Family vs. Job: No-Win Choice : Want a pro-family policy? Here’s one

In most American families, both parents work. In millions of households, a family crisis can force Mom--or, increasingly, Dad--to choose between taking care of a seriously ill child and keeping a job. These hard-working men and women need compassion during a family emergency, not a final paycheck.

Hardest hit is the so-called sandwich generation. These middle-aged women and men must take care of children and elderly parents.

The federal Family Leave Act would allow employees to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for a seriously ill child, spouse or parent and then return to the same job or an equivalent position. The bill would also allow similar unpaid leave after the birth or adoption of a child.

The Senate approved the measure Wednesday, thanks to a compromise forged by Sen. Christopher S. Bond (R-Mo.) and Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.). Their bill also requires employees who are expecting to become parents to give 30 days’ notice before taking time off. That reasonable requirement would allow employers to plan. The legislation also exempts the highest-paid 10% of workers, restricts the policy for part-time workers and limits penalties for any violations of the law.

The compromise persuaded 15 members of the GOP to vote for it along with most of the Senate’s Democrats. That may signal sufficient votes to override the veto threatened by President Bush, who vetoed a stronger version of the bill last year after he sided with critics who argued that the law would penalize business.

House Republicans should not buy that argument when the compromise comes up, sometime this month. They should follow the lead of California Gov. Pete Wilson, a Republican who signed a state Family Rights Act on Tuesday.

The new state law, sponsored by Assemblywoman Gwen Moore (D-Los Angeles), allows employees to take as much as 4 months’ leave without losing their jobs. It protects employers from abuses by allowing reasonable requests for documentation of illness.

Like the federal proposal, the California compromise also limits the policy to employers with 50 or more workers. That restriction excludes 95% of the nation’s employers and more than half of American employees, but it protects small companies, which find it harder than large corporations to spare workers.

Employers who allow family leave typically incur minimal costs, according to a recent study on such laws in four states, while retaining the loyalty of valuable employees.

President Bush should follow the example established by California--and 16 other states--and approve a reasonable federal family leave law.