America Needs Paid Leave
From the AFL-CIO
This week, America’s union movement celebrates the 25th anniversary of the Family and Medical Leave Act, which allows millions of working people to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for sick or injured loved ones without the fear of being fired. The AFL-CIO salutes the activists who pushed Congress for a decade to pass the bill in 1993 and urges more action to expand paid leave today.
- America needs paid leave because one major life event that demands a worker take time off to care for a sick child or spouse can destroy a family’s economic security and throw people into homelessness and chaos.
- Paid leave policies already are working at the state level by helping millions of families juggle the competing demands of work and family at a very modest cost, which may even be offset by savings.
- Everyone benefits from paid leave. Mothers, fathers, children and caregivers all benefit from paid leave.
- Paid leave helps businesses by making the benefit more affordable, decreasing staff turnover and raising morale.
* 87%: The percentage of California businesses that said the state’s paid leave policy costs no extra money to administer, while also producing savings because of decreased employee turnover.
***
