Stephanie Bornstein, Charlotte
Fishman
Tuesday, August 5, 2003
San Francisco Chronicle
URL: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/
chronicle/archive/2003/08/05/ED118362.DTL
Ten years ago, during debate over the passage of the
federal Family and Medical Leave Act, opponents predicted
it would cause the demise of the U. S. workplace,
and even the economy. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, claimed
that mandating the FMLA would not only "destroy
job growth and economic growth," but would also
"foster a bias against hiring women of child-bearing
age." The late Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-S.C., echoed
that similar mandates in Europe "contributed
to a stag[nant] economy and unemployment."
Today, on the 10th anniversary of the FMLA's enactment, history has proved the detractors wrong. According to a study by the Department of Labor, the FMLA has allowed more than 35 million workers to take needed time off from work with virtually no negative impact on employers. Eighty percent of employers covered by the FMLA reported that the law had a neutral or positive effect on their profits and productivity. Eighty-five percent of employees reported either neutral or positive effects when their co-workers took FMLA leave.
The FMLA has also been crucial to the advancement of women's equality in the workplace. As women's participation in the workforce continues to grow, the FMLA legitimizes taking time off from work for family reasons -- a need that still falls more heavily on women then men. Reducing the stigma associated with taking time off from work for family in turn enables men to assume more responsibility for family caregiving.
Over the past 10 years, the idea that workers are entitled to have job- protected leave to care for seriously ill family members or to bond with new children has achieved broad public support -- so broad that the connection between the FMLA and workplace equality has been noted with approval by an unlikely ally, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist. Two months ago, the chief justice wrote the court's opinion in Nevada Department of Human Services vs. Hibbs, upholding state employees' entitlement to FMLA protections and acknowledging the FMLA's role in breaking down a "self- fulfilling cycle of discrimination that forced women to continue to assume the role of primary family caregiver, and fostered employers' stereotypical views about women's [lack of] commitment to work and their value as employees."
While we have made tremendous progress in the 10 years since the enactment of the FMLA, we still have a significant way to go to meet the reality of workers' lives, especially female workers. The FMLA only covers companies with 50 or more employees, leaving 42 percent of the American workforce unprotected,
according to the Department of Labor. Leave provided by the FMLA is unpaid, making the benefit inaccessible to workers who are eligible to take the 12 weeks off but cannot afford to do so without a paycheck. Fifty-three percent of employees in the private sector lack any paid sick leave, according to the National Partnership for Women and Families.
States have begun to fill in where the federal law fails. Last year, California became the first state in the nation to pass a comprehensive paid family leave law, which, starting in July 2004, will provide all workers covered by the State Disability Insurance system up to six weeks of partial pay during time off for bonding with a new child or caring for a seriously ill child, parent, spouse or domestic partner. Other California laws provide similar disability benefits to employees unable to work due to their own disabilities, including pregnancy, and additional time off for pregnant workers.
A handful of states around the nation extend the protections of the FMLA to those who work for smaller employers or provide additional job-protected time off from work. Twenty-seven states are considering paid leave legislation.
State and federal legislators need to expand the protections of FMLA and similar state laws to cover smaller employers and to provide paid leave so that the right to take leave is accessible to all regardless of income level.
Employers also need to do more to help workers balance the competing demands of work and family by offering paid sick leave, paid family and medical leave, flexible work hours, telecommuting and assistance with child care. While state and federal laws provide minimum worker protections, employers can and should provide additional benefits, practices that can improve worker productivity and reduce employee turnover.
Ten years from now, all workers should be entitled to paid family and medical leave. The American workplace should routinely provide a structure that allows workers to balance successfully both work and family responsibilities. Ten years from now, the expectation that work and family can be balanced should be as obvious to us as the need for the FMLA is to us today.
Stephanie Bornstein and Charlotte Fishman are staff attorneys with Equal Rights Advocates (www.equalrights.org), a nonprofit women's law center specializing in gender discrimination in education and employment and a partner in the California Paid Family Leave Coalition (www.paidfamilyleave.org).