What do the US bishops have to say about child poverty in America?

[tad]

The great majority of these proposals supported the Democratic Party. They nearly all required more government.

The bill referenced in the article I posted above was introduced by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL)

Here’s what the Senator had to say.

The senator said it is “wrong” when new mothers are forced back to work within weeks of having a child to avoid missing a paycheck. The bill also aims to reduce the number of new mothers currently forced to turn to other forms of public assistance.

“It’s startling how many parents, particularly first-time mothers and people with who just have children in their family, go on public assistance because they lose their job or they can’t draw a paycheck any longer. So what we’re doing is we’re giving people an option,” explained Rubio.

 

[tad]

What worries me is that the bishops are still, today, under pressure to take a stand on whatever CNN is focusing on.

That’s not a very compelling argument for not supporting paid family leave, as the US bishops do.

Given the Church’s commitment to life, the family and the worker it’s easy to see how they have come to that position.

 

[13pollitos]

How does it benefit society to put strain on employers and their other employees, and still have to pay the one who isn’t working? Someone has to do the job of the missing person, and most likely that will be a temporary hire for a long term absence. The employer will then be paying TWO employees, knowing that one will later be let go an de unemployed. What if the temp hire is the better worker? What if the one you have been paying later decides not to return to work? Is there a way to recap the free money you gave them or is it just your loss?

All I see happening is businesses using this to lay off people or find ways to avoid hiring people, that are likely to need this leave time. That benefits no one at all.

“It’s startling how many parents, particularly first-time mothers and people with who just have children in their family, go on public assistance because they lose their job or they can’t draw a paycheck any longer. So what we’re doing is we’re giving people an option,” explained Rubio.

And this is the reason politicians want this. It is to prevent families going on public assistance. I don’t think the families going on public assistance are the ones that would benefit from this at all. Employers will be hurt which will in turn hurt all of their workers, and the number going on public assistance will just increase anyway.

 

[vsedriver]

And this is the reason politicians want this. It is to prevent families going on public assistance. I don’t think the families going on public assistance are the ones that would benefit from this at all. Employers will be hurt which will in turn hurt all of their workers, and the number going on public assistance will just increase anyway.

I would agree here. Public assistance was designed to help those who through no fault of their own needed help. I would think if a woman is married and the couple is planning to have children they would plan for when she isn’t working. That doesn’t mean I’m not sympathetic to a woman who finds herself pregnant and not married. But an across the board program shouldn’t be necessary. For too long we have had programs and people who turn to the government to solve problems of their own making. We need to stress personal responsibility more. We need to teach people how to save, how to spend wisely, and how to make good decisions but too often no one wants to address problems from that point of view. There’s a big difference between being irresponsible and being uneducated on how to be responsible.

 

[tad]

How does it benefit society to put strain on employers and their other employees, and still have to pay the one who isn’t working? Someone has to do the job of the missing person, and most likely that will be a temporary hire for a long term absence. The employer will then be paying TWO employees, knowing that one will later be let go an de unemployed. What if the temp hire is the better worker? What if the one you have been paying later decides not to return to work? Is there a way to recap the free money you gave them or is it just your loss?

All I see happening is businesses using this to lay off people or find ways to avoid hiring people, that are likely to need this leave time. That benefits no one at all.

I work for a small business. We just have an handful of employees. The whole reason I got this job is I happened to stumble in one day when his framer was in the hospital with pneumonia. I worked there on a part-time basis until his framer was able to work again. A little while later, when the manager of 15 years quit, I was offered the job. My boss is a Catholic and a man of conscience. He paid the framers full wage the whole time he was out of work. Everyone benefited. The framer didn’t go into debt because of his illness, I got a great new job, and my boss got the best manager he’s ever had.

All this because my boss decided to do the right thing.

With a booming economy and large corporate tax breaks, I don’t understand why these businesses wouldn’t want to do the right thing as well. I also don’t understand why we’re putting business interests ahead of our greatest resource, our children.

Again, in a society where 1 child out of 5 ends up aborted, and 1 on 7 is born into poverty, it’s easy to see why we wouldn’t care if parents are forced away from the children during the first weeks of their infancy because of economic necessity. It’s wholly consistent.

 

[13pollitos]

parents are forced away from the children during the first weeks of their infancy because of economic necessity.

This isn’t accurate though. Parents are not forced away from their children. We have up to 12 weeks unpaid leave, which many employers do paid leave of 6 weeks or more anyways. We can take other paid leave as well. And we don’t HAVE TO return to work unless we want to. I, and most mothers I know, return to work for all sorts of reason. Being forced isn’t one of them.

I am glad that you have a great employer who is able to provide that. Not all employers can. And honestly, should they have to? Would you pay for a job that isn’t being done? Would you pay for a service that wasn’t rendered? Would you WANT to be paid for not having done what you were contracted to do? For me, the answer is no. I am not going to a store and pay for things I never bought either.

The countries that have parental benefits, it is usually covered by the government. Why not ask the government to cover that instead of insisting employers do it? Either a paid leave policy or a lump sum benefit. What about the moms that don’t work? Would they not qualify for the benefit? It doesn’t seem prolife to only give it to some babies and their families but not all. The countries that give these benefits do not have higher fertility rates, and often have much lower rates. So it doesn’t seem to make parenthood there an incentive at all. Their abortion rates rival or are higher than ours as well.

 

[Theo520]

Good point. So, I wonder, what do the US bishops have to say about the US being the only developed nation in the world that, by law, offers new parents no paid time off for maternity leave?

What does one have to do with the other?

Do you think that paid maternity/paternity leave solves child poverty? I think the vast majority of such children are in single parent households, where the legal parent doesn’t have regular employment, so I don’t see the impact.

Do these other countries give paid leave for every child you chose to claim as your own? If these baby daddies aren’t supporting their offspring, how does paid leave help.

When one has an agenda, it’s best just to come out with it in the OP (IMHO).

 

[vsedriver]

Do you think that paid maternity/paternity leave solves child poverty? I think the vast majority of such children are in single parent households, where the legal parent doesn’t have regular employment, so I don’t see the impact.

this is correct, the real cause of child poverty is unwed mothers. Statistics show that the quickest way out of poverty is to have a married mom and dad.

 

[tad]

When one has an agenda, it’s best just to come out with it in the OP (IMHO).

You guys really need to knock this off.

 

[Theo520]

You guys really need to knock this off.

Don’t follow.

You said practically nothing in your OP and only later exposed what you were thinking on the topic. Are you a school teacher? This isn’t class.

 

[tad]

You said practically nothing in your OP and only later exposed what you were thinking on the topic. Are you a school teacher? This isn’t class.

Are you a bishop? I don’t recall asking your opinion.

I really don’t need you, or anyone else second guessing my motivation. I’ll be flagging the next poster who does.

 

[Theo520]

Are you a bishop? I don’t recall asking your opinion.

I really don’t need you, or anyone else second guessing my motivation. I’ll be flagging the next poster who does.

You are getting quite defensive.

You started a thread here, this isn’t a forum for getting Bishops to explain things to you. If you don’t like the responses, if they make you uncomfortable, it’s something for you to reflect upon.

 

[tad]

Hey guys. I’m not the subject of this thread. The last two posts have been flagged.

If you want to share what the US bishops have to say about poverty, fine.

If you want to share your opinion on what the US bishops have to say about poverty, fine.

If you want to talk about me, while I’m flattered, you’ll have to start your own thread.

 

[Annie]

I work for a small business. We just have an handful of employees.

Here’s a major point: you work for a small business. It is probably owned and run by one or two people. They can decide to take every cent out of the company that they can, or they can decide to do good things for their employees which involve the owner’s taking home less money.

A lot of businesses are not small businesses and are corporately structured with many owners of a small part of the company each. Stockholders like these expect to get a return on their money, and they expect the company to be run in such a way.that this return is maximized.

Under certain circumstances, the stockholders can sue the management if they feel management did not maximize profits.

Moral responsibility is also diffused in this structure.

The result is that there is a concentration of energy on maximizing short-term profit. There is no responsibility to the employee, who is a a powerless economic unit in the vast machine.

It’s a conundrum, that’s for sure. We could institute company-paid parental leave, but then the company would avoid hiring people who might need it, because it’s a tremendous expense. Then we’d have to gear up the EEOC to micromanage hiring practices.

If the government were to pay for parental leave, we would of course have to pay additional taxes to have the money to do that.