When the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) became law in 1993, it was the first major expansion of labor protections for workers in decades. Since then, more than 35 million workers have benefited from the protected right to take time off from work to care for a child or parent.
Ten years later, it is even more common for working families to be juggling their families’ work and health commitments. Without the Family and Medical Leave Act, literally millions of families would be forced to make heartbreaking decisions that would hurt their families financially and hurt their employers’ ability to retain committed employees. The Family and Medical Leave Act has been good for workers, good for employers and good for our national economy.
Since the passage of the federal FMLA, unions have worked with Congress and encouraged states to pass laws that expand family and medical leave coverage to more workers and that provide paid leave so more workers at all income levels can afford to take advantage of it. With a labor-led campaign, in September 2002 the state of California approved landmark legislation providing paid family leave for most California workers.
The AFL-CIO will mark the 10-year anniversary of the FMLA by fighting to extend the rights of FMLA to cover more workers and by rejoining the fight to protect FMLA from renewed legislative and regulatory attempts to restrict workers’ ability to take unpaid family and medical leave and to weaken the intent of the law.Contact: Suzanne Ffolkes (202) 637-5018
