Paid parental leave for federal employees - when would it begin?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The US taxpayer should not pay for your maternity leave or child care. Go private employer.

How does it cost anything? You were already paying the salary. It’s not like they’re hiring a temp to cover the work. They just share the work between the other employees

Before this ridiculous law passed, you didn’t get paid when you weren’t working. Now you do. The fact that you don’t understand this explains why you’re a fed.

Since sometime in the Obama administration (I don’t remember exact year) you are supposed to be advanced sick and/or annual leave. So yes, people were getting paid, albeit not able to take their regular accrued leave for a long time while paying back the debt.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The US taxpayer should not pay for your maternity leave or child care. Go private employer.

How does it cost anything? You were already paying the salary. It’s not like they’re hiring a temp to cover the work. They just share the work between the other employees

Before this ridiculous law passed, you didn’t get paid when you weren’t working. Now you do. The fact that you don’t understand this explains why you’re a fed.

Since sometime in the Obama administration (I don’t remember exact year) you are supposed to be advanced sick and/or annual leave. So yes, people were getting paid, albeit not able to take their regular accrued leave for a long time while paying back the debt.

So? The law allows people to take more paid time off. That costs money. I’m not sure what you don’t understand.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The US taxpayer should not pay for your maternity leave or child care. Go private employer.

How does it cost anything? You were already paying the salary. It’s not like they’re hiring a temp to cover the work. They just share the work between the other employees

Before this ridiculous law passed, you didn’t get paid when you weren’t working. Now you do. The fact that you don’t understand this explains why you’re a fed.

Since sometime in the Obama administration (I don’t remember exact year) you are supposed to be advanced sick and/or annual leave. So yes, people were getting paid, albeit not able to take their regular accrued leave for a long time while paying back the debt.

So? The law allows people to take more paid time off. That costs money. I’m not sure what you don’t understand.

I’m not sure why you don’t understand that this was already happening. Agencies were directed by President Obama (to the extent possible) to advance paid leave. People were already getting 12 weeks of “paid” leave, again, that they had to pay back. But their salary was still being paid for that time and they were still being paid for the time they accrued back the leave - so largely, this is the same deal without having to pay back the leave.

The difference between what is already happening in a lot of cases and this is quite nominal. I can’t for the life of me understand why people are so bitter and selfish. And I’m speaking as someone who will probably never take advantage of this benefit!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The US taxpayer should not pay for your maternity leave or child care. Go private employer.

It's less than it would cost to replace me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The US taxpayer should not pay for your maternity leave or child care. Go private employer.

How does it cost anything? You were already paying the salary. It’s not like they’re hiring a temp to cover the work. They just share the work between the other employees

Before this ridiculous law passed, you didn’t get paid when you weren’t working. Now you do. The fact that you don’t understand this explains why you’re a fed.

Since sometime in the Obama administration (I don’t remember exact year) you are supposed to be advanced sick and/or annual leave. So yes, people were getting paid, albeit not able to take their regular accrued leave for a long time while paying back the debt.

So? The law allows people to take more paid time off. That costs money. I’m not sure what you don’t understand.

I’m not sure why you don’t understand that this was already happening. Agencies were directed by President Obama (to the extent possible) to advance paid leave. People were already getting 12 weeks of “paid” leave, again, that they had to pay back. But their salary was still being paid for that time and they were still being paid for the time they accrued back the leave - so largely, this is the same deal without having to pay back the leave.

The difference between what is already happening in a lot of cases and this is quite nominal. I can’t for the life of me understand why people are so bitter and selfish. And I’m speaking as someone who will probably never take advantage of this benefit!

But that’s the difference right there - before this law, they had to pay the leave back!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So what I’ve been hearing is this will only be for babies born October and later? So let’s say you have a baby in July, you couldn’t take leave starting in October? I’m seriously bummed for myself, but happy for those that will follow.

From the bill, it is pretty clear in the wording [see S. 1790: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020: Sec. 7602 Para (C)]

"The amendments made by this section shall not be effective with respect to any birth or placement occurring before October 1, 2020"

But I have to wonder what OPM is going to do when a bunch of people start making a stink about missing the cut off. Just imagine if a news story comes out about some premature baby that was born on September 30, 2020 and the big bad government isn't giving the mom family leave. It really doesn't seem completely fair for them to offer someone who gave birth one day later 3 months of leave and nothing for that other mother.

Honestly, I just think they were lazy with the wording in the bill. I think better wording would be something like [bolded is mine]

"The amendments made by this section shall not be effective with respect to any birth or placement occurring AFTER October 1, 2019"

and another line saying something like

"The paid leave that is available to an employee for purposes of subparagraph (A) is--(i) 12 administrative workweeks MINUS the number of work days from birth to December 31, 2019, of paid parental leave under this subparagraph in connection with the birth or placement involved; and..."

So if the baby is born on October 1, 2019, you are screwed.
If the baby is born on October 2, 2019, you get one day of leave.
If the baby is born on October 3, 2019, you get two days of leave.
...
If the baby is born on or after December 31, 2019, you get the full 12 months = 60 days of leave

[Anonymous]

Whoops, a typo. I meant to strike out the "not".

"The amendments made by this section shall be effective with respect to any birth or placement occurring AFTER October 1, 2019"

[Anonymous]

I suspect that this policy will backfire and cause hard-to-prove discrimination against women in the labor force unless/until men also take parental leave.

Also I wonder how the "caring for a family member" element will play out. Would someone be able to take 12 weeks of paid leave every year (every x years??) for this purpose?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The US taxpayer should not pay for your maternity leave or child care. Go private employer.

Dumbass. Paid maternity leave is better for mothers (and babies). Ultimately we’ll get better productivity of women allowed a proper period of time to heal their bodies from a major medical event. And this leads to more women in the workforce which means more taxes paid. So the piddly 12-weeks we are paying for women to recover is nothing over the lifetime of a Fed’s employment.

If you really want to get pissed about tax dollars, start lobbying to have Federal employment policies changed so that it is easier and quicker to fire the slackers. THAT will save you beaucoup bucks, not cheaping out on recovery from a medical event.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I suspect that this policy will backfire and cause hard-to-prove discrimination against women in the labor force unless/until men also take parental leave.

Also I wonder how the "caring for a family member" element will play out. Would someone be able to take 12 weeks of paid leave every year (every x years??) for this purpose?

To me the fact employees get to cash out their leave when they retire is discrimination against the maternal parent. Every year I see male colleagues talking about how many hundreds of hours they saved and will cash out, while female colleagues with children struggle in and out of LWOP status for decades. Because once you have more then one child, if you elect to stay home 12 weeks with each, its almost impossible to every build any substantive amount of leave again and you frequently stay well below a comfortable level.

But, I learned a long time ago no one cares and every one hates federal workers anyway. I think they hate federal workers who are parents even more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So what I’ve been hearing is this will only be for babies born October and later? So let’s say you have a baby in July, you couldn’t take leave starting in October? I’m seriously bummed for myself, but happy for those that will follow.

From the bill, it is pretty clear in the wording [see S. 1790: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020: Sec. 7602 Para (C)]

"The amendments made by this section shall not be effective with respect to any birth or placement occurring before October 1, 2020"

But I have to wonder what OPM is going to do when a bunch of people start making a stink about missing the cut off. Just imagine if a news story comes out about some premature baby that was born on September 30, 2020 and the big bad government isn't giving the mom family leave. It really doesn't seem completely fair for them to offer someone who gave birth one day later 3 months of leave and nothing for that other mother.

Honestly, I just think they were lazy with the wording in the bill. I think better wording would be something like [bolded is mine]

"The amendments made by this section shall not be effective with respect to any birth or placement occurring AFTER October 1, 2019"

and another line saying something like

"The paid leave that is available to an employee for purposes of subparagraph (A) is--(i) 12 administrative workweeks MINUS the number of work days from birth to December 31, 2019, of paid parental leave under this subparagraph in connection with the birth or placement involved; and..."

So if the baby is born on October 1, 2019, you are screwed.
If the baby is born on October 2, 2019, you get one day of leave.
If the baby is born on October 3, 2019, you get two days of leave.
...
If the baby is born on or after December 31, 2019, you get the full 12 months = 60 days of leave

Anyone thinking we’ll see a big bump in babies born to federal employee safety in the fourth quarter for next year? Anyone who’s been trying or was planning to start trying now will wait until Jan/Feb, as will all of the people who have been delaying indefinitely because they couldn’t afford unpaid leave.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Anyone thinking we’ll see a big bump in babies born to federal employee safety in the fourth quarter for next year? Anyone who’s been trying or was planning to start trying now will wait until Jan/Feb, as will all of the people who have been delaying indefinitely because they couldn’t afford unpaid leave.

That's a good point. You think nothing gets done in the government between Thanksgiving and New Years? Just wait until the baby rush this next October!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I suspect that this policy will backfire and cause hard-to-prove discrimination against women in the labor force unless/until men also take parental leave.

Also I wonder how the "caring for a family member" element will play out. Would someone be able to take 12 weeks of paid leave every year (every x years??) for this purpose?

I hear this argument all the time but I think the hiring managers who will discriminate against women are already doing it, because "she'll just leave."

There's no leave for caring for a family member in this, unfortunately. There was in the original Federal Employees Paid Leave Act that Maloney introduced but only the parental leave made it through negotiations.

[Anonymous]

Ugh seriously if I knew this was coming, we would have waited several more months. This blows.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So what I’ve been hearing is this will only be for babies born October and later? So let’s say you have a baby in July, you couldn’t take leave starting in October? I’m seriously bummed for myself, but happy for those that will follow.

From the bill, it is pretty clear in the wording [see S. 1790: National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2020: Sec. 7602 Para (C)]

"The amendments made by this section shall not be effective with respect to any birth or placement occurring before October 1, 2020"

But I have to wonder what OPM is going to do when a bunch of people start making a stink about missing the cut off. Just imagine if a news story comes out about some premature baby that was born on September 30, 2020 and the big bad government isn't giving the mom family leave. It really doesn't seem completely fair for them to offer someone who gave birth one day later 3 months of leave and nothing for that other mother.

Honestly, I just think they were lazy with the wording in the bill. I think better wording would be something like [bolded is mine]

"The amendments made by this section shall not be effective with respect to any birth or placement occurring AFTER October 1, 2019"

and another line saying something like

"The paid leave that is available to an employee for purposes of subparagraph (A) is--(i) 12 administrative workweeks MINUS the number of work days from birth to December 31, 2019, of paid parental leave under this subparagraph in connection with the birth or placement involved; and..."

So if the baby is born on October 1, 2019, you are screwed.
If the baby is born on October 2, 2019, you get one day of leave.
If the baby is born on October 3, 2019, you get two days of leave.
...
If the baby is born on or after December 31, 2019, you get the full 12 months = 60 days of leave

This is terrible logic. Making things harder for Oct-Dec babies does not make anything more fair, nor does it help people with Sept babies. There has to be a start date. It could have been the date of enactment and there would still be people who missed it by a day.

I am genuinely sorry for the people who miss the date by a small amount. That does seem somehow worse than having had my kids years ago, even though the outcome is the same. But I don't think people will make a stink in any meaningful sense: it's in the law, OPM has no discretion.