Pregnancy

Every time I think about why we need laws like the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, I feel sad and angry. To me, the law is just common sense: providing adjustments for pregnant workers on the job – adjustments that can be as small as a stool to sit on behind a counter, or permission to carry a water bottle on a sales floor – is usually free or cheap, helps pregnant workers continue to work and to provide for their growing families, and are good for business. The stories we hear from these pregnant workers make my heart sick from the injustice, and my brain dizzy from trying to comprehend the logic behind not providing these accommodations. After all, we offer seats on crowded trains to people who are pregnant all the time. It isn’t a heavy lift – and nor should it be for pregnant workers to get these workplace accommodations.

Yet, we hear time and again from employees who have been pushed onto unpaid leave, or terminated, just for asking for a small accommodation. Others have suffered complications in their pregnancies due to their employer’s refusal to accommodate them. For example, Hilda Guzzman’s employer refused to let her sit on a stool, which caused her to bleed and have premature labor pains. Read more »

The "crack baby" scare of the 1980s helped fuel a movement by prosecutors across the country to charge women who used drugs while pregnant or whose newborns tested positive for drugs with child abuse, neglect and even manslaughter [PDF]. But what really happened to those babies who were supposed to "overwhelm every social service delivery system that they come in contact with for the rest of their lives," according to one newscaster at the time? Were they, in the words of columnist Charles Krauthammer, doomed to "a life of certain suffering, of probably deviance, or permanent inferiority"? In a word — no. A recent New York Times "Retro Report" video revisited the crack baby hysteria and found no evidence that these dire predictions came true. These findings, which were being reported as early as 1992, should remind prosecutors and judges that the causal link between drug use and a specific pregnancy outcome is speculative, at best. While no one condones drug use in pregnancy, punitive measures do nothing to improve maternal, fetal, or child health [PDF]. Instead, they discourage women from seeking prenatal care and drug-treatment for fear of being prosecuted. 

The Mississippi state Supreme Court recently heard the case of Nina Buckhalter who tested positive for methamphetamine after suffering a stillbirth and was charged with manslaughter. The prosecutor in the case claims the drugs caused the stillbirth even though the actual cause is unknown and there is no clear evidence that methamphetamine use can cause a stillbirth. Read more »

Great news! Yesterday, a bill that will protect pregnant workers who need workplace accommodations passed in Maryland. This victory is due to the hard work of local advocates, especially the ACLU of Maryland. Now, when pregnant workers in Maryland need a simple accommodation to be able to continue to work safely – for example, a stool to sit on, or more frequent bathroom breaks – they will have clear-cut legal protection from being forced onto unpaid leave or even terminated. We have already seen the success of laws like these in protecting pregnant workers in states like California. Plus, experience shows accommodating pregnant workers, like accommodating individuals with disabilities, can be good for the bottom line. As a Maryland resident, I am very proud of my state. Read more »

The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act was introduced in the Senate last week. To help you learn more about the legislation and why it’s critically important to pregnant workers, here are five fast facts about pregnancy and the workplace.

1) Neither the Pregnancy Discrimination Act nor the Americans with Disabilities Act explicitly require employers to provide minor workplace accommodations if pregnant employees need them.

While the Pregnancy Discrimination Act extends Title VII employment discrimination protections to pregnant employees, all too often courts have held that it does not protect women who need minor adjustments on the job during pregnancy, such as being permitted to carry a water bottle, take more frequent bathroom breaks, or get a temporary reprieve from heavy lifting — unless the pregnant woman can point to someone else doing exactly the same work who needed and received exactly the same job adjustments but who wasn't pregnant. It will often be impossible to find this nonpregnant identical twin. The Americans with Disabilities Act also doesn't apply, because pregnancy itself is not a disability (although pregnancy complications, like preeclampsia or gestational diabetes, can be).

2) The United States does not have a federal law requiring paid medical or parental leave.

Although the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) provides twelve weeks of unpaid leave during which your employer, if large enough to be covered by the law, will save your job, most employers don't provide paid medical or family leave, and very few workers in low-wage jobs have access to more than a few days of paid leave for medical needs. Read more »

Yesterday, the 100th co-sponsor in the House of Representatives, Grace Napolitano (D-CA), signed on in support of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act would ensure that employers provide pregnant workers with simple accommodations if they need them to safely continue working during pregnancy.

The National Women’s Law Center is grateful to all of the bill’s co-sponsors for supporting this important piece of legislation.

So why is it so important?

To answer that question, today I asked Dr. Maureen Perry-Jenkins what happens to low-wage working women when they can’t get simple accommodations that they need during their pregnancies. Dr. Perry-Jenkins is a researcher at the University of Massachusetts conducting a federally-funded study of low-wage working families across the transition to parenthood.

Here’s her answer: All too often, pregnant low-wage workers wind up out of a job.

It is common for women in Dr. Perry-Jenkins’ studies to report they felt they had no choice other than to quit their physically demanding jobs in those instances when their pregnancies no longer permitted them to stand for long periods of time, lift heavy objects or work very long shifts with no break. Read more »

Help Close the Pregnancy Loophole!

Tell your Representative to co-sponsor the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act.

We are so close! So far, over eighty-eight Representatives have co-sponsored the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act. This bill would ensure that pregnant women are treated fairly on the job.

Help us reach 100 co-sponsors by the end of the week by emailing your Representative today! The more co-sponsors on this bill, the more likely it is to get moving!

So what's the problem? Courts have created a pregnancy loophole that allows many employers to refuse to accommodate even simple requests to help workers maintain healthy pregnancies. Pregnant women have been fired because they asked to avoid heavy lifting, or to stay off ladders, or to sit on a stool instead of standing at a cash register all day.

The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act would change this. Read more »

Help Pregnant Women in the Workplace

Share your story about pregnancy discrimination on the job.

Unfortunately, this is exactly what happened to a pregnant retail worker in Kansas. She was fired for following her doctor's advice and drinking water while working because it violated store policy.

So how can this be legal?

Courts have created a pregnancy loophole that allows many employers to refuse to accommodate even simple requests to help workers maintain healthy pregnancies. Pregnant women have been fired because they asked to avoid heavy lifting, or to stay off ladders, or to sit on a stool instead of standing at a cash register all day. It happens a lot. Maybe it happened to you.

The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act would change this. It would require employers to make the same sorts of reasonable accommodations for pregnancy, childbirth, and related medical conditions that they do for disabilities, ensuring pregnant women can continue to do their jobs and support their families.

But as we advocate for this bill in Congress, we hear the same question again and again: Has this happened to any of my constituents? We need to know your story. Read more »

Up ahead in this edition of NWLC’s weekly roundup: a couple international stories along with a look at “best intentions” laws and how they can hurt pregnant women here in America.

First of all, can we take a moment to talk about Valérie Trierweiler, the new first lady of France? She’s already unwittingly endeared herself to some American women – here are just a few of the reasons why:

• Ms. Trierweiler is one-half of France’s first unmarried presidential couple. Her partner – and newly sworn in French president to boot – is François Hollande.
• She has no plans to quit working. Instead, she’ll continue her work as a political journalist.
• Trierweiler is a working mother – she has three teenage sons, and like many working mothers she’s concerned about balancing her career and her family. “I’ve shared the fate of many working mothers, I felt guilty like them,” Trierweiler once said.
• And the kicker – here’s another quote of hers: “I haven’t been raised to serve a husband. I built my entire life on the idea of independence.”

Of course, it’d be awesome if France’s new president (or any country’s for that matter) were a woman, so that we could celebrate her achievement and not just her status as wife or partner to the male president. But I still think Trierweiler sounds like she’ll be a breath of fresh air in her role as the partner to a head of state. Read more »

Who knew we needed a law to protect pregnant women from being fired for taking a bathroom break or drinking water on the job? Speakers at today’s press conference after the introduction of the Pregnancy Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) highlighted the reality many women face in ultimately having to choose between a healthy pregnancy and their job.

At the press conference bill sponsor, Representative Nadler (D-NY), described cases where the law has failed to protect pregnant workers. Rep. Nadler stated what should be the obvious: that the economic devastation of a pregnant woman losing her job impacts not only her, but her family and the employer as well.

NWLC’s Emily Martin spoke at the conference. Martin explained how some courts have limited the protections set out in current law, the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA).

Martin, pictured above, described the gap courts have created between the PDA and Americans with Disabilities Act, which leaves pregnant workers unprotected when they need accommodations during ordinary pregnancy, such as avoiding lifting heavy objects in the last 6 weeks. The result, Martin explained, is that women “are losing their jobs because employers refuse to make temporary modifications to allow women to perform their jobs safely.”

A pregnant woman’s job shouldn’t depend on her willingness to ignore her doctor’s advice. But many women face just this choice, particularly women working in physically demanding jobs. When an employer refuses to accommodate, say, a request to shift job duties so a pregnant worker can avoid lifting more than twenty pounds for a few months, the worker will often lose her job (and possibly her health insurance), at the worst possible moment for her family. Today, Representative Nadler (D-NY) and more than 60 cosponsors introduced the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA), a bill that would ensure women are no longer forced into this impossible position.

The PWFA provides that employers must make reasonable accommodations when employees have limitations related to pregnancy or childbirth and when these accommodations do not pose an undue hardship to employers. In other words, it requires employers to provide pregnant workers the exact same sort of accommodations they already provide employees with disabilities under the Americans with Disabilities Act. In the absence of the PWFA, courts have often rejected the claims of women whose employers fired them when they sought modifications that would allow them to continue to do their jobs.  Read more »