President Bush and I have long been supporters of parental leave policies. The issue today, though, is whether this policy should be mandated by the federal government.
I have several concerns about a federal mandate. The first is that this new mandate will cost jobs. As labor secretary, I've been watching closely the numbers on new job creation this past year.What we are seeing is that employers are using overtime in near record amounts but are not making new hires. A new federal mandate, even one as important as parental leave, will only further discourage job creation by adding to the cost of each new hire.
My second concern is that employers will respond to this new mandate by hiring fewer women. Now I know this is against the law, but we should not close our eyes to how women in their child-rearing years may be treated. This process would be subtle but real.
My third concern is that a federal mandate assumes one size fits all. Lots of people may want this benefit, but others may be thinking about pension benefits or a better disability policy or something else.
Once employers are told they must provide parental leave, that means less of the something else. Maybe that's why only 31 percent of those polled by the Gallup Organization think a parental leave benefit is something employers should be required to provide.
Bush's parental leave bill recognizes these realities.
The Family Leave Tax Credit Act of 1992 would allow 99 percent of American workplaces - small and midsize businesses - to provide leave for their employees without costing jobs or crippling productivity.
Any employer with fewer than 500 employees could get a tax credit for 20 percent of an on-leave employee's earning up to $100 a week to a maximum of $1,200. Most big companies already provide parental leave. The president's plan covers the 75 percent of Americans who work for small and medium-size com-panies.
Leave could be for the birth or adoption of a child, to care for a sick child, parent or spouse or because of the employee's own serious health problems.
To qualify for the tax break, employers would have to continue providing health benefits to employees on unpaid family leave, and all family leave must be granted on a nondiscriminatory basis.
This is not cumbersome, federally mandated leave. It is not a hidden payroll tax on new hires. It's flexible, user-friendly, designed to give employers positive incentives to adopt responsible and responsive family leave policies that can be tailored to meet the individual needs of their own employees.
Now that we have the opportunity to pass good legislation, let's not sacrifice that chance because some want to draw political lines in the sand. Working parents deserve a better outcome.