Internal documents that have surfaced from Twitter reveal that the company’s new owner, billionaire Elon Musk, 51, plans to cut down the company’s paid parental leave from twenty weeks to just two weeks in a shocking turn of fate.
Musk, who is the father of ten children himself, does not believe that parents deserve paid time off to be with their children in the aftermath of giving birth to a newborn baby.
New York Times Tech Reporter, Kate Conger, reviewed internal documents at Twitter and found that Musk, who is also the CEO of Tesla, the electric car company, plans to cut down on paid parental leave and give new parents just two weeks to recuperate from childbirth and to be with their little bundles of joy.
“That’s being changed to whatever is required by law in the region where the employees work, along with a ‘top up’ of two weeks of leave,” Conger wrote for the New York Times.
In most states, new mothers and fathers do not get access to paid leave.
Instead, they are given a minimum of just two weeks to spend with their newborn babies in the wake of childbirth. However, in California, where Twitter is based, the state offers up to eight weeks of parental leave. Other states like New Jersey and New York offer up to twelve weeks. The most generous state with parental leave is Rhode Island, which offers thirty weeks to new parents.
When Conger reported on Musk’s desire to cut down on paid parental leave at Twitter, people across the spectrum of tech and the economy – as well as those at Twitter – shared their fury at the decision.
Dawn Huckelbridge, the founding director of Paid Leave for All, told DailyMail.com in a statement: “Paid leave is a proven boost to business and bottom lines, and a lifeline to working families. But this decision is more proof that we can’t rely on the private sector to ever solve this problem — we need a federal program to guarantee paid leave for all working people.
And ask any person who’s given birth what their health and life is like two weeks after, or what their baby needs, and you’ll realize this is a slap in the face.”
One former Twitter employee named Tina Forrest shared her concern on Twitter, writing: “As a former Twitter employee that oversaw US LOA (leave of absence) and rolled out the twenty-week policy in 2016, this is DEPRESSING. I am so sorry to hear of the amazing policies/programs that are being dismantled.”
Megan Anderson, another former employee of Twitter, wrote: “So let me get this straight… as an ex-Tweep who lives in MO – a state that doesn’t require employers to give any time off – I would only get two weeks under this new policy? Also, how does this not breach the acquisition deal of protecting benefits for one year after close?”
Do you think new parents deserve more than two weeks of parental leave?