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Businesses United States

American Express Will Give All Parents 20 Weeks Of Paid Leave (cnn.com) 179

Posted by msmash from the making-changes dept.
Starting in January, the financial services giant will expand its paid parental leave policy for mothers and fathers to 20 weeks at full pay, plus another six to eight weeks for women who give birth and require medical leave. Full-time and part-time employees who have worked at Amex for at least a year are eligible. CNN adds: That's a big shift from the company's current policy of offering six weeks of paid leave for the primary parent plus another six to eight weeks for birth mothers who require medical leave. Secondary caregivers, meanwhile, have gotten just two weeks. Under the new policy, parents will also have access to a 24-hour lactation consultant. And mothers who go on business trips will be able to ship their breast milk home for free.
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American Express Will Give All Parents 20 Weeks Of Paid Leave More

American Express Will Give All Parents 20 Weeks Of Paid Leave

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  • All parents? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Oswald McWeany ( 2428506 ) on Monday December 12, 2016 @03:11PM (#53470685)

    I'm a parent, I don't work for American Express... will they give me 20 weeks?

    • They will give you all the time you need. And they will even pay the rate that they are currently paying you!

    • Good Lord... half of Seattle doesn't take AMEX due to the higher-than-otherwise merchant fees, and they focus their money on *this*?

      Ugh.

      I don't mind that they do nice things for their employees, but a potential problem: should AMEX come into financial troubles, the incentive to offshore/contract employees (and use them as replacements for the existing ones who get fired or laid off) will now get much bigger if the money flow ever gets tight (or the board decides they really need to bump the stock price by e

  • so we single folks (Score:4, Insightful)

    by anthony_greer ( 2623521 ) on Monday December 12, 2016 @03:14PM (#53470713)

    get to pick up the slack with no extra PTO or a larger salary? I understand the need to help parents, and i don't dispute it. I get that maybe parents needsome time out for a new birth or to leave early or come in late or take time off now and again to deal with older kids, but 20 weeks at full pay? doesn't that put a huge burden on those who dont have kids to pick up the slack?

    • Re:so we single folks (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Shinobi ( 19308 ) on Monday December 12, 2016 @03:17PM (#53470743)

      Only if the work environment is already completely fucked up

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      The benefit is to you as a human. Your parents, had this policy been in place, would have been better able to care for you as an infant.

      Non-breeders needn't look at this as discrimination. The kid is the one who really benefits and we were all kids.

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by anthony_greer ( 2623521 )

        I dont look at it as discrimination, I think parents should be given help making sure they can care for their kids. But 20 paid weeks off while the non parents get what? two or three weeks a year of sick/vacation time? Lets flip this on its head, lets say some company did say "we evaluated things and saw that non parent singles worked more hours and got more done so we are giving the single childless people 20% higher pay"...how fast would that land in court?

        • You get the benefit of not having to deal with a screaming kid ever. You can just decide to shoot heroin or play world of warcraft for 30 straight hours and nobody will call you a bad person for neglecting your kid...

          You make up the 20 weeks in just leisure time that you can spend how you will...

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by dfghjk ( 711126 )

            The topic is paid time off, not the benefits of not having children.

            The work NOT done by employees who don't come to work for 6 straight months has to be covered by someone.

            • Yeah, it's not like everyone has kids all at the same time of year or anything. You are distributing the workload among other co-workers, those with as well as those without kids.

              On the surface, this seems like just because someone decides to have a kid, they get all kinds of extra perks. The thing is, yeah, they get extra perks, but they also have to work their ass off to be a parent.

              I am perfectly fine being the single guy with no kids. I love my freedom. No amount of minor perks is going to get me to giv

              • Yeah, it's not like everyone has kids all at the same time of year or anything.

                September is the most common birth month, I would assume it's because more children are conceived during the cold months because people stay home and warm in bed.

        • Re:so we single folks (Score:5, Insightful)

          by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Monday December 12, 2016 @05:16PM (#53471553) Homepage Journal

          Look at the bigger picture, in 30 years time you will need the children of today to be around to maintain a viable society and economy. If you make it so unattractive to have children that people don't, you will have a major problem like Japan. The only solution will be massive immigration, and you probably won't like that either.

          Another way to think of it is that by deciding not to have children you already saved yourself a tonne of money, while still benefiting from other people's kids in the long run.

          Rather than being jealous of new parents and the time they get off, maybe you should demand more time off for everyone. In Europe a year for new parents and a minimum of 28 days holiday (which can include national holidays, so typically around 20-22 days you can pick) is normal. We don't have "sick days", you just take time off for illness as you need it, and if you get sick on your holiday you get those days back. I realize this seems insanely socialist to Americans, but honestly our economies don't collapse because of it and in fact it's actually the minimum level you can expect.

          • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

            by Anonymous Coward

            Exactly. If people don't come to work sick, they don't get everyone else sick, etc.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Ogive17 ( 691899 )
          You're acting like staying home with a newborn baby is something easy.

          I can assure you those first few months are far more stressful than just about anything going on at work, especially with a first child.

          This new policy from AmEx is a recruitment bonus for young professionals. I think it's excellent.

      • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        If parents simply decided that children had priority over wealth, and one of the two gave up their job to care for the children they decided to have, that would be better still. Fuck their "I want it all" attitude and the expectation that society should support them in achieving it. And fuck those who would provide support which allows them to breed more easily.

        • Mod this parent up! if i could i would. Live within the means of one salary for a few years if you value one parent being with the child/children around teh clock for some amount of time. My folks did it, and many of my friends parents did too. They gave up the shiny new cars and yearly vacations for what for me was a pretty great family life.

      • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        No. This will sound harsh....but I do not care about your kid. It's not my job to care about your kid. Perhaps in a "make the world a better place" mentality, I should. But I don't. You should not get a paid vacation and I do not because you chose to have a child.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by SirSlud ( 67381 )

          Yeah, ask your parents how much of a vacation it is to take care of a newborn for 6 months. In fact, I'm fairly sure I couldn't pay you to do it.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by dfghjk ( 711126 )

        "Non-breeders needn't look at this as discrimination."

        But they should, after all that's EXACTLY what it is.

        "The kid is the one who really benefits and we were all kids."

        No, it's the parents that benefit. Kids weren't neglected when this wasn't available.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by SirSlud ( 67381 )

          You can't discriminate against people who choose not to have children. It's a choice.

          And having kids is a natural biological function of life. Good luck trying to convince people that you deserve anything more than the inherent independence and freedom you get from choosing not to have kids.

          We're also sorry that your parents raised such a whiner.

        • "Non-breeders needn't look at this as discrimination."

          But they should, after all that's EXACTLY what it is.

          It's exactly the same sort of discrimination as non-breeders having to pay taxes to support schools.

          Kids weren't neglected when this wasn't available.

          This clearly enables parents to take the time to bond more strongly with their young children, and that pays dividends later. Can that be done without? Sure. We also used to have our kids breathe lead fume-filled air and society got by... but had a significantly higher violent crime rate. Stronger, more stable families benefit everyone, including those who don't have kids.

    • Presumably PT positions would be upgraded to FT or temps would be brought in. This is about attracting and retaining talent, not about fucking people over.

      • Oh it is about fucking people over. Specifically, making life harder for recruitment and retention people who work in the credit card industry, but not for AmEx.

        Who knows - perhaps this desire to harm your competition's recruitment and retention will substitute for corporate America's long-established policy of bum-fucking their employees morning, noon and night.

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      I'm single and don't plan to marry of have kids. But other people do. That's just a fact of life, and hardly the only instance of life not being "fair".

      Since some people are going to have children, it makes sense to me to accommodate this reality in the most constructive way possible. Its either pick up the "slack" for someone on parental leave, pick up the "slack" for someone who is stressed out with a new baby or pick up the "slack" while someone is replaced. IMO, the first option is preferable.

      Plus, I wo

      • Exactly this.

        I used to think that it was unfair that breeders get all kinds of breaks. But then I learned how difficult it is to raise a child. I don't envy parents at all and they really do deserve every break they get (and they don't get that many, really).

        I am perfectly happy with giving them all these breaks and more because I can do whatever I want, whenever I want. They can't.

        Yeah, they may have chosen to have children. But on the other side of that, I chose not to have children knowing full well that

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      It's not even single folks. It's anyone that chooses to not have kids. It's horseshit.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ghoul ( 157158 )

        Its even worse. Its age discrimination. Say I am a 35-40 year old. I join Amex. I have kids and I have already gone through the hell taht is infancy and toddlerhood. My kids are now in school and I pay for after school day care so that I can work. Now I have to pick up the slack for 20 year olds who go off for 6 months ?

    • This isn't "20 weeks anytime a parent feels they need time off." This is 20 weeks from the birth of your child. As the parent of two kids, I can tell you that the first three months of a child's life is basically hell on the parents. The new baby has no set schedule and will wake up at all hours of the day or night to be fed, changed, held, etc. The baby might sleep for an hour before waking up for a diaper change and then sleep another half hour before wanting to be fed. Since the parents basically need to

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by msauve ( 701917 )
        "this then burdens the other parent with taking care of the baby 100% - likely the woman who just had a major medical event and is still recovering."

        It's amazing you're even here, what with all the harsh realities your ancestors had to actually deal with in life. If you're unable to make life choices which you can handle yourself, you have no one to blame but yourself.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by Anonymous Coward

          What, you mean when our ancestors lived in villages and the entire village helped out the new parents?

          It is only recent behaviour that new parents are living within other people and both working full time in a job located away from your dwelling

    • not really.
      In a small company, yes, but in a company as big as Amex you always have people on vacation/out sick/etc. your headcount is likely actually +1 or +2 of what you need in an idealized model anyway because of that (within an org level that 1-2 heads == ~8% of staff).

    • Travel to a country outside of the US. Their companies have managed to not collapse under the weight of parental leave. Perhaps ask them how they do it.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by phorm ( 591458 )

      It doesn't seem to add all that much burden in Canada or other countries that similarly don't treat new parents like garbage. If you can't do without sombody in a planned absence (parenthood has some pretty predictable dates), then you're even more SOL if they change jobs, get hit by a car, etc etc.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by DogDude ( 805747 )
        If you can't do without sombody in a planned absence (parenthood has some pretty predictable dates), then you're even more SOL if they change jobs, get hit by a car, etc etc.

        Absolutely not. If somebody leaves, you replace them. If somebody has a kid, you have to find somebody to do their job temporarily while they're away. Completely different situations, and the latter is significantly more difficult for a company to deal with.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by phorm ( 591458 )

          If you look at it that way, I suppose. However a correct way to address either situation is to ensure that your processes, documentation, etc allow for staff turnover of any type. Given the number of mid-large companies that also tend to make use of contractors, it's not much different than what's necessary to get a contractor up to snuff to temporarily fill out a project team.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by DogDude ( 805747 )
            That doesn't help small companies. What if the person leaving on maternity or paternity is 1/10 of the workforce? What if they're 1/8? What if they're 1/4? It's devastating to have to hold a position open for somebody for smaller companies.

            • Re: (Score:1)

              by phorm ( 591458 )

              And yet, again, it works in so many countries.

              Better than forcing staff to choose between losing their job and having offspring,
              Better than forcing staff to come back to work to come right back to work without time to bond and heal, then give their kids up to a caregiver during the daylight hours

              And this is AMERICAN EXPRESS, so I'm pretty sure they can afford to do it, and I'm also fairly sure that if it was a big impact on revenue they wouldn't have done so.

              Also pretty sure that neither you nor I work at A

    • Presumably you get the benefit of being at work and not missing 20 weeks of project work and product development. If you can't use this to impress upon your managers or bosses that you're worth more or use your extra time to become more vital to the company and get promotions than either you don't actually provide any additional benefit over someone who was taking leave or the management isn't capable of realizing what their employees are worth and you're stuck with some arbitrary system for advancement tha

      • When women chose to drop out of the workforce to have children, whether it is 20 weeks or whatever, their non-childbearing cohorts--usually males--continue to accrue experience and visibility. They earn raises and promotions. The child-bearing women then sue because they were not given raises or promotions, or at least complain about the "gender gap" and push for laws that force employers to ignore the raw fact that the child-bearing women (and their partners who might also choose to sit out for weeks or mo

    • Re:so we single folks (Score:5, Informative)

      by Piata ( 927858 ) on Monday December 12, 2016 @04:12PM (#53471111)

      This is such a bizarre and staunchly American attitude. In Canada you automatically get 17 weeks paid leave when having a child. You can also take an unpaid parental leave for up to 35 weeks and your employer cannot penalize you in any way for taking these leaves. The Canadian government is currently look at increasing the paid leave and applying it more equally to men and women in the future as the current system is felt to be inadequate.

      Typically when someone goes on parental leave in my workplace a new employee is brought on temporarily under contract to "pick up the slack". If you choose not to have children or are not in a position to have children well then that's just too bad for you. Raising children is a huge commitment, both in time and money and there absolutely should be support from government and business to make major life events like this easier. It also encourages new mothers to do what's best for their health and the baby's by staying home and taking care of the newborn.

      As someone from the outside looking in, the American system seems downright barbaric and more companies need to be doing what American Express is.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Luthair ( 847766 )
        Worth noting this is through Employment Insurance - as a Canadian, but not a parent I assume this means most people don't get their full wages.

      • >"This is such a bizarre and staunchly American attitude."

        So you think it is not at all unfair that people who choose to have children get 20 weeks of paid off-time while people who choose to not have children get nothing? Even though those non-children people might have, in their minds, equally important family or life things they might have to deal with? Those same people who choose to not have children might have a new pet and get no time off to care for it, train it, bond with it. They might have

    • In addition to everyone else's comment, think of it as an investment in the people who change the diapers of the people who are going to change your diapers.
    • That'd be a like a healthy person complaining they pay the same insurance premium as their obese coworkers.... technically correct but still going off on a bit of a tangent
    • A lot of big companies that give this time off usually have spare capacity on staff to be assigned to cover such things. I once started at a job where my nominal boss had already been out for 2 months on maternity leave, my temporary manager (not a temp, a full employee on staff who had literally become a floating manager for these kind of assignments) was my boss for my first 5 months, and she had been assigned the position before my real boss had gone out, so that she already knew the dept when my manager

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by eth1 ( 94901 )

      get to pick up the slack with no extra PTO or a larger salary? I understand the need to help parents, and i don't dispute it. I get that maybe parents needsome time out for a new birth or to leave early or come in late or take time off now and again to deal with older kids, but 20 weeks at full pay? doesn't that put a huge burden on those who dont have kids to pick up the slack?

      As a single person with no kids, even I won't complain about giving a new parent a break.

      That said, no way am I working a bunch of extra hours for 20 weeks to cover for an event that you knew damn well was coming for the last nine months. If you didn't get temp help, that means you're OK with stuff falling behind while they're gone.

    • doesn't that put a huge burden on those who dont have kids to pick up the slack?

      The beauty of the situation is you can choose to work at a company that offers parents such leave or not.

      As a single person, you can make this choice, as a couple wanting to have kids you can make this choice, as a couple not wanting to have kids you can make this choice.

      What would be a problem would be a one-size-fits all solution. You're right on the math, so by choosing your employer you can choose for a better chance at a

    • You probably can get someone in as a temp for 20 weeks for most jobs. It is around 5 months after all.

  • Congratulations America (Score:4, Informative)

    by Computershack ( 1143409 ) on Monday December 12, 2016 @04:09PM (#53471097)
    ..you're only now 19 weeks behind Statutory Maternity Pay in the UK.

  • I'm curious how this story is technology or science related?

  • I already see comments from single people or people who choose to not have kids saying we "breeders" are taking advantage of them. A policy like this makes sense. Families are already screwed up because unless you want to live in the middle of nowhere, a two-income household is becoming a requirement. Either both parents have to work low end jobs to make ends meet, or the cost of living is so high in regions with jobs that both parents have to be able to cover that so they can do the work they're qualified

    • Re:Here come the complaints about "breeders"... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by cayenne8 ( 626475 ) on Monday December 12, 2016 @05:37PM (#53471695) Homepage Journal

      Families are already screwed up because unless you want to live in the middle of nowhere, a two-income household is becoming a requirement.

      Well, depends, I guess, on your definition of "middle of nowhere".

      IMHO, unless you consider anywhere outside of LA, NYC, SF and other hugely $$$$ places to live, middle of nowhere....there are plenty of places with reasonable cost of living in the US. And you can still live in a decent place, in a safe neighborhood, where children still play outside, and get by on a single income family. Yes, I am talking about a 'real job', not a burger flipper, but I believe that's what we're all discussing here.

      No, you won't have the latest toys, not the newest car....and you won't be going out that much, but hey, that's what my parents did. Mom stayed at home with me till I was in about 2nd grade and then gradually began working again, up to full time by the time I was old enough to come home from grade school and stay on my own will they got home from work. No problems.

      We cooked at home most all meals, nothing wrong with that, forced us to eat a bit healthier, AND, I was taught from a young age how to cook myself.

      Sure, being a parent is tough, it takes sacrifice both personally and fiscally, But this isn't a new thing...parents have been doing this forever till now.

      Don't have them, unless you are willing to make those sacrifices. I never wanted to be tied down with the little fiscal boat anchors, so I chose not to have any...I like my time and my disposable income. A choice you make. I could NOT have both, and I chose my path and am happy with it.

      If you choose to have kids....you need to take what goes with it and if you have to move to an area with a lower cost of living, then be prepared to do that. Don't expect others to take up the slack for you.

      • Fine post, I couldn't agree more. Engineer/analyst (defense industry), married, four kids, my wife was an engineer also until our first was born, and is now a stay at home mom. Plan when we got married was to eventually move from AZ to the DC area, so huge CoL increase. Turned down a decent gig in DC in 2004 (pre-kids), since we weren't certain she'd have the choice to stay at home - looked at other areas, not quite in the city, but say, Dahlgren, Charlottesville, etc, lower CoL than DC. Kept plugging a

  • Random comments about it. (Score:3)

    by CannonballHead ( 842625 ) on Monday December 12, 2016 @05:01PM (#53471431)

    Random comments...

    Workers with families may actually be beneficial to companies. Why? Speaking as a parent in a single-income household, I would think they are less prone to job-hunting/switching frequently. It'd be interesting to see statistics on employee turnover rate for single vs. married vs. married-with-kids (or vs. single-with-kids, whatever). My income is very important to me, because I have three other people to provide for (plus associated "life" activities). It's stressful to not have a job; it's more stressful when you have a spouse and kids to provide for and, well, not starve, get into debt, lose your house, that sort of thing.

    That said ... heh, 20 weeks is a lot, that's like 5 months. I'm happy with 2-4 weeks of paternal leave, but it's not a huge deal if a company didn't give paternal leave. I think it's great, because IMO, it's a statement of the importance of family and the importance of fathers in family life. I mean, I wouldn't complain about 20 weeks! But I can see how someone might think 20 weeks for a *father* is a lot.

    Also, that said, 20 weeks for a mother is *not* that much. Even the official pediatric recommendation is to breastfeed, exclusively, if you can, for at least 6 months. It's really, really, really hard to exclusively breastfeed while working if you have any milk supply issues at all... because pumping just doesn't work the same. Sure, maybe companies should take that into account when working out pay, or maybe some of that should be without pay, or whatever, but unless we want to say to women that having kids is unimportant, or that making them healthy is unimportant, then time off for those critical months in a baby's development is a big deal to me. As a father. ;)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by godrik ( 1287354 )

      That said ... heh, 20 weeks is a lot, that's like 5 months.

      Actually I am not sure I agree with that. It is not just about the kid being taken care of, it is about ensuring that the parents (both of them) will actually bond with the little one. Bonding with the kid happens for both the mother and the father in the first few month after birth. If society want its fathers to be invested in the life of their kid so they don't bail out, it makes sense in investing in that relationship.

      Assuming you take two 20 weeks leave (~ 2 kids in average), that's only about 2% of yo

      • If society want its fathers to be invested in the life of their kid so they don't bail out, it makes sense in investing in that relationship.

        You said that better than I did, by far, and I totally agree.

        I guess I might be in a slightly different position in that I actually work from home anyways. Sometimes I forget that most people are gone from 7am to 6pm or whatever. :)

  • and I could stay home on full pay for a very long time

  • HOW can a business afford to have employees off for that long. And, if a business CAN afford to have employees off that long, do they have too many employees working for them?

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      HOW can a business afford to have employees off for that long.
      And, if a business CAN afford to have employees off that long, do they have too many employees working
      for them?

      While you're at it, ask why competitors that don't offer these type of benefits never seem to have significantly lower prices.

  • A baby boom has been reported at cities where offices of AmEX are located, the same areas where Trojan and other condom makers have posted an abrupt drop in sales. Maternity wards are overwhelmed with demand and retail stores are having trouble keep their shelves stocked with baby accessories. More details at 11.
  • I have been an American Express customer for twenty years. In those twenty years, I have had a few issues, like card numbers stolen and irregular charges. In all cases, they solved the problem immediately, at no cost or headaches for me, sometimes taking it in the chin for me. In one occasion, I had a dispute with a hotel about a $400 charge, and a call to American Express fixed it. They said to me that I did not have to worry about the issue any more, and they were true to their word: I don't know how they
  • I am gladly surprised, as I did not expect a big multinational company to give anything to workers without fighting. Perhaps there is some fine print somewhere?

  • How do you do this? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Mothers get a year in Canada. 52 weeks. Every one of them. The first 16 or 17 are at full pay, the rest are part of everyone's unemployment insurance, so it's 55% pay. It's considered too short, and they're thinking of extending it to 18 months.

    Our kid just turned 11 months, and we're preparing for daycare. I can't even imagine that at 20 weeks.

  • Now they will have more time to work on their resumes, they'll need it.

  • Am I eligible? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Does this apply to current cardholders only? I'm thinking of getting an American express credit card if this applies to new members as well.

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