This is the Kator Daily Podcast for Friday, October 6,

2003. I'm Caleb Brown. The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act

sounds good to be sure it's meant to protect pregnant workers from

discrimination, but what are the practical incentives created by some of the

laws requirements and open-ended invitations for new federal regs. And what policy changes would deliver tangible benefits to workers without new federal mandates?

Cato's Vanessa Brown Calder comments.

Women who are pregnant or are new moms often drop out of the

workforce. That's not necessarily a problem. It's good to have a mom with you at home when you're a tiny baby.

You know, people's priorities change as they get older, as they have children and that sort of thing.

Nonetheless, there are working women who

want to get right back to it and have children and they get right

back into the workforce. What should we know about how employers

think about the likelihood that one of their critical employees could get

pregnant and just vanish? Well you know I think that that is something that employers do sometimes

think about and worry about. Unfortunately, there is some new legislation

who was actually passed at the end of 2022 as part of the 2023 Consolidated Appropriations Act

and that legislation is called the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, which sounds very good.

You know, the legislation is it's well-intentioned.

I think it's safe to say it's meant to protect pregnant workers from their employers

during this vulnerable time that you're talking about

where you know often there are challenges there are sometimes you know there's doctors

appointments there's various symptoms of pregnancy

...