Read on Twitter
Biden's #PresidentialAddress last night included a call for a national program of #paidleaveforall. Here's why that call matters.
Paid leave strengthens the already-vital bond between parents and children. Are all parents naturally amazing? Well, no. But parents are bound in a deep way to the children we bear. https://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2020/01/the-mutuality-between-mothers-and-their-developing-babies/
It's increasingly clear that when parents and children can build a strong caregiving bond, it is an amazing process of synchronization, teaching children emotional regulation & fostering long-term development. https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/key-concepts/brain-architecture/
Parent-child bonding time changes parents' biology as well - essentially helping parents become parents. https://www.nbcnews.com/better/health/how-your-brain-changes-after-baby-ncna807611
But the nature of our economy and the absence of a national paid leave program limits parents' time for in person caregiving.
And household income drops right around childbirth, inducing financial precarity and ramping up parents' stress precisely when a child most needs their calm attention.
#Paidfamilyleave would give mothers and fathers the chance to do what they were made to do - nurture a child, become a parent - while also *preventing* a fall into poverty. It's the ultimate proactive, strength-based policy.
This thread is about the parental component of paid leave but similar points could be made about paid sick, caregiving, and medical leave which enable what humans are already made to do - rest, heal and connect.
