20/11/2021
Maternity Leave in the U.S.
The United States doesn’t have a historically strong record of strong family leave plans. In fact, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported only 17% of all U.S. workers had access to paid family leave, and 89% had access to unpaid family leave in 2018. According to a report from the OECD, the United States remains the only country in the developed world without a nationally mandated family leave program.
Some states do offer short term disability insurance, which can save families a lot of money in hospital bills, but this doesn’t necessarily help cover lost wages as a result of unpaid maternity leave. And of course, many employers do offer some sort of maternity or paternity leave structure for expecting parents, but sometimes the programs are just not enough to sustain the family.