Employees at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation have a new benefit coming soon: paid parental leave.
Agency employees will get six workweeks of paid leave per year for the birth, adoption, or foster placement of a new child that will apply equally to mothers and fathers. It is being offered as part of a bargaining agreement with the National Treasury Employees Union and will become effective in January 2020, following formal ratification of that agreement.
Highlights of the new program include:
- FDIC employees will be provided up to six workweeks of paid leave per year for the purpose of caring for or bonding with a new child.
- All employees become eligible for the benefit immediately upon beginning work at the FDIC.
- Employees must take the leave within one year from the birth, adoption, or foster placement of a child.
- The leave can be taken all at once or intermittently, and is separate from any benefit that may be available to an employee pursuant to the Family and Medical Leave Act.
There have been efforts underway in Congress for years to give paid parental leave to the entire federal workforce. To date, bills offering this benefit in any form have failed to pass into law. The latest effort tucked 12 weeks of paid parental leave into a larger military spending bill, but it failed to advance in the Senate.
