problem? To tell the truth, I don't really know. Parental leave sounds like a motherhood -- even fatherhood -- and apple pie issue if there ever was one. The bill is pro-family. It is humane and inexpensive. It supplies a need that cuts across social boundaries. And according to polls, there is broad support for a national family leave policy among voters. The bill got strong support in the Senate and the House, too.
President Bush objects, it seems, because he wants businesses to be free to set their own family leave policies and employees to be free to negotiate these policies in contracts. That's fine, but only a small percentage of employees engage in collective bargaining, and employers who are free to institute these policies are also free not to -- which is exactly what has been happening.
On the campaign trail, Mr. Bush told a group of women voters, "We need to assure that women don't have to worry about getting their jobs back after having a child or caring for a child during a serious illness." This bill is a way of doing exactly that. In fact, it is the only way of "assuring" that parents have this freedom from worry.
Mr. Bush talks a great deal about the importance of the family, and there's no reason to doubt that he means what he says. SO why is he now opposing a bill that would help American working families look after their children and each other? The President should look again at his campaign pledge and take it as seriously as American families have. That means signing the Family Medical Leave Act into law when it appears on his desk. How about it, Mr. Bush?