There should be a system that every n years you get a 6-month paid sabbatical that can be used for any purpose - studying, traveling, having a kid, anything. Because consider two women, one who wants kids and one who doesn’t. Why should woman 2 be disadvantaged? Isn’t that the exact opposite of equality?
Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
41–50 of 215 posts
Re: Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
#42It would have been a more interesting article had it also went into the downsides of this approach. One specific concern is that mandatory paternity leave may discourage men from becoming fathers, further decreasing the birth rate which is already quite low in many advanced economies. Another is that if taking paternity leave impacts men's careers, then in many cases both parents will suffer such an impact, further d…
> One specific concern is that mandatory paternity leave may discourage men from becoming fathers...
> Another is that if taking paternity leave impacts men's careers, then in many cases both parents will suffer such an impact...
As the article states: how are these factors different for men than for women?
Re: Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
#43These days when someone says, " Let's force someone to...", its usually a stupid idea.
Re: Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
#44It would have been a more interesting article had it also went into the downsides of this approach. One specific concern is that mandatory paternity leave may discourage men from becoming fathers, further decreasing the birth rate which is already quite low in many advanced economies. Another is that if taking paternity leave impacts men's careers, then in many cases both parents will suffer such an impact, further d…
Lowering the birth rates is the number one thing we can do to save the planet so I see that as a positive thing.
Re: Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
#45Can we stop linking and upvoting these article on HN, I've seen several in the last few months.
I don't see a clear link to hacker culture, if anything it's less relevant to developers as we often have some form of flexible working already.
The link I can see is that it's part of the gender culture war that has somehow become focussed on SV.
Re: Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
#46This seems really heavy handed. In my experience what’s valuable for men is flexibility, not some set number of weeks you have 100% off. I (as a father) went back to work at Fivetran 4 weeks after my son was born, but at 20 hours a week. That allowed me to help my partner during the initial recovery, but also be the primary parent (with daycare) from ~4-9 months when she returned to traveling for work in consulting.…
I think the primary point of the article is that this flexible planning is not functioning as an equalizer in the workplace (Title: Want Equality? Make New Dads Stay Home...) and that it could, and should. To turn it into more direct phrasing; a woman has to take a significant chunk of time off during a pregnancy by virtue of the condition, and this has a net effect on her career. When a woman takes off for pregnancy…
> When a woman takes off for pregnancy it is known up front it is for several months, and she is also indisposed during that time (can't answer questions or take quick phone calls, because she is not able to perform at peak levels while convalescing).
So wouldn't it be ideal for the mother's partner to be able to participate 24-7 to help her recover and to help both parents bond closely with the child? And not be expected to be tugged back by ties to work?
FWIW I had a lawyer who was messaging with clients from the delivery room. So not sure about your stereotype.
Re: Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
#47This seems really heavy handed. In my experience what’s valuable for men is flexibility, not some set number of weeks you have 100% off. I (as a father) went back to work at Fivetran 4 weeks after my son was born, but at 20 hours a week. That allowed me to help my partner during the initial recovery, but also be the primary parent (with daycare) from ~4-9 months when she returned to traveling for work in consulting.…
“What’s valuable for men...” It begins with “Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap”. Not, what would be valuable for men. A woman who just gave birth just spent an increasingly personally costly, and completely requisite (so long as the pregnancy is wanted), nine months simply getting to the maternity leave portion of the process. I can’t immagi how a woman would perceive for men to gawk at it even…
I meant valuable in terms of what I was contributing to the family ... when I took 9 months of part-time paternity leave. I feel like you didn’t really think about what I was saying. All of this was the result of lots of planning and long discussions between the two of us about how we would take care of our son, and how this would affect each of our careers — you really don’t need to lecture me here.
Re: Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
#48We western economies have to figure this out or we'll gradually depopulate, or live under fascist governments, or worse. Much of the gains of two-income parents goes into house prices to be closer to good schools - i.e. zero sum competition, while company incentives are to encourage people not to have children, or defer children until too late to maintain population, and essentially stopping the next generation of em…
>And then you mix migration driven by climate change Do you seriously believe the migration is driven by climate change, not by the difference in life quality driven by political/cultural differences?
Do you seriously believe that climate change isn't a factor? One need look no further than the Maldives for an extreme example, but there are little examples all over. Obviously people migrate for lots of different reasons, but climate change is becoming a serious one for a lot of people.
Re: Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
In theory, yes, but in practice taxes tend to favor married couples and people with children. So even if in the theoretical case you are right practically speaking we all share the cost of having children.
Sorry to be that guy but you're making a clear logical fallacy. The argument is "should we subsidize children" and you're substituting "does society want to subsidize children" and then for THAT you're substituting "do we currently subsidize children". You can only go from 1 to 2 by assuming something like tyranny of the majority. You can only go from 2 to 3 by assuming that the current system is exactly what society…
It is pretty safe to assume the tyranny of the majority in a democratic system and it is a given that society chose what it did, if it did not it would have changed.
'Given a blank slate' is so far from practice that it might as well be fiction.
Utopia is not suddenly going to spring to life, if you want it there is only one way to get there: get into politics, and good luck because the one word you will learn very quickly once you've arrived there is 'compromise'.
Re: Mandatory paternity leave would help close the wage gap
#50It would have been a more interesting article had it also went into the downsides of this approach. One specific concern is that mandatory paternity leave may discourage men from becoming fathers, further decreasing the birth rate which is already quite low in many advanced economies. Another is that if taking paternity leave impacts men's careers, then in many cases both parents will suffer such an impact, further d…
The downside is that it forces people who don't want children to pay for other people's children, at a time when we should be trying to reduce the population and not increase it. Having children is not a public service, it's closer to pollution and I object so much to subsidising it.