Parental Leave Revolution Moves From Tech To Banking

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As tech companies like Facebook, Netflix and Spotify up the ante on parental leave benefits, they're putting pressure on the staid world of banking to do the same.

Credit Suisse announced Monday that it would begin offering all of its U.S. employees 20 weeks of paid maternity leave. Previously, the Zurich-based bank had offered 12 weeks paid plus eight weeks unpaid leave to its 8,300 U.S. employees.

The company also announced it would pay for new parents to bring a nanny with them if they had to travel for business in the first 12 months of their child's life.

Competition from increasingly enlightened tech firms drove the change, said Elizabeth Donnelly, Credit Suisse's head of benefits for the Americas. "We're no longer just competing with other financial services firms," she told The Huffington Post.

You hear tech companies talk a lot about game-changing disruption. There are endless examples: Uber "disrupted" the taxi industry, Seamless made calling for pizza obsolete, Netflix changed the way we watch television. Less discussed is the way tech is starting to change and improve how new parents get treated at work -- at least at certain high-end employers.

Giving employees at well-paid, white-collar jobs more maternity and paternity leave is the new hotness of 2015.

The same day Credit Suisse announced it would beef up leave, Facebook said it would offer four months' paternity leave to all dads worldwide -- previously, just male employees in the U.S. had the benefit.

Also this year, Netflix gave 12 months parental leave to employees that work in its streaming business. Spotify gave six months of leave to its U.S. employees. Amazon, Microsoft and Adobe also increased their leave allowances this year. 

In banking, Goldman Sachs increased paid maternity leave to 16 weeks, Donnelly pointed out. Most of Credit Suisse's competitors offer about 12 weeks. "We didn't necessarily want to mimic other banks," she said.

As for the "gilded" nanny perk, elite private equity firm KKR announced a similar benefit in August, as part of an effort to attract more women to the old-line firm. Only 13 percent of KKR's employees are women.

Women in finance face many of the same issues as women in tech -- feeling like you've just walked in on a boys' party, etc. -- especially at the elite investing and private equity firms.  While there's parity in the lower ranks in the finance industry, as you move up women start to disappear, according to data from the nonprofit women's advocacy group Catalyst. 

There's only one woman, out of 13 of people, heading up one Credit Suisse's regional offices in the U.S. 

Credit Suisse's new policy is also distinctive because it gives employees a year to take time off. All primary caregivers, including same-sex and adoptive parents, are eligible for the leave and can take it within the first year of a child's arrival. That means a man working at Credit Suisse can take 20 weeks off, after his employed spouse takes her maternity leave from her job. That's a huge win for a dual-income family -- essentially doubling the amount of time a baby gets to bond with her parents at home.

These People Got Way Too Aggressive On Black Friday

If it's worth waking up for at 3 a.m., it's apparently also worth waking up for at 3 a.m. and then punching someone in the face. 

Welcome to Black Friday, the annual tradition where bargain-crazed shoppers gather at big box stores and reenact scenes from Lord of the Flies.

At a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, bystander Adolfo E. Arzaga captured a chaotic scene as a scrum of shoppers scuffled over discounted flat-screen TVs:

In Springfield, Virginia, a college student waiting in line at a Best Buy told Fox 5 that he was attacked by a woman who tried to save a spot at the front of the line by leaving a chair there, then returning hours later.

“She was angry, and I was telling her, ‘No, you’re not getting in the front of the line. I’ve been here since 12 [p.m.],'” the student, Ahmad Shukrey told the outlet. “And she proceeds to attack me with the chair, pushing into my friend, knocking me over and twisting my ankle.”'

Steven Boone, another man in line, told the station the woman "refused to calm down" and ended up getting arrested.

Lady cut Blk Fri line @BestBuy, assaults cust & police, gets arrested. Officer very professional. @fairfaxpolice pic.twitter.com/fag1pcPTU2

— Al Luna (@AlLunajr) November 26, 2015

Not to be outdone, shoppers at the Alexandria Mall in Alexandria, Louisiana, were treated to the sound of gunfire Thursday night after a fight in the mall parking lot escalated, reports the Town Talk. One person was injured.

Police said afterward that the "dispute [appeared] unrelated to shopping or mall operations."

Real estate search site Estately crunched the numbers last week and came up with the top 10 states most likely to see fights over Black Friday deals. Be careful out there, discount shoppers.

Map of which states are most likely to have #BlackFriday sale fights https://t.co/OmY6z9Z1Zu pic.twitter.com/YaQRk0SGrx

— Estately (@estately) November 23, 2015

Also on HuffPost:

The Case For A Meat Tax

A lot of the talk around fighting climate change is focused on big business and the auto industry. But what about meat? 

The livestock sector generates nearly 15 percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, according to a 2013 report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. That footprint is roughly equivalent to the one created by cars, planes, trains and boats combined: Transportation produces around 14 percent of global emissions.

Though public awareness of the environmental effects of meat and dairy consumption is relatively lower, a new report suggests that people are willing to adopt financial incentives, like a meat tax, that would encourage them to shift their diets away from those items.

Researchers at Chatham House, a London-based policy institute, surveyed people across 12 countries and focus groups in Brazil, China, the United Kingdom and the United States, and found that many would welcome a food charge if it helped alleviate high emissions levels -- though concerns about costs and alternatives to meat remain.

The report cautions that consumer knowledge alone won't be enough to cut back on these emissions. The push will have to come from government policy and business coalitions, including retailers and producers in the food supply chain.

"You only see the impact on consumer behavior when you put additional incentives," said Antony Froggatt, a senior research fellow at the institute who co-authored the study. A meat tax, in addition to helping curb emissions, could also benefit people's health and generate tax revenue.

Less visibility might explain why people are more attuned to the environmental impact of their cars, for example, than their meals. Refilling a gas tank over a lifetime reinforces the connection between a driver and gas pollutants, while most people's initial reaction to emissions resulting from food is centered on packaging, not the consumption itself, Froggatt said.

Participants in focus groups reported limited access to meat alternatives, which also tend be more expensive. "There's concern about prices and the impact on poorer people," Froggatt said. Unless alternatives are easily available, something like a meat tax would be "detrimental," he added.

The researchers say that stores and schools could lead the way in raising awareness of these foods. Offering fruit and vegetables at the front of a supermarket, for example, could significantly boost shoppers' likelihood of selecting something other than meat or dairy. The government could also provide subsidies for plant-based foods to support low-income households.

With the COP21 climate talks set to begin in Paris next week, many expect the participating countries to reach a global agreement about curbing carbon emissions. Some of the world's biggest polluters, including the U.S. and India, have already made reduction commitments for 2020.

But a deal on meat consumption is unlikely to be on the table. As of last month, only 21 of the national proposals include commitments to reducing livestock emissions.

"This is very low on the policy agenda," Froggatt said. "But part of the discussion will be what do we do next, and how do we increase our ambition. We hope diet is given greater consideration. Attention placed on the food sector is overdue."

The Case For A Meat Tax

A lot of the talk around fighting climate change is focused on big business and the auto industry. But what about meat? 

The livestock sector generates nearly 15 percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, according to a 2013 report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. That footprint is roughly equivalent to the one created by cars, planes, trains and boats combined: Transportation produces around 14 percent of global emissions.

Though public awareness of the environmental effects of meat and dairy consumption is relatively lower, a new report suggests that people are willing to adopt financial incentives, like a meat tax, that would encourage them to shift their diets away from those items.

Researchers at Chatham House, a London-based policy institute, surveyed people across 12 countries and focus groups in Brazil, China, the United Kingdom and the United States, and found that many would welcome a food charge if it helped alleviate high emissions levels -- though concerns about costs and alternatives to meat remain.

The report cautions that consumer knowledge alone won't be enough to cut back on these emissions. The push will have to come from government policy and business coalitions, including retailers and producers in the food supply chain.

"You only see the impact on consumer behavior when you put additional incentives," said Antony Froggatt, a senior research fellow at the institute who co-authored the study. A meat tax, in addition to helping curb emissions, could also benefit people's health and generate tax revenue.

Less visibility might explain why people are more attuned to the environmental impact of their cars, for example, than their meals. Refilling a gas tank over a lifetime reinforces the connection between a driver and gas pollutants, while most people's initial reaction to emissions resulting from food is centered on packaging, not the consumption itself, Froggatt said.

Participants in focus groups reported limited access to meat alternatives, which also tend be more expensive. "There's concern about prices and the impact on poorer people," Froggatt said. Unless alternatives are easily available, something like a meat tax would be "detrimental," he added.

The researchers say that stores and schools could lead the way in raising awareness of these foods. Offering fruit and vegetables at the front of a supermarket, for example, could significantly boost shoppers' likelihood of selecting something other than meat or dairy. The government could also provide subsidies for plant-based foods to support low-income households.

With the COP21 climate talks set to begin in Paris next week, many expect the participating countries to reach a global agreement about curbing carbon emissions. Some of the world's biggest polluters, including the U.S. and India, have already made reduction commitments for 2020.

But a deal on meat consumption is unlikely to be on the table. As of last month, only 21 of the national proposals include commitments to reducing livestock emissions.

"This is very low on the policy agenda," Froggatt said. "But part of the discussion will be what do we do next, and how do we increase our ambition. We hope diet is given greater consideration. Attention placed on the food sector is overdue."

Why Mark Zuckerberg's Paternity Leave Is A Win For Women

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Hoodie-wearing Facebook founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg announced recently that he’ll take time off -- two whole months! -- after his wife Priscilla Chan has their first baby.

This is a big deal for working men both at Facebook and in the U.S. (and their families). Guys here rarely take paternity leave -- few companies even bother offering it. For the chief executive of a Fortune 100 company to take leave, is just unheard of.

Zuckerberg’s move signals that it’s OK for men to prioritize family over their jobs -- at least for a hot second when you have a brand-new infant at home. There’s a good chance he’ll inspire other fathers to take time off.

And that is amazing news for women -- that’s right, women -- who face serious penalties and discrimination at work for becoming mothers. When men take paternity leave, it is a signal that juggling work and family isn’t just “lady business,” it promotes real understanding and empathy between the sexes at work and goes a long way in eliminating outdated, useless stereotypes that harm everyone.

“It fosters a different sense of cooperation when the women and men are both taking leave and understanding what it’s like to have newborns at home,” Nancy Altobello, the vice chair for talent at the consulting firm EY, told The Huffington Post this summer while explaining why the firm encourages fathers to take paternity leave.

Working women and men are both up against certain stereotypes and expectations when they become parents. For men, this mostly works in their favor on the job and hurts them at home. Women, well, they’re just screwed either way.

Priscilla and I are starting to get ready for our daughter's arrival. We've been picking out our favorite childhood...

Posted by Mark Zuckerberg on  Friday, November 20, 2015

There’s a cultural expectation that a good father prioritizes his job because he is the breadwinner -- indeed, fathers often make more money after having kids, studies have found.

And despite the fact that women are the sole or primary breadwinner in 40 percent of U.S. households with children, it’s assumed they’ll prioritize family over work and, as a result, become less reliable and less hard-working.

“Mothers are less likely to be hired for jobs, to be perceived as competent at work or to be paid as much as their male colleagues with the same qualifications,” Claire Cain Miller explained last year in the New York Times, citing an extensive 15-year study that showed women’s pay decreased 4 percent for each child they had. Men’s pay increased more than 6 percent after having kids.

Some research has found that the pay gap between mothers and non-mothers is wider than between men and women. 

If a woman signals that work is her priority -- over her children -- she runs into problems. She’s judged extremely harshly for being a terrible mother.

“Women are fundamentally [supposed to be] oriented to the family not to work," Robin Ely, a professor at Harvard Business School, who studies gender expectations at work, explained to HuffPost a few months ago. “The expectation is if you don’t do it, then you’re not a good mother.”

When Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer announced this fall that she’d only be gone a couple of weeks after she gives birth to twins in December, critics pounced. “Marissa Mayer’s Two-Week Maternity Leave Is Bullsh*t,” was the Daily Beast's headline. There were similar hot takes all around the internet.

Referring to Mayer’s two-week maternity leave stint in 2012 after she had just landed at Yahoo, the Telegraph summed up her double-bind pretty well: "Her 14-day maternity leave caused many to question her priorities as a parent. Others cast doubt on her dedication to her career."

Men face a different challenge: one that's become more problematic as more young dads of Zuckerberg's generation actively want to be more involved parents. These men run into problems because guys are often stigmatized or penalized if they demonstrate that work isn’t their top priority.

“The idea of a guy taking paternity leave was just [makes face] for my managers. Guys just don’t do that. They teased me," one consultant at a prominent firm told researchers from Boston University in a recent study.  "Then one of the partners said to me, ‘You have a choice to make: Are you going to be a professional or are you going to just be an average person in your field? If you are going to be a professional then that means nothing can be as important to you as your work.'"

Tell that to his little baby. Men who take paternity leave set themselves up to be more involved parents for that child's entire life. Seems important, yah? Oh, and fathers who are more involved at home certainly make life easier for their partners. Too often it's working women who wind up taking on more of the parenting work in dual-income couples.

Men want time with family, stigmas often keep them from doing so. @JoshLevs #AllIn

— marcyheinz (@marcyheinz) November 22, 2015

Paternity leave is a really powerful lever in changing these outdated paradigms. In Sweden, which provides paid time off for fathers, women’s earning potential rises 7 percent on average for every month a dad takes off. 

Some enlightened employers are recognizing this -- including Facebook, Spotify and Netflix -- and treat parental leave in a gender neutral way, offering equal amounts to men and women.

Facebook offers four months leave to dads -- but most do like Zuckerberg and only take two.

There’s still a long road till we get to equality. 

Microsoft Is More Male Than Last Year, Insists This Is Progress

Back in December, Microsoft’s chief executive publicly vowed to do better at diversity. The company, like its rivals in the tech industry, is overwhelmingly white and male. “We will make progress every year towards building a more diverse workforce,” CEO Satya Nadella told shareholders.

One year later, the company is even more male-dominated -- and ever-slightly less white -- according to Microsoft's latest report on demographics, released Monday afternoon. 

The overall percentage of women the company employs declined to 27 percent from 29 percent in 2014, according to the report. And 8.9 percent of the company’s workers are either black or Hispanic, up from 8.5 percent last year. Asian employees comprised 29.3 percent of workers, up from 28.8 percent.

Yet, because Microsoft did place a couple more women in leadership roles and because much of the decrease in female employees comes from overseas layoffs, the company is actually framing the news as positive overall.

“If we’re seeing gains at the top, we’re technically progressive,” Gwen Houston, Microsoft general manager of global diversity and inclusion, told The Huffington Post. “The trend is moving in the right direction, but we still have a long way to go.”

Tech companies are under increasing pressure to diversify. Publishing an annual diversity report is now a standard practice in the industry, though the reports typically contain depressing news. Facebook, Google and Twitter's diversity reports all revealed a similar level of blinding white-dudeness.

Though the numbers aren't getting much better, tech companies' increased attention and openness to diversity has certainly moved the needle in certain ways. Many tech companies are now doing training on unconscious bias, and some -- including Microsoft and Facebook -- are insisting that managers at least consider at a diverse slate of candidates before they choose someone to hire. 

At least people are talking about this stuff.

The drop in female employees at Microsoft this year was a direct result of the company’s decision to restructure its smartphone business, Houston said. The company laid off 7,800 employees on the struggling phone side -- a disproportionate number of whom were women working in overseas factories making the phones, she said.

Houston emphasized that three of the 11 people who report directly to Nadella are women, up from two last year. In the boardroom, if shareholders approve, three of Microsoft's 11 directors will be women, up from two out of 10 a year ago.

"The goal at the leadership level is to dial up the numbers, so women and people of color can see their presence affirmed at the top of the house," Houston said.

At the lower end, 31 percent of the company’s interns are women, up from 28 percent last year. And 30 percent of entry-level hires were women, up from 27 percent.

A big problem in tech is the so-called "leaky pipeline" -- women leave tech in higher numbers then men because, the theory goes, the culture is overwhelmingly male and often hostile to women.

Earlier this year, Microsoft increased the amount of parental leave it offers to workers to 20 weeks -- a move that may help retain more women in the long run, though Houston said it was too soon to tell.

“All our efforts to hire is for nothing if we can’t retain folks,” Houston said.

And more than a year ago, the company got rid of its famously harsh annual performance review system that pitted workers against one another. Studies have found that performance reviews can often be biased against women.

The new system is more inclusive and drives collaboration between workers, said Houston. And that helps retain women and people of color, she said.

For the past 15 years, Microsoft has been sponsoring a program to get more high school girls interested in tech careers, and it’s just now paying off, Houston said. “They’ve finished high school and college and now they’re working inside Microsoft,” she said.

She said the company has also instituted mandatory unconscious bias training, which is also available to the public. 

Nadella faced criticism last year for saying women don't need to ask for raises and should simply have faith that the system will deliver fair pay.

Since then, he's been more mindful about what he says. 

Houston said Nadella initiated a new practice to check in with people at the end of a meeting to see if everyone feels their voice was heard. "He'll ask, 'How did we do? Did people feel heard?'" she said. 

Now, other managers are also doing this at the end of meetings.

It gives employees a license to speak up, Houston said. “It sounds little but was powerful.”

Spotify's New Parental Leave Policy Is Pretty Amazing

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NEW YORK -- Citing its home base of Sweden, which has extremely generous maternity and paternity leave, Spotify just announced it would offer six months of parental leave to all full-time employees globally, effective immediately. 

The music company made the announcement in its New York offices with White House senior adviser Valerie Jarrett, who emphasized that the administration is making a push for a paid leave policy right now. 

"The fact that the U.S. is the only developed country without a paid leave policy doesn’t make sense," Jarrett said, emphasizing that leave increases worker productivity and even profitability. "We really want to have a culture in our country were you can be a working parent and be productive at work."

The leave will be available to all new parents at the company -- including same-sex couples and those who adopt and use surrogates -- for the first three years of a child's life. The company also said it would offer a month of flexible work options for those returning, including the ability to work from home, work part time or take advantage of flexible hours.

"I think we can be a role model," Daniel Ek, the company's CEO, told a group gathered here, speaking from Sweden.

New parents can take the leave continuously or in three chunks over three years. The policy will also be retroactive, meaning workers who had children after Jan. 1, 2013 will be eligible to take advantage.

Employees are not guaranteed their same exact job upon their return from leave, but their role "will be commensurate with that employee's current level of experience," Spotify said in an FAQ it gave HuffPost. Workers can also start their leave up to 60 days before the child arrives.

In Sweden parents get up to 480 days leave, and you can take it until your kids are 8 years old, Katarina Berg, the company's chief human resource officer, told the crowd.

Berg encouraged everyone in the room to tweet their support for paid leave, with the #LeadOnLeave hashtag.

Spotify, with its 1,600 employees, joins a growing group of mainly tech companies that have expanded the amount of leave on offer to workers, partly in an effort to attract workers as the market for tech talent heats up. Companies that recently expanded leave include Amazon, Netflix, Microsoft, Adobe and Accenture. 

The United States is currently one of only three nations in the world that offer exactly no paid leave to new parents. Jarrett said that puts us at a competitive disadvantage globally and doesn't serve the American workplace, where more than 50 percent of workers are women. "Our strategy is to make the case for why this is important," she said.

Jarrett mentioned that the White House is throwing its support behind the Healthy Families Act, which would require companies with 15 or more employees to offer up to 7 paid sick days each year.

The White House offers three months paid leave to men and women, Jarrett said. "And if you don't take it on my team, you're going to get a lecture from me."

"The flexibility is what I'm most excited about," said Alison Gilles, Spotify's director of engineering.

Gilles, who has a 10-week-old baby, is out on leave now but is happy to take advantage of the flex time, especially since she's got a 3-year-old at home, too. Her infant also made it through the almost hourlong press conference without a peep -- he slept through the whole thing.

Maybe, when he grows up, companies won't need to announce leave opportunities because they'll be an accepted part of work life.

This post has been updated.