Week 1 Interactive Assessment
Read the Work, Family, Equity Index 2007 report and state your views on where the U.S. stands in terms of leave for illness and family care. State your views on the differences between the U.S. policy and those implemented in other countries. How do you think the U.S. policy impacts both the individual who is sick and their family members? Do you think the U.S. policy should change? If so briefly describe what you feel the U.S. policy should be. If not, state why you support the existing policy.
Although the United States does not offer many of the benefits that the other countries have on illness leave and family care, the U.S. does offer benefits that are covered at most work places. Benefits to employees that the U.S. does offer includes policies that protect all people, regardless of sexual orientation, gender, etc. Other policies that are beneficial to employees of the United States includes a guaranteed paid premium for overtime work and paid leave for childbearing. The United States does not have as many policies as other countries that offer support to parents that are bearing children. In other countries, guaranteed leave is given to those in connection with childbirth and women’s right to breastfeed is fully backed with their country’s support. Also, the United States does not cover all workers who have serious illnesses and many of the U.S. employees are not paid during major events, such as weddings or funerals. The United States should introduce more policies that enable employees to feel comfortable when leaving before childbearing and for family care. The United States impacts sick individuals by not giving them paid time off. Individuals therefore have to come back to work because they want to get paid, spreading germs among their coworkers. If a family member is sick or has special care needs, other than the employee, they are not able to receive support and care from the employee. Although the FMLA guarantees workers up to twelve weeks of unpaid leave annually to care for themselves or children without risk of being fired, only half of FMLA employees are eligible for leave. Many choose not to leave it because the leave is unpaid (Schuster et al., 2009). Children who do not receive support from parents who may work overtime hours or receive unpaid sick days do not recover as fast as the children of parents who receive paid sick leave and may not get the preventive health care that they need. The policy in the U.S. should not change because employees are aware before starting a job what benefits the corporation has. Lack of knowledge about concerning rights to family and medical leave should be addressed before beginning a new career in case employees need to take a family leave during their work time (Grosswald & Scharlach, 1999). If the policy changed, more people may try to abuse the new procedure.
Leading Question: How do you think employees beginning a job would feel if they had to take a test on the FMLA policy?
References
Grosswald, B., & Scharlach, A. E. (1999). Employee experiences with family and medical leave: a case study. Community, Work & Family, 2(2), 187-203.
Schuster, M. A., Chung, P. J., Elliott, M. N., Garfield, C. F., Vestal, K. D., & Klein, D. J. (2009). Perceived Effects of Leave From Work and the Role of Paid Leave Among Parents of Children With Special Health Care Needs. American Journal Of Public Health, 99(4), 698-705.