Tuesday, January 21, 2020

Research Support for Family Paid Leave Policies with Morgan Healy and Lauren Zabierek


Cities and states across America are leading the push for paid family leave policies, as calls for national legislation seem to grow louder every day. The United States is one of only two developed countries in the world that does not provide its citizens any form of federal paid family and medical leave [1]. Given that America’s workforce is now comprised of predominantly dual-earner households [2] where a majority of mothers with young children are active contributors to the labor force [3], it is no surprise that debates in favor of paid family leave policies are gaining traction.

The current national leave policy, known as the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), offers American workers 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for newborns or seriously ill family members (in companies of 50 or more employees). While these unpaid leave provisions are job-secured, they are not mandated and only cover 60% of the workforce.[4] Those who cannot afford to miss work, but must do so in order care for a sick child or welcome a new baby into the world, know that every day away from work incurs huge economic losses for their family. Each year in the US, families lose billions of dollars in wages by taking unpaid leave or reducing their time to care for family members.[5]

Paid family leave policies allow families to forgo the impossible choice between an early return to work at the cost of family member wellbeing and a later return to work at the cost of financial wellbeing. Other than stabilizing earnings during critical moments, paid family leave policies are linked to other positive outcomes. Studies suggest that families with access to paid family leave policies experience lower rates of infant mortality,[6] higher rates of immunization [7] and higher rates of breastfeeding [8]. The positive impacts of parental leave on child developmental outcomes are maximized when the leave is paid and provided in a job-secure context [9].

Paid family leave policies have also been linked to both mothers staying in the workforce longer and mothers being better connected to the workforce, which is associated with higher earnings [10]. Findings further show that fathers who are able to use their paid leave provisions, felt they developed a closer relationship with their infants [11], were 25 percent more likely to change diapers and 19 percent more likely to get up at night to take care of their babies [12].

Outside of the benefits for families, flexible paid leave policies have also been linked to empirically-demonstrated benefits on employee hiring, retention, and morale [13]. Policies that support families are regularly cited as the single most important factor in attracting and retaining employees [14].

Current Paid Leave Policies

Despite the lack of a paid family leave policy at the national level, the good news is that many states have shouldered the responsibility where the federal government hasn’t. Legislatures in CA, MA, NY, NJ, RI, and WA have recently passed sweeping paid parental leave legislation into law.

Jane Waldfogel, Compton Foundation Centennial Professor of Social Work for the Prevention of Children’s and Youth Problems at Columbia School of Social Work, is a leading researcher on paid family leave policies in the U.S. She and her team have taken a specific look at California’s Paid Family Leave law (CA-PFL) and evaluated its reception by employers and employees across the state. CA-PFL was originally passed in 2002 and implemented in 2004. The law is groundbreaking in that it marked the first time a state mandated and administered a paid family leave program, making paid parental leave available to both fathers and mothers.

The researchers found that after the enactment of the law, California mothers and fathers took more leave overall, and fathers took more father-only and joint leave [15]. Compared to California fathers prior to the passage of the act, Waldfogel, et al identified a 46% increase in the likelihood of fathers taking family leave after the birth of their child. While this statistic represents a small overall increase in the number of days of leave taken (from approximately one week to 1.5 weeks), the increase in the intended behavior is significant. According to Waldfogel, et al, in 2013 less than 2% of employed men with children under the age of one in the United States reported being on leave [16]. 

The importance of the discovery that more parents, and especially fathers, took more parental leave as a result of this law cannot be overstated. It proves that these laws can produce the intended outcomes, giving parents more time at home to bond with and take care of their children without the worry of missing full paychecks. For low-income parents without prior access to paid leave through their employers, the law is particularly impactful. For the first time, they possess the same ability to care for their families as their higher-income peers. 

To be sure, the law is not a panacea.  Funding for the legislation is administered by the State Disability Insurance program, which employees pay into to receive Paid Family Leave (PFL)[JW1]. The PFL replaces 70% of a low-income employee’s wages and 60% of high-income earners’ wages over six weeks (up from 55% across the board when the law was first passed) [17].  Waldfogel’s research suggests that 55% of replaced wages might not have been enough to induce fathers to take the full six weeks of leave, so it will be important to investigate any increase in the likelihood of fathers taking leave in California due to increasing these measures.  It will also be critical to assess the increase in the amount of leave taken as a result of the wage replacement increase in 2018.

The Harvard Kennedy School Women and Public Policy Program hosted Waldfogel as a guest lecturer in March 2019.  The subject of her seminar was exploring the impact of paid family leave on employers [18]. [JW2]  She and her team surveyed employers in Rhode Island, New Jersey, and New York – three states that passed and implemented paid family leave laws. They found that across a range of industries and the spectrum of business size, fully two thirds of firms were supportive of paid family leavebusting the myth that these policies have detrimental impact on small businesses [19].

Final Recommendations for Paid Family and Medical Leave

Despite small shortfalls in the paid family leave wage replacement, the California Paid Family Leave act is an important model for the rest of the country.  First, 62% of American workers said they have had to or are very likely to have to take time off from work for a family or medical reason [20].  Many of those workers are low-income earners who say they cannot afford to forego their salary during that time. Paid family leave helps low-income workers and their families by allowing parents to take six weeks of paid family leave, giving them the ability to bond as a family or take care of a sick family member without the stress of having to choose between family and work [21]. Where men remain the primary breadwinners, even in dual-income families, the availability of paid leave for men is particularly important [22]. Second, through our research on other paid family leave models, the Insurance Program model appears to be a best practice. Insurance Programs have gained the approval of businesses and employees alike and could have better[JW3]  chance at becoming law than state-only or employer-only funded plans [23].  Finally, by enacting a paid family and medical leave policy rather than just parental leave, the law covers more workers making the appeal and the access to leave more comprehensive—across gender and life events. We believe these factors make for best policy and practice and encourage other states to adopt similar models.


[1] International Labor Organization “Maternity and Paternity at Work” 2014.
[2] The Rise in Dual Income Households.  Pew Research Center, 2012. https://www.pewresearch.org/ft_dual-income-households-1960-2012-2/
[3] US Department of Labor: Beareau of Labor Statistics. Women in the Labor Force: A databook. November 20167. https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/womens-databook/2017/home.htm
[4] Kurani et. al, “Paid Family Leave and Sick Days in the U.S.: Findings from the 2016 Kaiser/HRET Employer Health Benefits Survey” (2017).  https://www.kff.org/womens-health-policy/issue-brief/paid-family-leave-and-sick-days-in-the-u-s-findings-from-the-2016-kaiser-hret-employer-health-benefits-survey/
[5] Glynn, S. & Corley, D. “The Cost of Work-Family  Policy Inaction Quantifying the Costs Families Currently Face  as a Result of Lacking U.S. Work-Family Policies.” September, 2016.  https://cdn.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/22060013/CostOfWorkFamilyPolicyInaction-report.pdf
[6] Ruhm, C. “Parental leave and child health.” 2000. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0167629600000473
[7] O’Brien, M. “Fathers, Parental Leave Policies, and Infant Quality of Life: International Perspectives and Policy Impacts.”
[8] Galtry, J. 2003. The impact on breastfeeding of labour market policy and practice in Ireland, Sweden, and the USA. Social Science and Medicine 57:167-77.
[9] O’Brien, M. “Fathers, Parental Leave Policies, and Infant Quality of Life: International Perspectives and Policy Impacts.”
[10] Houser, L. & Vartanian, T. A Report from the Center for Women and Work, Pay Matters: The Positive Economic Impacts of Paid Family Leave for Families, Businesses and the Public. 2012. http://www.nationalpartnership.org/our-work/resources/workplace/other/pay-matters.pdf
[11] Huttunen’s (1996) as cited in O’Brien, 2007
[12] Tanaka and Waldfogel, 2007 as cited in O’Briend, 2007
[13] Victoria Budson’s Remarks. Democratic Steering and Outreach Committee, Meeting on Paid Leave.  March 18, 2015.
[14]The Council of Economic Advisors “The Economics of Paid and Unpaid Leave” 2014. http://whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/doc/leave_report_final.pdf
[15] Bartel, A. P., Rossin-Slater, M., Ruhm, C. J., Stearns, J., & Waldfogel, J. (2018). Paid Family Leave, Fathers’ Leave-Taking, and Leave-Sharing in Dual-Earner Households. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 37(1)
[16] Ibid
[18] Jane Waldfogel’s Remarks.  Women and Public Policy Program Seminar: Paid Family and Medical Leave: What Are We Learning from Surveys of Employers? March 28, 2019.
[19] Ibid.
[20] Horowitz, J., Parker, K., Graf, N., & Livingston, G. Americans Widely Support Paid Family and Medical Leave, but Differ Over Specific Policies.  Pew Research Center, 2017.  https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2017/03/23/americans-widely-support-paid-family-and-medical-leave-but-differ-over-specific-policies/
[21] Ibid.
[22] Bartel, A. P., Rossin-Slater, M., Ruhm, C. J., Stearns, J., & Waldfogel, J. (2018). Paid Family Leave, Fathers’ Leave-Taking, and Leave-Sharing in Dual-Earner Households. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, 37(1)
[23] Small Group Discussion with Jane Waldfogel, Harvard Kennedy School.  March 28, 2019.