Thoughts on maternity benefits

I read this article yesterday:
http://money.cnn.com/2013/04/30/technology/yahoo-maternity-leave/index.html?fb_action_ids=10152798888910721&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=288381481237582

If interested, read the comments. Very interesting, to say the least.

I have mixed feelings about this whole maternity paid leave thing. I have voiced my opinions earlier about how Intel does not give us even a single day of paid maternity/paternity or bonding leave. Also, the state of CA classifies maternity as a short-term disability condition and because we pay for a short term disability plan through our paycheck, we get those benefits.

On one hand, I applaud large corporations like Cisco, Google, Facebook, and now Yahoo, for providing such generous benefits to new moms and dads. Any amount of leave for a new mom is not going to be enough. So whatever you get is great. However, I am of the opinion that such benefits have to come from the government (state or country), not from private corporations. Or, there should be a standardized policy that everyone follows. Atleast the minimum requirement. And then they could go above and beyond the minimum requirement, and that's entirely upto the company and its policies. That is how it is in many of the European countries, where the government itself has generous policies for new parents. In some countries, moms get upto 2 years of leave (not all is paid but their position in the workforce is guaranteed). Most countries do a year of leave in Europe.

I can see how the current situation where the benefits largely vary from one company to another in the US can cause lots of grief. Within the company as well, it brings on feelings of discrimination between employees. Another point that is sure to bring feelings of discrimination is these private companies dishing out cash for baby gear. Why is that? Isn't having kids part of your life plan? Don't you plan your expenses in such a way that you can accommodate the additional expense of bringing in a baby in your life? How do you compensate to the employees who choose not to have children or who don't have them yet or have fertility issues? Again, the appropriate thing is the tax breaks that you get for having more dependents in your household, and any deductions/credits you can take for their care....but such policies are already in place.

Not only the leaves - atleast with Intel - most of the "Great Place to Work" perks and events are also catered towards employees who have children. We have spring carnivals, movie nights, free museum and water park days, discounts on kids activities, etc. There are a ton of college graduates in the workforce who don't have a family, many childless couples, many more whose kids are college-age, and not to forget, the few single souls, who feel totally left out. This one colleague of mine who is single is never able to utilize any of the perks. He even skips the holiday dinner coz everyone brings their spouse and he feels odd to show up by himself.

The whole childcare-daycare ecosystem is also not too great in the US. From infants to preschool age children, there is a big dirth of quality childcare centers or individual providers who are licensed and experienced. I am experiencing all the issues first hand. I'm reading a book (bringing up bebe) which talks about creche's in France and how good they are, and how you have to get into the waitlist, etc and I feel why don't they have such places here in the US? Why don't they train people specifically for this purpose and pay them well enough to take up this career as a living?

An ideal life is where one parent stays home and takes care of the kids and the house, and the other one is the bread winner. But then we would never evolve as a society, would we?

I've mostly ranted out here...but what do you think?