Posted on 02/27/2020 5:35:59 AM PST by Kaslin
Despite recent stock market jitters related to the coronavirus, the U.S. economy is doing well. Wages are growing, especially for lower-income workers, and unemployment is low. Yet calls are intensifying for the federal government to implement paid leave, which may unwittingly hurt those whom the program claims to help. Supporters often resort to the same misleading notions to make their case -- misperceptions that must be continuously debunked, lest they lead to unnecessary harm to working families.
Among the most common claims used to make the case for government provision of paid leave is that not every working woman gets paid leave, which supposedly demonstrates a market failure. Still, data show that 63% of women today have access to such leave, a 280% increase since the 1960s. The women who don't receive this benefit are mostly lower-skilled workers with part-time and hourly jobs employed at small businesses.
Undoubtedly, these women would like to get paid to stay home after the birth of their children, yet that's no more evidence of a market failure than is my not driving a Tesla, even though I'd like to drive one if it were free. This isn't a reason for government to mandate paid leave (or Teslas) for all workers.
More to the point, such mandates will likely harm low-income workers.
Here's why: Because paid leave is costly, when firms provide this benefit, they change the composition of their employees' total compensation by reducing the value of workers' take-home pay to offset the cost of providing paid leave. While some workers prefer this mix in their pay packages, others don't. In particular, mandated leave would be a hard trade-off for many lower-paid women who would prefer as much of their income as possible in the form of take-home pay.
In fact, polls show that when women learn of the trade-offs inherent in any government-mandated paid-leave policy, their support for such a policy collapses.
Another weak argument that pro-paid leave advocates make is that the United States is the only industrialized country without a national paid leave program. While true, this doesn't mean what paid leave proponents would like you to believe. As we've already seen, absence of federal government action doesn't mean that U.S. women aren't getting any paid leave. Nor does it mean that women in countries that have such government-mandated programs are doing better than women in the United States.
In fact, while proponents of government-supported paid leave policies like to list the many benefits that women, their children and the companies they work for get from paid leave, these proponents are silent on the costs -- of which, unfortunately, there are many.
A National Bureau of Economic Research, or NBER, paper shows that while women in non-U.S. countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development often have higher labor force participation, the lack of a U.S. paid leave policy leads to women in America being more likely "to have full time jobs and to work as managers or professionals."
Moreover, government-supported paid leave policies don't improve women's labor market outcomes compared with men's. A well-cited NBER paper looks at Denmark's very generous paid leave policy and finds that before having children, women's hours, employment and wages are equal to those of men, but that these metrics all worsen relative to men after having children. Another recent NBER paper expands on this research and shows that while this divergence also exists in the United States, it's significantly smaller here.
The last misleading claim in this debate is that the levels of benefits being proposed in America aren't anywhere near as high as those mandated in Europe, so the negative consequences of government-mandated benefits in the United States would be smaller than they are in Europe. That's only true if the benefits don't grow over time, which is unrealistic.
European programs didn't start off as big as they are now. The average length of family leave programs in the eurozone increased from 17 weeks in 1970 to 57 weeks in 2016. That's because what starts as a maternity leave program expands to parental leave and then becomes an even broader kind of leave, such as home care for sick family members.
There are many more poor arguments for mandated paid leave out there, many of which, unfortunately, demonstrate that facts and sound economics are, in this debate, too often optional.
The average person out there does not have the slightest idea of what payroll costs are or how they affect an employer.
Even Trump is out there pushing this, so chuck it onto my pile of bad ideas which are inevitable.
A 40-hour work week translates to about 2,000 work hours in a year. My preference would be to pay my staff 15% higher than the market rate and let them take off 300 hours every year with no pay.
Here’s the nut in this deal. If one concedes that “The State” has a “compelling interest” in the health and welfare of able citizens on the basis of a “national security” argument, you are surrendering your sovereignty out of the gate, so to speak. Once you have accepted this dangerous fiction you have to also concede the “State” essentially owns your body. The reason your healthcare is free is because you are a cog in the nation’s defense whether you like it or not. It leaves no room at all for “Valor” or “Patriotism” but only a grudging acceptance of slavery and servitude.
Nothing could be more UnAmerican, IMHO.
Tl:dr- if the government is paying you to make babies you might want to ponder for a moment, at least, “Why?”.
Paid leave for personal reasons, and a separate paid leave for being sick, are standards afforded to EVERY federal employee. 4 hrs sick leave accrued every pay period, with no cap, and either 4,6, or 8 hrs personal each pay period, with a cap of 240, which can be maintained, as long they remain employed.
The average person out there does not have the slightest idea of what payroll costs are or how they affect an employer.””’
Absolutely correct.... they have no idea how hard a small business person works to keep the doors open & their paychecks flowing.
Trump is out there pushing this, so chuck it onto my pile of bad ideas which are inevitable.”””
IVANKA is pushing this——not so much Trump. He knows how much of a burden such paid leave is on ANY business. IVANKA isn’t seasoned enough to realize this and she may never be.
ALSO-— this is discrimination against those of us women who NEVER had any children.
Why should ANY employee in the same company as I be getting such a benefit??? In small companies, it is highly likely that NO temp replacement will be hired, and the work load of the missing woman on paid leave will be distributed among all the rest of the workers. (Been there-—did it—and the missing woman had NO paid leave. When she was supposed to ‘come back’ to work, she chose to stay home with new baby-—and presto ! — we did the work with the remaining women...no one was hired) When the owner has proven that the people who picked up the slack can do it all-—why should he bring back the employee who got paid leave???
I am totally against paid leave. NOT fair to owners or other employees.
57 weeks of leave: How expensive is this?
57 X 40 = 2280 HOURS Times $15 an hour (MIN WAGE)=$34,200
Show me ANY business in the USA that can afford such a mandate.
A better way to look at it: 57 weeks off is OVER a year! How many businesses can pay a full employee to not work for a year? Sure, it’s a great benefit if they choose to offer it, but that’s crazy to be required by big brother!
Virginia just mandated 40 hours of paid sick leave per year for every employee including part-time. Just waiting on the Governor to sign it.
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