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Family and Medical Leave Act Essay

Decent Essays

Family and Medical Leave Act

The Family and Medical Leave Act was enacted by Congress on February 5, 1993, and it is public law 103-3. This law allows for a person to leave work in certain situations without losing his/her job. An eligible employees must have worked for the employer for at least 12 months and at least completed 1250 hours of service. An employee is able to leave work for up to 12 weeks for any of the following reasons: the employee expects a baby in his/her immediate family, the employee expects an adopted child in his/her immediate family, the employee has to take care of an ill family member which includes spouse, parent or his/her own children, and/or the employee has a serious medical …show more content…

First, the number of working parents in a single or two-parent household is increasing. Nowadays, usually both parents work in a two-parent household and the single parent works in a single-parent household. This law allows for the unity of the family structure. Another reason is that parents should be able to take some time off to spend with their newborn children. It is crucial that a baby be reared by his/her own parents so that the child can have a proper development. Also, if there is an ill family member, the employee should have a right to take time off to care for that ill member. One important issue was that people should not be forced to choose between their family or their job. A family is something very precious and should not be given up for anything. However, to provide for the family one needs to have a job to have income. One should not have to pick one or the other. This law allows the individual to keep both and not have to choose. By enacting this law, Congress relieved some of these issues of the family structure and job security.
This is an important law more to society than the actual organization, in my opinion because it protects the family structure. It protects individuals from having to choose between their loving families and their source of income, their job. It is crucial that parents have a job so that they can provide food, clothes, and shelter for their family. There is no way to do that without making

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