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Comment by razemio | Hacker News Reader

It is absolutely not! We live in Germany which has good options compared to other countries and it is still not enough. My wife earns 5000€+ in her job. Guess what, you can earn a maximum of 1800€ during parental leave. It gets even better, now that she takes a few hours less because somebody needs to take care of our child, kid number 2 will even be compensated with less (1400€). How is this fair? This is without the missed opportunities to get a higher position. Women are less likely to be employed because of the fear that they might leave for a year or 2. What needs to happen is that the compensation is higher AND that men are forced to take an equal time of. If the woman takes a year the man has todo the same. Otherwise equality will be very difficult to archive.

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> How is this fair?

Well, if I were going to argue the case I would probably start with the impossibility of any man ever getting that opportunity. Of course, whether those figures are enough or given out in the right way to the right people at the right time, all of those details can be argued over, but if you're going to start with fairness as your argument you'd better address the elephant in the room first.

> AND that men are forced to take an equal time of

Why is it right that anyone is forced to do anything so that your political views are enacted?

equality ends where it hurts the capital

let me give you an example

good equality: have more women enter workforce so the pool of candidates is bigger and the salaries (expenses) decrease

bad equality: pay for parental leave of both parents

Yeah, I'm constantly surprised that nobody every says this. With women entering the work force, now the family as a whole needs to work almost twice as much, as before when women were house wives. That's a pretty hefty price to pay for everyone, to save those women who were unlucky to have a cruel or unfair husband. I don't know if it's possible to say if it's "worth it" or not, but this independence sure does not come for free.

> With women entering the work force

What year is it again?

> That's a pretty hefty price to pay for everyone, to save those women who were unlucky to have a cruel or unfair husband.

Uh, I don't think that's the trade off here.

> I don't know if it's possible to say if it's "worth it" or not, but this independence sure does not come for free.

When one option is to go full Taliban, it's actually pretty easy to say if it's "worth it".

why can't a new law be passed to reduce from 40 hour week to 20 hour week now that women are in workforce?

Yeah this is what I'm wondering too, seems like this is the obvious part of the deal that was somehow missed?

It makes perfect sense, and it would also be fair and benefit both single/childless people as well as people with children.

You're saying it's "absolutely not" compensated, and then you enumerating just some of the ways it's compensated?

I'm confused.

I didn't say it was fully compensated. Of course it's not.

But why should you have children, and expect "someone else" to pay for everything?

Nothing else in life works like that.

But yes, I've heard of the German child benefits, and tax rules for married couples, that are not optimal for an equal and fair society.

You say the compensation is "not enough". What would be? That "someone else" pays for the entire cost of your child? Why stop there? Why not demand salary from the government for choosing to raise a child?

If I live in a country with public health care, and I choose to become morbidly obese, smoke cigarettes, excessively drink alcohol, develop diabetes, get limbs amputated, and go on disability because I can’t work, I’m expecting the government to foot the bill to keep me alive.

There are many choices people make that they expect others to pay for.

True. But these people also die earlier.

I saw a study saying smokers are a net financial gain for society because of the huge savings on pension payments.

in Germany the expectation is that you will inherit

if you’re not looking to inherit while you’re young, you end up in a whole different social hierarchy

Harrison Bergeron would approve, and I can only begin to imagine how this would be abused by vindictive spouses or exes to sabotage men's careers.

Harrison Bergeron distopia is a different topic in my opinion.

I agree with you that it might be impossible to enforce such a law without having the downsides you mentioned. However I would very much like being able to take 6 months of parental leave without being called lazy. This goes both ways.

Yeah the Harrison Bergeron example is definitely hyperbole

I know a bunch of women who ran a successful startup on the side of parental leave, so it can't be too bad.

[this was a joke]

This kind of presumptuous content does not belong here.

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