One thing you won’t hear any chest-beating about from rabid patriots: the need for paid family and medical leave. See, too many of them care only about stuff that makes the country seem big by either (a) blowing up other countries or (b) just spouting hot air about “specialness”. How about this for special: The United States is the only high income country that does not mandate paid family and medical leave.

Pretty ludicrous. Here’s what the reality is, via CEPR:

Instead American workers rely on a patchwork of employer insurance, state programs, public assistance, and savings to make ends meet during a leave event. About 30 percent of private sector employees taking unpaid leave incur debt as result of their leave. More than 2.5 million employees cannot afford to take leave to care for self, a family member with a serious health condition, during pregnancy, to bond with a new child, or to care for an injured military service member every year.

Sure, if there was a federal program, as CEPR suggests, some employers would complain–but for no good reason:

In a survey of Californian businesses (see Milkman and Appelbaum, 2013), some emp loyers reported that the state’s Paid Family Leave program actually generated cost savings by reducing employee turnover and reducing their own benefit costs when employees used the state program instead of employer provided paid leave benefits.These findings indicate that a federal paid leave program could be beneficial to both employees and employers.

Which is not surprising.