Jodie Levin-Epstein
34 Voices: New Zealand Business and Worker Interviews on Sick Leave and Parental Leave
The purpose of 34 Voices: New Zealand Business and Worker Interviews on Sick Leave and Parental Leave is to gain insights into work-leave from those who are giving and those who are taking it. The interviews with employers and employees reveal stories about the pluses and minuses of actual ‘on the ground’ experience and should help inform on-going discussions of how these two work-leave policies can best operate in New Zealand. In total, 17 workers and 17 employers were interviewed.
The 34 interviews are part of a larger study related to New Zealand’s Paid Parental Leave and Sick Days Leave laws. Specifically, the findings from these interviews are integrated into a broader policy review by this author entitled The High Wire Act: Balancing Families and Jobs at Precarious Points…The Role of Work-Leave in New Zealandand the United States. The goal of The High Wire Act is to understand the New Zealand experience so that operational and policy issues that deserve attention are flagged; further, it is designed to identify issues for consideration in the United States where neither paid parental leave nor paid sick leave are federal law. In short, a goal is to provide lessons from New Zealand for the United States.
The criteria for the selection of the interviewed employees and employers [Appendix A] were driven by this dual interest in work-leave experience within New Zealand and the possible lessons for the United States.
For employers, the selection criteria focused on those with fewer than 50 employees. This is because in the United States, employers of this size are exempt from a federal law that provides for unpaid parental and medical leave. The United States law, the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA), protects an employee’s job for up to 12 weeks to care for a newborn or to take time off when the employee faces a serious illness or needs to care for a family member with a serious illness. However, employees who work in firms with fewer than 50 employees are not entitled to this unpaid leave period. In addition, while there is no federal law for paid sick days, it is anticipated that the greatest resistance to any such policy in the United States would come from smaller employers.
Because the United States has exempted employers with fewer than 50 employees from providing unpaid leave, the New Zealand businesses that were interviewed were selected precisely because they fit within this exemption. The intention of the selection criteria is to underscore how businesses of the size that are exempt in the United States manage parental leave.
Sick days leave represents both a management and cost issue for employers. While some United States employers provide for paid sick days -- even though there is no statutory mandate to do so-- less than half of private sector United States employees have access to any paid sick days. Thus, how New Zealand businesses perceive the sick days leave law and its operation should be of interest to similar businesses in the United States. The business interviews provide an opportunity for a “business to business” message on work-leave from companies in one nation to companies in another. At the same time, suggestions for operational improvements could assist future policy discussions within New Zealand.
With respect to employees, the selection criteria focused on lower wage workers. This is because the laws set a floor for work-leave entitlements and lower wage workers often have access only to the minimum required. In contrast, higher wage workers often enjoy additional benefits provided by their employers. Different selection criteria were used for the interviews about sick days leave and the interviews about paid parental leave. Most notably, the paid parental leave interviews were entirely with sole mothers who earn relatively low wages.
The decision to interview sole mothers is driven by the particular challenges such parents face in achieving work-life balance. If paid parental leave seeks to help workers achieve balance and to enhance the development of children, this population deserves particular attention.
34 New Zealanders took the time to talk about their experiences with work-leave. They shared experiences, expectations, attitudes and feelings. It is hoped that 34 Voices captures this texture of experience with work-leave; the themes heard from 34 Voices are reflected in the recommendations made in High Wire Act.
Jodie Levin-Epstein
