Medical and Family Leave Act

The policy I have chosen is The Medical and Family Leave Act of 1993

Note: Keep in mind that that an objective balanced review and analysis of the policy must be provided- you may not present as an advocate would.

NOTE: please keep in mind that this paper is about the POLICY PROCESS!! We are to focus on the policy process.

NOTE: This paper MUST BE CORRECT APA format and citations AND this paper WILL BE sent to TURNITIN. Please be careful of too many quotes according to this professor. Please proof read as this professor is very picky. At the end I will include his grading rubric for this paper.

This paper will focus on the post-adoption aspect of the Policy Process, and will include the following information:

1. The written policy that was adopted, including an overview of its major provisions within the text of your paper, and a copy of the full policy as an appendix to you paper.
2. The individual and organizations assigned the responsibility for implementing the policy.
3. The amount of funds appropriated for the policy.
4. The challenges associated with the implementation
5. The intergovernmental and inter- sectorial implications of the policy as it is written ( that is, how does this policy enacted by a specific government affect-both directly and indirectly-governments at other levels, nonprofit organizations, or the private sector?)

Medical and Family Leave Act Overview:

In 1993, Congress passed the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), which required that businesses with fifty or more employees permit twelve weeks a year of unpaid leave to employees for birth, adoption, foster care, or personal or family illness. Under the FMLA, employers must also continue to provide health care coverage during family medical leaves and restore employees to their jobs or equivalent positions when the employee returns to the workplace. This legislation marked the formal adoption of a policy intended to alleviate the growing social problem of insufficient time for workers to care for children or aging parents, and was an important step towards the creation of an overall family policy that considers the needs of working individuals with dependents. Prior to the passage of the act, the United States was the only industrialized nation without a comprehensive family-leave policy.1 The passage of the FMLA was the culmination of a political process that attempted to balance competing interests, which resulted in the gradual development of a federal policy towards family leave.