Maternity Leave: Could the U.S. Do Better?

Posted by: Sarah Davis on May 14

The right to a paid maternity leave seems a simple topic to me, but a little investigation shows it to be as controversial as the health-care issue in general. (“Why should my tax dollars pay for a stranger to have more kids than she can afford?” is the type of argument you hear on the other side.) Two recent posts on the WSJ’s Juggle (here & here) and the comments that follow give a good sampling of how dissatisfied parents can be, even well-employed parents.

It didn’t occur to me to complain about my own experience. After the birth of each of my two children, I pieced together 6 weeks of paid maternity leave, saved-up vacation, and a handful of sick days so that I could be home for a full three months to get to know these new wobbly-headed creatures. I have a flexible schedule, so the return to my job was not a tremendous shock on the system. In fact, a strong record of family-friendly benefits has earned The McGraw-Hill Companies, which owns BusinessWeek, a place on Working Mother magazine’s 100 Best list for the past three years.

So I’m lucky, right? After looking into the support systems in place in other parts of the world, turns out I could be luckier. According to MomsRising, an organization that strives to improve conditions for working mothers, the U.S. is one of only four countries not to offer paid leave. The others? Papua New Guinea, Swaziland, and Lesotho. Fifty-one percent of new mothers in the U.S. have no paid leave at all.

I asked Janette Eng, a Canadian risk analyst who lives in Munich with her German husband and 10-month-old baby, how the system works there. In Germany, mothers are allowed three years of leave. Six weeks before and eight weeks after the baby’s due date, all workers receive full pay. After that, until the baby is one year old, the government pays up to two-thirds of the salary (up to a maximum of 1,800 euro per month). Mothers who return to their jobs within three years are guaranteed the same position and pay (or better). Daycare is subsidized by the state and costs, depending on household income, no more than 460 euro a month for a full-time spot. There’s much more: free midwife service before and well after the birth; “child money,” or 150 euro a month per child till age 25; and on and on.

Starting a family on the right track seems the least a government can do toward creating a productive, satisfied workforce—and happier, better-balanced families. This is clearly not a U.S. priority. Can’t we do better?

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