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How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

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Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#301

Post by Dylan16807 »

wodenokoto wrote: post #296
shas3 wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hope you are not trolling, because your assertions about the 'other side' are egregiously wrong and pseudo-logical. 1) Toddler's do contribute to economy (fertility rate, up to a point is positively correlated with economic growth). Ageing populations are bad for the economy [1], 2) Well-being and good policies are correlated and causally linked to better productivity [2]. [1] e.g. http://blogs.wsj.com/chinarealtime/…

OP's suggestion actually does make economic sense, if and only if you import enough people. I don't think any country currently import enough resourceful people to make up for the high quality they themselves can produce. But I definitely think you could make it work. Hypothetically, not humanely.

Not humanely???

Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#302

Post by shawabawa3 »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #300
Domenic_S wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that it's trade-offs. UK's maternity leave - considered the gold standard by many - does indeed allow 52 weeks, but only the first 6 weeks are paid at 90%, then from week 7-39, you get a paltry £136.78/week. Weeks 40-52 are unpaid (some employers offer "enhanced benefits" that override these numbers, but now we're back to relying on employers' generosity). Indeed a tough problem.

Edit: I can't read

It's 6 weeks paid, 10.5 months mostly unpaid

Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#303

Post by Dylan16807 »

the_ancient wrote: post #265
SCdF wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine we will never agree on this, as it sounds like our opinions could not differ more. To sum up with an example though: a few elections ago I voted for the political party who had stated that they would raise my taxes (in particular, the bracket I get paid in). I did so because I consider myself very fortunate to work in a clean ventilated office, and sit at a desk solving programming problems. I don't think i…

Allow me to sum up with a quote... "It’s amazing to me how many people think that voting to have the government give poor people money is compassion. Helping poor and suffering people is compassion. Voting for our government to use guns to give money to help poor and suffering people is immoral self-righteous bullying laziness. People need to be fed, medicated, educated, clothed, and sheltered, and if we’re compassio…

You don't think it's mostly objective whether people are being helped? I don't care about the joy of helping nearly as much as actual help. Fuck moral credit. Actually help people. Force everyone to give instead of relying on charity from the few.

Yes, it is bullying. That's the only complaint in that quote that makes any sense.

Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#304

Post by Dylan16807 »

the_ancient wrote: post #282
aperrien wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (3) Unlike something like cancer pregnancy is not an accident. If you can't afford to pay for children, don't have them. It's not an accident, it's merely one of the foundations of any healthy society. I'm willing to part with a bit of our collective wealth to help raise them.

ahh good old communism... Everything is owned by the collective and we have no personal wealth.... North Korea Welcomes you

Yes. If even a single dollar is taxed, that means personal property ceases to exist. Thank you for explaining it to us.

Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#305

Post by Dylan16807 »

pc86 wrote: post #231
ropiku wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also a EU court decided that you get sick days even if you are on holiday: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-18534028

Maybe I'm too engrained in the American way of thinking, but why in the world if you are sick on Christmas (when you're already being paid while off) should you get paid again in the terms of additional sick days? It doesn't make any sense to me.

I can make a similar argument in the other direction. Vacation days are roughly equivalent to money, and many companies let you convert them. If you get sick on a normal day it doesn't cost you any money/vacation. Why should it cost you money/vacation to get sick on an attempted vacation day?

If anything you're already doing the company a favor to use sick days on vacation rather than any other time because everyone has already planned for you to not be there.

Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#306

Post by yardie »

sosborn wrote: post #186
yardie wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is those problem employers are in the majority. The many employers you're thinking of are typically in the STEM fields or highly unionized gov't, manufacturing, transportation industries.

>The many employers you're thinking of are typically in the STEM fields or highly unionized gov't, manufacturing, transportation industries. Not trying to start an argument, but do you have any sources for this? I work for an independent school and my benefits are fantastic.

> I work for an independent school and my benefits are fantastic.

Thank you. This is the perfect example of an anecdote. Walmart, the largest employer in the US at 2.2mm employees. Guess who FMLA benefits don't apply to? Small businesses (And know I don't have numbers. Other countries have created a uniform referable benefits baseline that companies are required to provide. For me to answer your question I would need to interrogate every US company. There are research companies that do exactly that, I would need to pay for their answers.

Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#307

Post by CalRobert »

Domenic_S wrote: post #275
ebrenes wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the Costa Rica case was a real bummer for me. Just had my first child and I only managed to get 5 days from the company, they were nice enough to throw in 2 additional days to my 3 days. To at least make it a week. There's a bit of a caveat to the women's 4 months, those 4 months start by law 1 month before the child is scheduled to be born and continue for 3 months. We would have preferred more time after the…

Wow, that's really interesting! I am always amazed at the geographic diversity in tech.

Costa Rica is pretty heavily vested in tech, actually.

"... In 2006 Intel's microprocessor facility alone was responsible for 20% of Costa Rican exports and 4.9% of the country's GDP.[20][21]..."

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Costa_Rica

Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#308

Post by NateDad »

the_ancient wrote: post #263
mikeash wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It appears that a lot of people think it is the business of government to force that on business owners. I think you'd do better if you could justify your position instead of just flatly declaring it as if it were an objectively verifiable fact.

It is a combination of how people look at employment, and how people look at government Many(most) people have this entitlement mentality where by government, society, employers "owe them". Employment is simply you selling your labor to the highest bidder. Company X needs Y labor done for them, you have the ability to perform that labor so you agree to a wage where by said labor gets done. Nothing more. It is not a "…

The job of the government is to help us make our world a better place. If the job of government was just to resolve conflict, we'd have no roads, no bridges, no public education, we'd all be working 100 hour weeks for a pittance, and the world would be a really really awful place that none of us would like to live in. To think otherwise is just foolishness.

Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#309

Post by NateDad »

secabeen wrote: post #294
the_ancient wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Allow me to sum up with a quote... "It’s amazing to me how many people think that voting to have the government give poor people money is compassion. Helping poor and suffering people is compassion. Voting for our government to use guns to give money to help poor and suffering people is immoral self-righteous bullying laziness. People need to be fed, medicated, educated, clothed, and sheltered, and if we’re compassio…

The problem with this argument is that if we only relied on compassion, people who fit well into community norms would be taken care of, and those people who didn't would get lesser or no services.

I think most people have no idea how much it costs to do half the things the government does, and so even if everyone was compassionate, they'd give far less money than is actually needed, even for the socially normal people.

Re: How My Employer Put the “FML” in FMLA

#310

Post by sliekasbekelniu »

Domenic_S wrote: post #268
ska wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One common view is that 4-6 weeks is, in fact, terrible. Of course it's all trade-offs, but the US is a long ways from most similar countries in this respect, and I can see people getting frustrated with it. In many places there are reasonable options to manage a combined year of parental leave, for example.

I dunno about a long way off... what I'm seeing are medium-long amounts of time and a paltry % of your pay, and often only for mothers. Canada for example offers 50 weeks (wow!) of 55% pay (uh oh) with a 2 week waiting period (ooo..) up to a max of $501/week (eek). Costa Rica gives women 4 months at 100% (yay!) but only 3 days for fathers (boo). Japan is 14 weeks 60%, nothing for fathers. Examples are many at http://…

Thats why I like Lithuania, you can take this:

1 year 100% or 2 years: 52 weeks 70% and 52 weeks 40% (either mother or father can take it or take the leave in shifts)

And you could even do Like this:

1 Year Mother 100 %, next Year Father 100 % - awesome, right?

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