Does a Full Time Employee Get Paid for Maternity Leave?
Receiving paid maternity leave is a fringe benefit and is therefore not a guarantee for every full-time or part-time employee across the country. Federal law guarantees many employees across the nation unpaid leave for childbirth, but the decision to pay workers for the time away from the job rests, in most cases, solely with the employer.
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Employer Benefit Rules
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At publication, no state or federal law requires an employer to offer paid maternity leave for full-time or part-time employees. An employer choosing to enact a benefit policy offering paid maternity leave for full-time employees must apply this policy to all eligible workers regardless of age, race, country of origin, gender, ethnicity or disability. Eligible men must have the same benefits as eligible women because paid maternity leave falls under the auspices of the Equal Pay Act, which prohibits wage discrimination specifically by gender.
Family and Medical Leave
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The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) requires all public government agencies, all public and private schools and private employers with at least 50 employees in a 75-mile radius to grant up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for each employee to tend to the birth of a newborn child or to care for serious personal or family illness. Employers under this Act must hold the temporarily vacated positions of those using unpaid leave open and allow the employees to return to work at no penalty to job status or rate of pay.
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FMLA Employee Eligibility
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An employee must work for an employer at least 12 months and accumulate at least 1,250 working hours over that 12-month period to be eligible for unpaid maternity leave under the FMLA. The accumulation of working hours must meet requirements under the Fair Labor Standards Act for recordable working hours. An employee taking off work due to complications associated with a pregnancy can count this time toward the 12-week unpaid leave under the FMLA according to the U.S. Department of Labor website.
Collective Bargaining Agreements
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When a legal collective bargaining agreement exists between a public or private employer and a representing labor union, both parties must comply with the terms of the agreement. This includes any provisions in the agreement requiring the employer to provide paid maternity leave for full-time employees. Failing to uphold the terms of the collective bargaining agreement could result in either a civil lawsuit or a formal hearing before the National Labor Relations Board.
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