Family-Leave Values

The New York Times has an excel­lent arti­cle in today’s paper, writ­ten by Eyal Press, deal­ing with a new per­spec­tive on “fam­ily val­ues”: the impor­tance of employ­ees with fam­ily respon­si­bil­i­ties to have flex­i­bil­ity, includ­ing leave, from their employ­ers, and law­suits that are seek­ing to enforce this flex­i­bil­ity using a vari­ety of legal approaches:

Since the mid-​​1990s, the num­ber of work­ers who have sued their employ­ers for sup­posed mis­treat­ment on account of fam­ily respon­si­bil­i­ties — becom­ing preg­nant, need­ing to care for a sick child or rel­a­tive — has increased by more than 300 per­cent. More than 1,150 such law­suits have been filed in fed­eral and state courts, a trend that has not gone unno­ticed in the busi­ness world, not only because com­pa­nies are well aware of the neg­a­tive pub­lic­ity law­suits can gen­er­ate but also because numer­ous plain­tiffs have walked away with hefty dam­age awards. In one case, a jury granted $11.65 mil­lion to a hos­pi­tal main­te­nance worker who was penal­ized for hav­ing to care for his elderly par­ents. In Ohio recently, a jury awarded $2.1 mil­lion to an assis­tant store man­ager who was demoted because she has sev­eral kids.

Press sug­gests that this indi­cates that so-​​called “fam­ily val­ues” issues have moved beyond the old con­ser­v­a­tive bat­tle cries of “gay mar­riage and abortion”:

Beyond caus­ing headaches for their employ­ers, the law­suits are serv­ing notice that the bat­tle over “fam­ily val­ues” is no longer just about gay mar­riage and abor­tion: it’s also about work­place atti­tudes that some advo­cates believe do sig­nif­i­cantly more to under­mine fam­ily life than those con­tro­ver­sial prac­tices do.

Of course, an effec­tive solu­tion from the employer and employee per­spec­tive is to pro-​​actively deal with these issues, and step away from the con­trol obses­sion so many employ­ers feel. The ben­e­fits often extend well beyond avoid­ing lawsuits:

Some C.E.O.‘s, how­ever, have begun rewrit­ing the rules on their own, spurred by the need to com­pete for high-​​quality employ­ees. Several years ago, a busi­ness­man named Jim Johnson dropped in on a talk Joan Williams was giv­ing in Denver, because his wife had heard about Williams and urged him to go. Afterward, he decided to reor­ga­nize the moving-​​and-​​storage com­pany he runs. Today, many of Johnson’s employ­ees log more hours at home than at the office. “I’ve got customer-​​service peo­ple work­ing at home, order-​​entry peo­ple, long-​​distance dis­patch­ers,” he told me. There has been a slight increase in pro­duc­tiv­ity, he said, as well as another ben­e­fit: “This flex-​​hour, work-​​at-​​home group — the turnover has been almost nonexistent.”

Press also points out how, on this issue (as on a num­ber of quality-​​of-​​life issues), the United States lags the rest of the devel­oped world:

Indeed, in the United States today, work­ing par­ents receive sup­ports and ben­e­fits that in much of the devel­oped world would be con­sid­ered scan­dalously ungen­er­ous. Some unflat­ter­ing com­par­isons with Europe were drawn at the E.E.O.C. hear­ing in April, where Williams sug­gested that even com­pa­nies had reached the point of want­ing more guid­ance from Washington about how care­givers should be treated. The mes­sage was evi­dently heard. In late May, the agency issued enforce­ment guide­lines that for the first time spell out the myr­iad sit­u­a­tions — a police detec­tive removed from high-​​profile inves­ti­ga­tions after she adopts a child, a tech­ni­cian and father denied a part-​​time post­ing reserved for a woman — pro­hib­ited under exist­ing law. The E.E.O.C. makes clear that per­son­nel deci­sions imple­mented on the basis of stereo­typ­i­cal assump­tions are unac­cept­able and urges employ­ers “to make it eas­ier for all work­ers, whether male or female, to bal­ance work and per­sonal responsibilities.”

Lawsuits are, per­haps, an unfor­tu­nate way to get there. Actually end­ing up in court is painful for all involved, ben­e­fit­ing per­haps only the pock­et­books of the attor­neys. But some­times, as with seg­re­ga­tion and racial dis­crim­i­na­tion, law­suits are the only way to force soci­ety to change:

It would be hard to imag­ine such a step hap­pen­ing were it not for the wave of law­suits in recent years. Meanwhile, peo­ple like Karen Deonarain are wait­ing for their days in court. It has been more than three years since she lost her job. Her law­suit, which charges that she was fired for com­pli­ca­tions related to her preg­nancy, amount­ing to a form of sex dis­crim­i­na­tion, is in the dis­cov­ery phase. A hint of weari­ness creeps into her voice when she talks about the case. “I think they want to drag it out so I’ll go away,” she told me, laugh­ing softly.

From a per­sonal per­spec­tive, I’d like to point out too that this does not sim­ple effect moth­ers, or fathers, but any­one who may wish to care for a sick rel­a­tive, deal with their own health issues, or sim­ply main­tain a healthy life beyond the work­place. For this rea­son, I think “work-​​life” issues are absolutely crit­i­cal for the American work­place to con­front and deal with if we wish to main­tain pro­duc­tiv­ity and effec­tive­ness. We can­not sim­ply squeeze more work out of employ­ees indef­i­nitely. We need to work, as the old adage goes, “smarter, not harder.” And bal­anc­ing work and life is a key part of this.

For more infor­ma­tion, see:

• Family-​​Leave Values in the New York Times
• WorkLife Law Center
• Unbending Gender: Why Family and Work Conflict and What to Do About It by Professor Joan Williams