{"id":4137,"date":"2015-09-04T17:50:25","date_gmt":"2015-09-04T17:50:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=4137"},"modified":"2015-09-04T17:50:25","modified_gmt":"2015-09-04T17:50:25","slug":"magazine-u-s-failing-mothers-in-paid-maternity-leave","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=4137","title":{"rendered":"Magazine: U.S. Failing Mothers in Paid Maternity Leave"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Eric Galatas<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

AUSTIN, Texas<\/strong> – The U.S. is dramatically behind the rest of the world in providing adequate support for mothers to spend time with their newborn babies, according to an investigative report by In These Times magazine.<\/p>\n

Sharon Lerner, the report\u2019s author, found most other countries, rich or poor, mandate paid maternity leave. Lerner says American moms frequently have to choose between bonding with newborns or paying the rent.<\/p>\n

\"The

The U.S. is currently the only major country in the world where mothers aren\u2019t guaranteed paid leave after childbirth, according to an investigative report by In These Times magazine. Only 13 percent of American women have access to paid maternity leave. Photo: SolStock.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cOnly 13 percent of women have access to any paid time off after they have children,\u201d says Lerner. \u201cThat means 87 percent of American women don\u2019t have paid leave. So what do they do when they have children?\u201d<\/p>\n

To find out, Lerner spent months following challenges faced by four new mothers. Lerner says for Natasha Long in Mississippi, back to work three weeks after giving birth, the hardest part was missed bonding time.<\/p>\n

Long worked four to five 12-hour shifts a week, developed symptoms of depression and was prescribed antidepressants. Now three years old,\u00a0Long\u2019s child still refuses to call her mama.<\/p>\n

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, more than one in five of the nation\u2019s top 10 percent of earners get paid family leave, compared to one in twenty earners in the bottom 25 percent.<\/p>\n

Lerner points out in Sweden all mothers, regardless of income level, get 16 months paid leave. In Finland, she says in addition to nine months paid maternity time the mother or father can continue to receive paid time off until the child\u2019s third birthday.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt this point, pretty much everyone else in the world does it differently,\u201d says Lerner. \u201cWe as a country aren\u2019t handling the situation well. It\u2019s not an individual problem, it\u2019s a national problem, it\u2019s a policy problem and I do think that\u2019s how we\u2019ll solve it.\u201d<\/p>\n

California, New York and New Jersey are the only states with paid family leave legislation on the books.<\/p>\n

President Barack Obama asked Congress to deliver a bill mandating seven days of paid leave in his 2015 State of the Union address. Senate Democrats responded with a bill that was rejected by Senate Republicans earlier this month.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Eric Galatas AUSTIN, Texas – The U.S. is dramatically behind the rest of the world in providing adequate support for mothers to spend time with their newborn babies, according to an investigative report by In These Times magazine. Sharon Lerner, the report\u2019s author, found most other countries, rich or poor, mandate paid maternity leave. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":4138,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4137"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4139,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4137\/revisions\/4139"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}