Paid maternity leave is a hot political issue in Australia at the moment.
Mothers get a $500 baby bonus in addition to any family allowance entitlements. The jury's
out on the paid maternity leave on a national scale, but some companies are already offering this.
Coles, a major supermarket chain offers 14 weeks paid maternity leave. Aldi, a discount supermarket chain is soon to follow. Even pizza giant Dominos offers 8 weeks paid maternity leave in Australia.
Small business owners are concerned about the prospect of having to pay employees for maternity leave if this becomes law. This is a major cost. While paid maternity leave may possibly pay off in employee loyalty, it will cost dearly in productivity and continuity.
Imagine if you had to pay employees who were not at work. There may be a scheme where the government subsidizes it, but this detail is still all being discussed.
Australia, America and New Zealand are major industrialized nations still not offering paid maternity leave.
The Courier Mail offers these stats -
- Afghanistan and China - 90 days full pay
- Australia - 1 year no pay
- Canada - 17-18 weeks 55% pay
- Hungary - 24 weeks full pay
- Japan -14 weeks 60% pay
- New Zealand - 14 weeks no pay
- USA - 12 weeks no pay
- As a small business owner, what are your thoughts on paid maternity leave?
I can certainly see both sides of this issue. On one hand I understand how it would not necessarily be cost effective for businesses to pay employees who are not working, on the other hand, I can see the benefit of showing employees that you really care about them by implementing such a policy. In the US when people have paid into unemployment, they can collect that while on maternity leave. It's only a percentage of your work income but I think that's fair. I would be interested to see if paid maternity leave is sustainable for small business owners. Maybe there could be some sort of exemption for the smaller companies that probably couldn't sustain such a policy.
Posted by: Kimberlee Morrison | May 26, 2008 10:42 AM | Permalink to Comment