A Baby Dies at Day Care, and a Mother Asks Why She Had to Leave Him So Soon

The answer to the mother's question is that she did not have to leave him. She chose to return to work. Life is all about the choices we make. If you can't afford kids, don't get pregnant (and yes, you can avoid pregnancy in most cases). If you want to have kids and don't want them in day care, don't work until they are in school. If paid family leave is critical to you, don't work at a company that doesn't offer it, or negotiate it into your contract.

If the day care was criminally negligent, they can (and should) be gone after for manslaughter.

 

I wonder how many stay at home parent families make below the magic income threshold, where it's okay to have one job in the family. In some cases it really is a matter of money.

I hope to be above it when I have kids, but life doesn't really give a **** about plans.

 

Agreed, but that's not really the point of the article...the point is why is the USA is in the stone ages when it comes to paid parental leave? Certainly a complex issue that isn't easily solved. When you see a chart like the one posted in the last page, does that stir any curiosity in you as to why the USA seems to be the only country that really doesn't do anything?

 

Her story really isn't a great indictment of the lack of parental leave since it's way too premature to say the daycare was at fault for her son's death. She's lashing out a bit, understandably so, but quite possibly her son would have died had he been in his crib and she'd been in another room, asleep etc.

I suspect Leroy's chart understates some leave allowances. Canada, for instance, offers 15 weeks maternal and 35 parental (can be split by mom or dad however they choose). So, really, it's 50 weeks. It's paid though the Unemployment Insurance plan so it's not a burden on the employer (some do top up for part or all of the leave, but that's their choice).

She states it wasn't about money -- she was willing to go unpaid -- but about medical insurance. Again, we can pick apart her story and I'm not sold on her premise that her son would have lived had she not had to return to work, or we can dismiss the concerns as personal choice concluding that kids and family are really just a luxury or commodity to be evaluated on a spreadsheet, or we can look at how the US stacks up with other countries in evaluating the adequacy of leave and insurance options for young families.

 

So many things in this country are the result of impatience
The Rush to put people back to work
The Rush to do this or that

Rocket River

 

It is also a great way to ensure the poor and lower middle class stay that way. Benjamin and Alister get to be raised by mommy and a nanny, elite pre-schools and montessori schools.

Rondell and Daryl are shoved in the cheapest possible daycare and learn to fend for themselves.

 

Like John Lennon said..... whatever gets you through the night.

 

Good job.

 

With a scarcity of jobs she may not have the freedom to choose jobs that offer paid leave.

 

No. I see no reason why the federal government should legislate how much time off an employer gives to an employee who has a baby. I also do not see any authorization to make such a law in the powers granted to Congress by the Constitution. That other countries have nonsense regulations is sad, but it doesn't make me want it to happen in the United States.

You addressed one of the several ways she could have made different choices that would not have resulted in her leaving a baby at day care to return to work (and it was hardly an exhaustive list). What about the others?

 

List of countries that do not guarantee paid maternity leave
Lesotho
Papua New Guinea
Swaziland
The United States of America

List of countries that do...
Every other f***ing one...in the world.

So, your opinion is that us and the other 3 I listed are doing the right thing and the other 200-something countries in the world aren't doing it right. Is that correct?

 

Why would any Mexican want to come over to the US illegally to give birth to their kids and give up all that maternity leave?

 

Correct.

 

I'm proud to be an American, at least I know I'm free.

I'll be sure they teach that at daycare. It makes a fine breed of worker.

 

Our population would die off in twenty years if even one of these edicts were taken seriously. And most women (wisely) wouldn't even reveal a pregnancy to male or younger female hiring managers, let alone telegraph it by playing hardball on benefits.

 

Our population would die off in 20 years if women didn't work while they had young children? If they didn't have children they couldn't afford? Really? I'm pretty sure our population wouldn't die off in 20 years if no one ever had children again, since there are large numbers of people in the US that are not within 20 years of death.

 

Ladies and gentlemen....here we have the ugly American.

Shame on you.

 

Yep, I believe we should govern the country according to the Constitution. SHAME.

 

I, for one, also yearn for the days when people could be considered property and treated as 3/5s of all other persons.

 

Like most conservatives these days, you don't have a ****ing clue about the Constitution. All you do is spout off a bunch of pro-ogliarchy nonsense about freedom and choice, but fail to recognize that these concepts are worthless without basic necessities. Perhaps you feel taking care of a child is not a basic necessity, but I can assure you that you are in a very tiny minority.

Here's a quick lesson - not that I expect it to sink in to a mind as closed as yours. The General Welfare Clause in the Constitution certainly enables our government to set up requirements for maternity leave.

I've responded rudely and perhaps I'd get further with more honey and less vinegar in my arguments. But frankly, I consider uneducated conservative cultists like yourself to be the biggest danger to our country and every once in awhile I need to go off. Please don't take it personally.