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Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

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Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#371

Post by matthewmacleod »

woodpanel wrote: post #233
rytor718 wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's just logical self-interest which is exactly his #1 job if he's running his own business. This is precisely one of the cultural obstacles to correct. Dropping in a 1 year policy without substantial organizational preparation and planning is -- surprise -- doomed to fail. Like every single other aspect of organizational planning. The problem in the US is we simply do not value these kinds of things. We value ind…

> This is precisely one of the cultural obstacles to correct. I have to disagree: If a cultural obstacle at all, to me it's rather labeling civilizational accomplishments like ownership or property rights as a "cultural obstacle". > We value individuality foremost and I believe its among the top reasons parental leave is incomprehensible to many people While I can't speak for the US, in Germany we have a pretty gener…

Certainly it's not because of culture

It’s precisely because of culture. “Plain truth” is a bit of a sham.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#372

Post by matthewmacleod »

bluecalm wrote: post #159
dragonwriter wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If I am looking for 3rd programmer in my 2 person small company I will not risk hiring a young woman as getting a new employee to the stage where they contribute value is a huge cost. So, OTOH, is a sex discrimination lawsuit, especially when you are blatantly guilty. Also, most Western jurisdictions with paid or even unpaid but job-protected parental leave policies apply them without limitation by gender. And thes…

>>So, OTOH, is a sex discrimination lawsuit, especially when you are blatantly guilty. Yeah, lawsuit or my children not being able to afford college. Oh the choices... I think I am taking the lawsuit, especially that it will be very hard to prove anything with just one employee. >>Also, most Western jurisdictions with paid or even unpaid but job-protected parental leave policies apply them without limitation by gende…

Yeah, lawsuit or my children not being able to afford college

Run your business better. If an employee leaving—something that can already happen at any time due to causes outwith your control—means your children can’t go to college, then your chances of failure are already sky high.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#373

Post by matthewmacleod »

phil21 wrote: post #259
xutopia wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We hire interims or share responsibilities between other members of the team. It happens all the time and we rarely find an issue with this. If any company is run in such a way that bus-factor means the company can't thrive with one person gone you're simply doing it wrong.

> If any company is run in such a way that bus-factor means the company can't thrive with one person gone you're simply doing it wrong. Hacker News - where everyone forgot what an actual startup is. VC funded "startups" with millions in the bank should really be called something else entirely. Only in the past 20 years has that become the norm. Typically a startup is a self-funded enterprise with 1 or 2 key employees…

Hacker News - where everyone forgot what an actual startup is.

During those actual startup phases you likely have a bus factor of 1 or you are likely not doing anything remotely interesting

I’m sure you can appreciate why those two statements are not reconcilable. Stop gatekeeping.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#374

Post by woodpanel »

barry-cotter wrote: post #319
woodpanel wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Germany you'll get up to three years right-of-return. The employer doesn't pay you a dime. First twelve months you get approx. 60% of your current income from the government (BTW the same coverage people get when unemployed). You can expand those twelve months into 24, halving the amount of what you're paid. You can also apply for additional support (e.g. there's a fixed amount per kid you'll get until it reaches…

Germany’s total fertility rate is below all but one of its neighbours so whatever it’s doing it’s not making things easier for women who want to have children. Germany 1.41 France 1.98 Luxembourg 1.78 Denmark 1.74 Netherlands 1.66 Switzerland 1.44 Austria 1.38 Poland 1.27

Not to nitpick: Fertility rate (FR) in Germany is at 1.50 (2016), up from 1.24 (1994).

Other than that you're right.

One thing I keep hearing that actually worked better in Eastern Germany were the government funded expenses to make sure, women stayed financially independent from the father (and family), if need be (as indicated by the fact that Eastern German women that experienced the GDR are usually immune to today's extreme forms of feminism).

One thing in particular was that in the GDR day-nursery coverage was at 80%, in cities at 100% and they were completely free (except for the food). FR was higher than in Western Germany during the whole time GDR existed.

Note: This is not an endorsement of high government spending or communism. The US trumps all of Europe with their FR while having assumably a far looser social security net [1]. In GDR there also wasn't much choice for where to put your kids and the methods of caring for them were certainly blind to trends like "montessori" etc.

I guess, much of FR is due to economic predictability and less to the height of income you predict.

[1] For now, since US FR is declining, against the trend in Europe. Also of interest: How much of that rate (US or EU) is inflated by migrants?

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#375

Post by acchow »

patmcc wrote: post #307
simonsarris wrote: post #11

> [heading] How do they manage in Canada? > In Canada, companies have had no option but to make 52-week parental leaves work, when requested, since 2000. The question Canadian companies ask isn’t “Can we do it?” but “How do we do it?” Okay, so... how do they do it? They never answer the question. If you have say, a CFO or a specialist mechanic (that you only need 1 of, but definitely need) and they take a year off, w…

First, on the legal side: the firm can leave the position open, or hire a full or temporary person for it, but when the parent returns they get their old job back (or an equivalent one). Also it's not exactly 52 weeks parental leave, it's 13 weeks medical leave (for the mother expressly) and 39 weeks for either parent, to be split as desired. And that's just the paid component (which is paid by the unemployment insur…

> I've never seen any data that Canada has poorer gender equality or more age discrimination than the US.

Gender wage gap is much worse in Ontario than California (26% vs. 11%).

These are the two economic powerhouses of the respective countries. Hard to compare the nations on the whole since they differ in many other ways (Canada is a significantly more urban nation, for example).

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#376

Post by flemming_geir »

bluecalm wrote: post #159
dragonwriter wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If I am looking for 3rd programmer in my 2 person small company I will not risk hiring a young woman as getting a new employee to the stage where they contribute value is a huge cost. So, OTOH, is a sex discrimination lawsuit, especially when you are blatantly guilty. Also, most Western jurisdictions with paid or even unpaid but job-protected parental leave policies apply them without limitation by gender. And thes…

>>So, OTOH, is a sex discrimination lawsuit, especially when you are blatantly guilty. Yeah, lawsuit or my children not being able to afford college. Oh the choices... I think I am taking the lawsuit, especially that it will be very hard to prove anything with just one employee. >>Also, most Western jurisdictions with paid or even unpaid but job-protected parental leave policies apply them without limitation by gende…

What other laws are you willing to break in order to run your company? Are you fine with tax fraud?

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#377

Post by dagw »

Mirioron wrote: post #336
lhorie wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually have a friend who runs a restaurant with her husband. It's an _extremely low margins_ business with brutally long hours. She got pregnant and eventually took time off (she went back to China for a few months to get her parents to help with the baby). When she came back a few months later, surprise surprise, the business was still there. Did they have worries? Sure, stress from wait staff turnover, an air c…

Restaurants aren't exactly businesses where people become difficult to replace. Imagine you had a company that was trying to start a video service and the expert on ffmpeg goes on parental leave half way through. Good luck replacing somebody like that if you're not in a tech hotspot.

Imagine you had a company that was trying to start a video service and the expert on ffmpeg goes on parental leave half way through.

How is that different than that person getting hired by Google half way through? Other than the fact that with parental leave you generally get 4-6 month warning that it's coming and with someone change jobs you might not even get 4-6 weeks. Also at least in my experience people on parental leave will answer the phone/email if its important.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#378

Post by ionised »

barry-cotter wrote: post #319
woodpanel wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Germany you'll get up to three years right-of-return. The employer doesn't pay you a dime. First twelve months you get approx. 60% of your current income from the government (BTW the same coverage people get when unemployed). You can expand those twelve months into 24, halving the amount of what you're paid. You can also apply for additional support (e.g. there's a fixed amount per kid you'll get until it reaches…

Germany’s total fertility rate is below all but one of its neighbours so whatever it’s doing it’s not making things easier for women who want to have children. Germany 1.41 France 1.98 Luxembourg 1.78 Denmark 1.74 Netherlands 1.66 Switzerland 1.44 Austria 1.38 Poland 1.27

You can't infer from the birth rate that German women want to have kids but can't.

Birth rates drop as prosperity increases and people feel less need to have children (some rejecting children entirely), and Germany is one of the most prosperous countries in the world.

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#379

Post by ionised »

p1esk wrote: post #279
woodpanel wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it really that? I've come to think that it's rather the expectation that they are expensive. It is expected by employers as well as the old employees themselves, so if they would demand a lower than expected wage it would come across as fishy (did he serve time? an underachiever?). Another thing might be that with experience comes less naiveness. As you become more resilient against corporate BS you become equally…

Have you hired many 40+ year olds who are both good and cheap?

Why would you expect someone good to be cheap as well?

Re: Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation backtracks on one-year parental leaves

#380

Post by apexalpha »

908087 wrote: post #324
thetrb wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, calling a pregnant woman "leech-like" is one of the most misogynistic things I've ever read on HN.

They didn't call her "leech-like", they called her behavior "leech-like".. and it was. Should pregnant women be exempt from any type of judgement regardless of their behavior?

Or perhaps implementing a Canadian/European style parental leave program paid by taxes would mean this woman wouldn't have to act like this to get some support before/after having a child.
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