Gov. Noem Expands Paid Family Leave for State Employees Rules Package to Expand Benefit to 100%
PIERRE, S.D. – Today, Governor Kristi Noem and the Bureau of Human Resources expanded Paid Family Leave benefits for state employees to 100% for up to 12 weeks. This benefit covers birth and adoptions. The rules package was passed by the South Dakota Legislature’s Rules Review Committee.
“I want to make sure that South Dakota continues to be the best state in the nation to live, work, and raise a family – and that starts with making sure our state employees have the resources they need to care for their families,” said Governor Noem. “By expanding South Dakota’s Paid Family Leave opportunities, we will give our state’s hardworking moms and dads the chance to bond with a new child during the precious first few weeks after birth or adoption.”
###
Is there something more profound that can be done for US families?
I know in the tech sector, ending the H1B debacle would help greatly since many of these future proof jobs can be done from home, while being close to family.
cue the people who will think this applies to employees in the private sector as well who will blame the Governor when their employers don’t offer them the same benefit, claiming she promised it to them
Is she empowered to expand this employee benefit without Legislative action and approval? I’m all for it, but is this action within her constitutional authority??
What I’m getting at is while this expansion of benefit and (I assume) expenditure of state funds was approved by the “State Rules Review Committee” of the Legislature it requires an appropriation of funds and inclusion in the budget. This expansion, to my limited knowledge, has never received a Hearing before members of the House and Senate Committees who govern Budget and Appropriations nor has it received a vote of either House. It appears to this amateur to usurp the authority of the Legislature and delegates it to a small committee and the Executive Branch. The expansion of the benefit and the expenditure of funds doesn’t seem to follow “How A Bill Becomes A Law.”
Every expansion of government shrinks the monetary value of someone in the private sector.
Its not expanding government, its an employee benefit. For all the lip service worship to family values most politicians spout I applaud Noem for leading by example. Considering the US is one of the richest country in the world and there are over 100 countries (of 195) that require some amount of paid parental leave its a pretty hard argument to make that the US private sector can’t follow suit.
Maybe CEOs should quit hoarding wealth like dragons and treat employees with the dignity they deserve. Back in the 1960e CEOs only made on average 20x more than average worker pay. Now it’s over 390x.
A couple of options for you:
1) Ask the Investment Council to only invest your retirement in companies that pay their CEO’s 20x and live with the lower retirement (an investment strategy available to you if you quit and withdraw your retirement funds) or
2) Encourage and expect the Investment Council to invest in the companies that have Boards who hire and are willing to pay the CEO’s who have the vision to maximize shareholder return and thus your retirement.
The least productive and innovative segment of economy* has the best benefits and they keep raising the bar. You just can’t make this up.
* Because leadership focuses on hot button political issues vs. the day to day nuts and bolts of delivering government services with efficiency and effectiveness.
Why do more productive and innovative segments of the economy not have better benefits?
Should government be lowering the bar?
Companies have a mix of benefits and pay (total compensation) to best meet the desires of their employees as well as allow them to remain competitive in the marketplace (companies not competitive ultimately go out of business resulting in no pay or compensation for anyone).
Government exists on the prosperity of its citizens. When the government uses its ability to tax and increase spending to distort the marketplace where the taxpayer (business and its employees) is no longer prosperous, government is no longer serving its primary purpose.
Thanks for insulting 13,000 employees who work hard everyday to provide life sustaining services. Oh, and by the way, we do it at a fractions of the wage we could get in the private sector. But what do I know-I am just a dumb state worker.
13,000 employees proves my point. Over the last 30 years, businesses have been forced to become more productive (get more results with less resources) and adjust what it does and how it does it. Government is organized and conducts its affairs the same as it did 30 years ago AND increased its share of the workforce (by definition, declining productivity).
Machine operators in businesses make recommendations all the time that result in their own jobs (or the job of the person next to them) being eliminated so the business becomes more productive. When is the last time you’ve made recommendations of eliminating or changing programs or new technologies which might result in teh loss of your job paying you “fractions of the wage” in the private sector?
To be clear and honest, I think the lack of productivity and innovation in government is combination of leadership insufficiently empowered to focus on productivity and innovation, employees comfortable with the status quo, and politicians willing to accept the illusion of doing the peoples business instead of doing the hard work to actually empower leadership to do it.
The problem with cutting a lot of government jobs is that people still expect people to answer the phone and solve their problems. Government is a people pleasing business. Most people will sit on a phone tree for corporate customer service for a half hour. If you have to wait 10 minutes to get license plates, you’re finding your county commissioner’s number. If you wait more than 20 minutes to speak to a state office, you have your Representative on the phone or you’re bashing the Governor here. No one wants their county office to close, no one wants their school to close, and hands off my university. Until we change the expectations voters have of government, elected officials are going to keep providing what those pesky voters want. Service. That’s expensive and takes a lot of people and buildings.
Yes, we expect the services. We just think you should be innovating and increasing your productivity to do it for less like everyone in the private sector.
I am not sure how 13,000 proves your point? That is less than 10 years ago. We are always looking for ways to innovate and streamline at the state.
I have never met an employee in the private sector that innovates himself out of a job. I know of managers and owners that do it all the time. Check out the layoffs at Amazon. Not an employee innovation reduction. That was a, take care of the profits for shareholders reduction.
You seem to be, one, putting all state workers under one umbrella because you saw one dude working on the highway while four watched. Two, I also get the distinct impression that you just don’t like government or the employees they hire. That means no matter what is said, you will argue because you do not have room open in your mind to grow or change.
Whatever I “seem to be”, the truth is I’ve worked for the federal and state governments as well as the private sector. Only the latter gets up every day looking for innovations and productivity opportunities. The other two resist them with a passive aggressiveness honed by decades of being too comfortable with the status quo.
As No-one Special said rightly said, it is not just the employees fault. It is also the politicians who don’t empower and demand leadership to pursue innovation or productivity changes because “No one wants their county office to close, no one wants their school to close, and hands off my university.”
What No-one special gets wrong is inefficient pork isn’t service. When the county government is the only entity that requires coming to the office when banks (which have greater risks related to identity theft) can provide ways for everything to be done at home, that isn’t service, it is pork. When small schools stay open but don’t students classes and services routine in big schools (which might be done with technology), it isn’t service it is pork. And, I don’t even want to broach the universities which is by far the least innovative and productive segment of our entire society.
It is the job of politicians to lead so the voters get true improved service, their most basic desire from their government.