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Path: utzoo!decvax!decwrl!sun!dbercel
From: dbercel@sun.uucp (danielle & the Kitten brigade)
Newsgroups: net.women
Subject: Job protected maternity leave
Message-ID: <2711@sun.uucp>
Date: Tue, 27-Aug-85 11:51:55 EDT
Article-I.D.: sun.2711
Posted: Tue Aug 27 11:51:55 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 28-Aug-85 22:11:33 EDT
Distribution: na
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Inc.
Lines: 40

In the United States there is no national policy on maternity leave for
parents. The United States is the only industrialized nation without a
job protected maternity leave. What currently exists is the Pregnancy
Discrimination Act passed in 1978. This is a joke.

Consider:

     A hospital worker in Louisiana asked for a leave of absence in her
     second trimester. She was fired.

     An assistant drugstore manager became ill in her seventh month of
     pregnancy. She was fired.

     An Ohio banquet coordinator arranged for a temporary leave during
     her pregnancy. When she returned, she was fired.

The Pregnancy Discrimination Act classifies pregnancy and childbirth as
temporary disabilities, and stipulates that expectant mothers must
receive the same health insurance coverage, income and job protection as
employees who suffer other disabilities. However, an employer who does
not provide such fringe benefits is not required to establish them. Even
if a a company does provide disability benefit coverage, it usually only
covers the time during which you are medically certified unable to work -
usually no more than six to eight weeks. If you elect to extend your
leave by taking an unpaid leave of absence beyond the time when you are
medically disabled then the law no longer provides any protection.

Further, the act applies only to companies with fifteen or more
employees, to employment agencies and to labor organizations. If you
work for a smaller company...forget it.

There is currently a bill (HR2020) introduced by Pat Schroeder that would
require employers to give mothers OR fathers at least a four-month unpaid
leave and protect their jobs if they choose to stay home with a newborn,
newly adopted or seriously ill child.

What do you think?

I think this is just another example of how we're discriminated against
at so many levels.