Paid leave is nice, but I'm much more concerned about daycare. I think it's a travesty as well as a remnant of patriarchy that you can deduct a steakhouse lunch as the "cost of doing business" but not deduct daycare as a cost of being able to work. I'm in envy of countries with functioning public daycare systems.

Out of date for Australia. Australia has had 18 weeks paid parental leave since 2011:

http://www.humanservices.gov.au/customer/services/centrelink...

Among the list of things about the United States that are incomprehensible to me (a Canadian), the absence of paid maternal (let alone parental) leave ranks pretty close to the top.

The patriarchy says men can't take care of babies. Us feminists think men can take care of babies and should have the same leave / similar entitlement as women.

Why is it considered a good thing when the government foists responsibility for the social safety net off on people's employers? Especially when it only applies to sufficiently large employers?

The correct title for the map is “Countries where employers are fined or threatened with jail time for not providing maternity leave”.

Despite what our ‘enlightened’ friends the world over think about the dark, backwards, USA, it is not, in fact, illegal to provide paid maternity leave in the US.

This map, and the comments in this thread, support mandatory, government-backed maternity leave in the amount and style which the government believes is appropriate. Honest differences in preferences or opinions are subject to government punishment.

In the USA, we are skeptical of the benefits of the government making it a law to do mothering the way the government wants you to. We ask “Why is it noble to force people to forgo higher wages and other benefits for an in-kind contribution to a particular type of maternal care?”

The argument against government-mandated benefits has been made elsewhere in great detail. Facts, evidence, history, and common sense indicate that forcing people to consume their wages the way the government wants, in the the style the government wants, decreases the success of the overall community. That’s why every people who has ever had the chance to overthrow communism, has. And that’s why the children of all these states in Europe find that jobs are very difficult to get, and many of them, particularly the entrepreneurial ones, come to America.

Fewer rules imposed on people lead to greater growth, which leads to greater health, happiness, wealth, and longevity.

Further, there is something immoral about threatening to throw people in jail, or fine them, if they don’t do exactly what the government says on something as basic as raising your children.

To those who say that we should go ahead and follow “The Man” and be happy for these gifts, you have to realize that we are paying for the benefits, not the government, so forcing us to do it the way “they” want it, in a one-size-fits-all manner is not really a benefit to anybody.

You may say that it is only fair, or right, or just, that there be 3 months, or 12 months, or 24 months of paid maternity leave. 24/7/365 child care is bliss for many mothers — perhaps most. But for others, they may prefer to spend those dollars on better daycare, or weeklong breaks interspersed with work, or a 4-day week, or they may be just fine with working a full week and spending a more focused, quality time with their child on their days off.

Demanding that one size fits all, that the government has figured out the correct style of maternal care once and for all time, (when, it should be noted, every government legislature in the world is still majority male), and that those who disagree should be fined or thrown in jail, is not, in fact, a kind or compassionate policy, but a kind of abuse.

Incorrectly titled maps may be great for click bait, but they shouldn’t pass for deep analysis here on HackerNews.

I'm sure Somalia has a great time enforcing their maternity leave laws.