Paid Family Leave Dies in New York: Washington Lawmakers Should Drop The Issue in 2009

New York legislators adjourned after failing to pass a paid family leave bill. The legislation passed the Assembly but died in the Senate when the session ended last week. There were many versions of the paid leave circulating around Albany. They were all very costly.  Here is a sample of the proposals:

• One would impose 12 weeks of disability insurance benefits for family leave on ALL businesses for employees of newborns, families adopting children and caregivers of sick parents, spouses and children.
• Another would provide 13 weeks of leave and would have increased the maximum disability benefit from $170 to $550 per week by 2010 and would have permanently indexed the benefit to one-half of the state's average monthly wage.

As for the proposal to pay for it.  Workers would have to pay a mandatory 45 cents per week payroll tax, which according the the Business Council of New York, was inadequate to pay for the program's costs.

The Buffalo News editorialized when the bill failed:  "Hopefully, that will be the end of it in New York.  The question to ask is if this proposal will add to private-sector job growth.  The answer is NO!  New York State can hardly afford to be in a situation in which workers will automatically receive a maximum of 50 percent of their regular weekly pay, up to a maximum of $170 per week.  Offering Cadillac benefits places New York at a disadvantage when businesses choose to locate, an even greater issue in struggling areas upstate and western New York, especially where the competition is Pennsylvania and Ohio."

Only Washington, California and New Jersey have paid family leave programs and only California's is operational.  Lawmakers in our state haven't found a palatable funding source pay for our program. It will be an issue in the 2009 legislative session in Olympia and AWB is pushing them to revisit the whole issue to determine the real costs, who pays and who benefits. 

In place of the new law, AWB believes flexible leave policies where employers and the people who work for them work out family leave arrangements is the way to go.  It has worked for employers AWB talks with and it keeps from adding a whole new layer of costly state bureaucracy. This is not just an issue with private sector employers, but many school districts and public employers have the same concerns about costs and potential abuses. 

It is the unintended consequences which sink good intentions.

Don C. Brunell, President (DonB@awb.org)