I believe some European states solve this by having the state cover ~60% of your wage while on leave so that it's not a giant burden for companies
That is, I'd propose we let some government pay the maternity leave, and finance it from income tax.
This would still exist in this world. You're still down an employee. So you don't hire women or married men.
Also, it doesn't actually happen.
Though, I would probably fund it via a payroll tax so it could remain employer-paid. I don't think it makes any difference to the economics whether you tax the employee or the employer, but changing who pays is an additional decision you'd need to explain and that would be attacked by political opponents. A payroll tax is a smaller change and equally effective, so it's the better option.
How do you accomplish that without violating the right to privacy? If a man keeps coming into work and his partner is pregnant, nobody has to know.
The disadvantage women have is that they can't hide a pregnancy forever. Men can go to extreme lengths to hide their relationships. Although rare, it is not unheard of for a man to have two families at the same time, each one hidden from the other, and maintain this state of affairs for years before getting caught (otherwise we'd never hear about it).
Also multiple marriages are illegal in Western countries.
The fact is, an employer has no right to know what, if any, relationships the employee has, let alone the pregnancy status of them.
The fact that employers discriminate against pregnant employees is the problem we should be addressing directly.
The tax forms might be a key: Require everyone to be honest about their underage children, whether or not they are dependents, and give the option to claim fewer dependents on their tax forms.
Yet another option is to handle it much like FMLA. The employer doesn't get the right to know exactly what is going on and the doctor can use medical codes instead of plain English. My ex's psychiatrist did this when he needed time off for a major mental illness (he later went on disability for said illness). The employer doesn't have to know, but he'll need similar notice.
I would hope a reasonable person would never advocate for such intrusion.
Birth records are already there. Most employers won't look unless law, and I agree this isn't the best way to do it. However, if some time off is mandatory, it'd be reasonable for the state to inform the father he's required to take time off after the baby. Following the law would be his responsibility: The employer would only be forced to comply if they knew.
There are already regulations (either through law or company policies) about adding a child onto your health insurance. Most times, folks have to upgrade their health insurance to a family plan if it is their first child. For other children, they already have to report that to health insurance so the child is covered. A reminder from the insurance that the law requires parental leave as well as maternal leave would be prudent. These folks already are handling your information now.
FMLA is already in place. These folks already handle health records, and as mentioned, the reason can stay hidden from employers to an extent.
This is a draconian idea. Besides, employers don't want it! If they didn't want you coming to work, they would lay you off. Otherwise they're going to look the other way. Families living on the edge will do anything to avoid this problem, including leaving the father's name off the birth certificate, if it comes to that.
Perhaps increasing the scope of the worse hire will make discrimination impractical, but it is still going on while it's at roughly 50%.
You can somehow make companies unable to discriminate by relationship status, and that would push it into "age bracket" discrimation.
I believe the problem is more fundamental and a cultural solution is required.
It's all about the culture. Get the culture right and the decrimination goes away.
I think we should strive to have equal maternity/paternity leave, but let’s not deny the origins of the current reality.
(as it happens, fathers can breastfeed, albeit not literally. Mothers can pump breastmilk for fathers to feed to the child, or they can use formula. It's a perfectly viable way to raise a child, and people do)
My point is that OPs argument holds some water. Notably, it suffices to support the statement 'women are more likely to want to be care-taker than men'. There remains an argument about magnitude, and compensating effects, but there is a difference.
Paternal investmemt has at most 6M years (time since split from chimps who have almost none)
When I express my sadness that I have to work and can’t be with children all day long (same complaint my father and grandfather had), my wife often jokes that I should find a husband. It’s funny, but it’s ultimately true. Men are simply better able to do the sorts of things I take on in my family and women at the things my wife does