Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave • Hacker News Board

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#291

Post by Lagged2Death » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 4:47 PM UTC

acangiano wrote: post #7

This is great. It sends the message that no matter who you are, prioritizing family over business is an option, especially when a newborn has arrived. I'm also willing to bet that it's good for business. An employee with better relationships at home is more likely to be productive at work in the long term.

...no matter who you are, prioritizing family over business is an option...

"Prioritizing family over business" would be, say, 30-to-40-hour work weeks - or even just staying home, period - for the next 12-to-18 years.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#292

Post by jedrek » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 4:48 PM UTC

humanrebar wrote: post #267

ryanmonroe wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who "forced" you to buy a Microsoft OS?

I have to use MS or Apple OSs to work from home.

That's between you and your employer.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#293

Post by nascentmind » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 4:56 PM UTC

dalke wrote: post #222

nascentmind wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have seen that most of kids who have struggled in their childhood because of say low income from their parents or bad family have a kind of a fighting spirit. Most of the people who you see achieve greatness either say in sports or in engineering come from really poor and troubled backgrounds. Now compare that to the upper middle class and the rich whose kids have been given all the resources and you don't see much…

You have a massive survivor bias in your example of greatness in sports. The odds of achieving greatness in sports is very low. If you come from a rich background, and want to maximize your chances of having a well-paying career, you do not go into sports. You go into law, or medicine, or banking, etc. Sure, the top players get paid well, but then look at what, say, minor league players get. But if you come from a po…

>But if you come from a poor family, then sports is one of the ways to get out of poverty, because even if you can't go pro, there's still the chance of college athlete funding or becoming a coach for a school.

This is true. In India for example engineering and medicine are the ways to get out of poverty. Hence there is an over representation.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#294

Post by nascentmind » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 4:59 PM UTC

stickfigure wrote: post #223

nascentmind wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have seen that most of kids who have struggled in their childhood because of say low income from their parents or bad family have a kind of a fighting spirit. Most of the people who you see achieve greatness either say in sports or in engineering come from really poor and troubled backgrounds. Now compare that to the upper middle class and the rich whose kids have been given all the resources and you don't see much…

Do you have some statistical evidence to support the claim that people from low income and bad families are overrepresented in the higher echelons of sports of engineering? I strongly suspect quite the opposite is true. It is not sufficient to view a few examples - after all, a huge portion of the population comes from 'really poor and troubled backgrounds'.

No I don't. It is just an observation. Now in for e.g. India there are a lot of people going into engineering or medicine as a way out of poverty. So you are right but now it is the profession through which to get out of poverty and there will be a lot of people from poor and troubled families in it.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#295

Post by Turing_Machine » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 4:59 PM UTC

veidr wrote: post #134

Turing_Machine wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is probably going to get me voted down, but maybe...just maybe ...you shouldn't be having kids if the only job you can get is McDonalds or Yum! Brands (i.e., Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, etc.). If you choose to have a child when your resources are that limited, your non-paternity leave is going to be among the least of the child's problems.

Ha ha! You probably should have been voted down, but OK, let's take a look at your idea. You are saying 1 out of 4 American workers shouldn't have kids[1]. If everybody followed your advice, a lot of pretty influential people wouldn't have been born: Steve Jobs, J.K. Rowling, Larry Ellison (OK maybe that works in your argument's favor). Jay Z. Abraham Lincoln. Barack Obama. I wouldn't be here, either; my dad was a sh…

Steve Jobs was raised by parents wealthy enough to send him to Reed College. His biological parents were grad students who (I believe) later became professors (or at least his father did). None of those people were working McDonald's jobs with no prospects for anything better.

Barack Obama? You're citing Barack OBAMA? That would be the same Barack Obama who was raised by his banker grandparents, sent to a fancy private school (current tuition: $22,000/year), then through Columbia and Harvard?

Yep. McDonald's all the way, there, dude.

In any case, citing people who overcame poverty does not refute the overall point. In fact, the only reason we tell stories about these people is because they are rare exceptions. I mean, Stevie Wonder is a great musician who happens to be blind. That doesn't mean we should intentionally make more people blind in the hope of producing more Stevie Wonders. Neither should we encourage people living in poverty to have children that they cannot afford.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#296

Post by wpietri » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 5:10 PM UTC

melted wrote: post #198

wpietri wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am astounded by the arrogance of you thinking you know his life and situation better than he himself does. And so well that you feel entitled to lecture him in public.

I am astounded that you're astounded. Seems like common sense advice to me: put your family ahead of everything else. That's what I do, anyway. Once "everything else" starts to interfere, I make sure to change my circumstances to make sure that my family gets the attention it so richly deserves.

Yes, it's such obvious common-sense advice that you presuming he has never heard it is arrogant. The problem is not the advice; it's you appointing yourself qualified to lecture somebody with little understanding of their situation.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#297

Post by Turing_Machine » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 5:11 PM UTC

lghh wrote: post #272

VanillaLime wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're suggesting that being poor is a genetic condition (and one that apparently should be perpetuated)? Because that sounds even more dehumanizing than suggesting that the poor consider their resources before choosing to have children.

No, I am suggesting that people born into poverty are much more likely to stay in poverty and people not born in poverty are much more likely to stay out of poverty. Poverty is generational, social conditions can be passed down from parent to child without being genetic.

"No, I am suggesting that people born into poverty are much more likely to stay in poverty"

And I am advocating for fewer people being born into poverty.

Why are you opposed to this?

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#298

Post by engi_nerd » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 5:16 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #296

melted wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am astounded that you're astounded. Seems like common sense advice to me: put your family ahead of everything else. That's what I do, anyway. Once "everything else" starts to interfere, I make sure to change my circumstances to make sure that my family gets the attention it so richly deserves.

Yes, it's such obvious common-sense advice that you presuming he has never heard it is arrogant. The problem is not the advice; it's you appointing yourself qualified to lecture somebody with little understanding of their situation.

It's advice that I acted upon in 2014, when I realized,as we were about to try for pregnancy #1, that my then-employer was untenable. No promotion potential, mandatory 20+ hours a week of unpaid overtime, lots of deployments (up to 6 months a year away from home), no commonality with engineering done anywhere else...I moved and got the job I have now with hyphenated-corporation. It's big and evil, sure, but my immediate management (up to 2 levels above me) treat me well and respect the work that I've done for them. So I am loyal to them, but not the corporation. It's the corporation that has these policies that I don't like, but my management worked with me to soften the blow as much as possible.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#299

Post by eli » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 5:29 PM UTC

grandalf wrote: post #281

Jach wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which large tech companies don't have paid paternity leave? It's kind of a common thing... https://www.fatherly.com/50-best-places-to-work-for-new-dads...

Ahh, unfortunately most startups can't afford that kind of policy.

I think that's wrong. A few months leave is far more affordable and desirable over replacing a valuable employee or having a very unhappy and burned out employee forced to return to work. Not to mention the positive benefits that policies like this have on recruiting.

It's also just the right thing to do.

Re: Mark Zuckerberg Will Take Two Months Off from Facebook for Paternity Leave

#300

Post by ta0o0o0 » Sat, Nov 21, 2015, 5:49 PM UTC

collyw wrote: post #216

ta0o0o0 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you plan on retiring? Who's going to produce the goods and services you intend to purchase in your retirement? First world birth rates are already low. Under your guidance we'd have a demographic crisis like you wouldn't believe. Sure, there's immigration, but I don't see why your rule doesn't apply to poor people in other countries.

Fuck up the planet in order to preserve the ecconomic system. Does anything strike you as wrong with that?

The comment I was replying to said nothing about the environment, only individual wealth.

Also, it doesn't matter what economic system you're using, if your ratio of working people to non-working people decreases, your quality of life will also decrease.

Lastly, what I said doesn't require the population to grow, only to stay constant. If you want to reduce the population because it's somehow bad for the planet, you can do it gradually.