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_______________________________
Institute for Workplace Studies----------------- Professor Samuel B. Bacharach
School of Industrial & Labor Relations-------- Director, Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell University
16 East 34th Street, 4th floor---------------------- Stuart Basefsky
New York, NY 10016 -------------------------------Director, IWS News Bureau
________________________________________________________________________

 

Congressional Research Service (CRS)

 

The Family and Medical Leave Act: Current Legislative Activity

Linda Levine, Specialist in Labor Economics

August 3, 2010

http://opencrs.com/document/RL31760/2010-08-03/download/1013/

[full-text, 18 pages]

 

Summary

Time off to care for one’s own health problems or those of family members is not a job-protected

entitlement. Thus, employees sometimes have jeopardized their continued employment to be

away from the workplace to address health-related matters. With passage of the Family and

Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA, P.L. 103-3), Congress mandated in Title I that private

employers with at least 50 employees and public employers of any size provide job-protected

unpaid leave for 12 workweeks in a 12-month period to employees who meet the length-ofservice

and hours-of-work eligibility requirement in order to care for their own, a child’s,

spouse’s, or parent’s serious health condition; to care for a newborn, newly adopted, or newly

placed foster child; and upon the birth or placement of an adopted or foster child. Employees in

the federal government’s executive branch generally are covered under Title II of the FMLA,

which is administered by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM).

 

The Department of Labor, which administers Title I of the act, replaced its 1995 regulation

effective January 16, 2009. The final rule contains many changes and addresses regulatory issues

raised by enactment of amendments to the FMLA in the National Defense Authorization Act

(NDAA) of FY2008. The NDAA provided (1) 12 workweeks of FMLA leave to Title I FMLAeligible

employees dealing with issues arising from family members in the Guard or Reserves

being called to active duty as a result of a qualifying exigency and (2) 26 workweeks of FMLA

leave to Title I and Title II FMLA-eligible employees and next of kin caring for seriously injured

or ill service members in the Armed Forces, Guard, or Reserves. Relatedly, in August 2009, OPM

proposed regulations about military family caregiver leave for eligible civil service employees.

 

In October 2009, the President signed into law the NDAA for FY2010, which contained further

changes to the FMLA. P.L. 111-84 extends qualifying exigency leave to FMLA-eligible family

members of regular and reserve members of the Armed Forces deployed to a foreign country and

extends military family caregiver leave to eligible family members and next of kin of recent

veterans of the Armed Forces, Guard, or Reserves. These provisions apply to employers covered

by Title I and Title II of the FMLA.

 

The Airline Flight Crew Technical Corrections Act was the only other bill to amend the FMLA

that advanced beyond committee referral in the 110th Congress. The 111th Congress approved the

reintroduced bill, which the President signed in December 2009 (P.L. 111-119). The law

recognizes that because the work hours of flight attendants and pilots were for the purpose of

FMLA eligibility being calculated based on in-flight time only, full-time flight attendants and

pilots usually work less than 1,250 hours and were therefore unable to take leave under the act.

 

Other bills introduced during the 111th Congress would, among other things, effectively increase

the number of employees eligible to take FMLA leave by such means as changing the hours-ofwork

requirement, adding new reasons for time off, and increasing the groups of eligible

employees. Bills include H.R. 389, H.R. 626/S. 354, H.R. 824, S. 3680, H.R. 2776, and H.R.

5944.

 

Contents

Introduction ...............................................................................................................................1

The Act’s Major Provisions and Regulations ...............................................................................1

Coverage and Reasons for Leave...........................................................................................2

Breaks in Service ............................................................................................................3

Substitution of Paid Leave for Unpaid FMLA Leave .......................................................4

Length and Form of Leave ....................................................................................................4

Notifications .........................................................................................................................5

Medical Certifications of Serious Health Conditions .............................................................6

Enforcement .........................................................................................................................7

FMLA Policy Issues....................................................................................................................7

Expanding the FMLA ...........................................................................................................7

Coverage and Eligibility..................................................................................................7

Reasons for Leave...........................................................................................................8

Care Recipient Groups ....................................................................................................8

Paid Leave ......................................................................................................................9

Clarifying or Tightening the FMLA.......................................................................................9

Serious Health Condition ................................................................................................9

Intermittent Leave......................................................................................................... 11

Employer Response Time to Notification of Need for Leave .........................................12

Legislative Activity...................................................................................................................12

In the 110th Congress...........................................................................................................12

In the 111th Congress ...........................................................................................................13

Contacts

Author Contact Information ......................................................................................................15

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This information is provided to subscribers, friends, faculty, students and alumni of the School of Industrial & Labor Relations (ILR). It is a service of the Institute for Workplace Studies (IWS) in New York City. Stuart Basefsky is responsible for the selection of the contents which is intended to keep researchers, companies, workers, and governments aware of the latest information related to ILR disciplines as it becomes available for the purposes of research, understanding and debate. The content does not reflect the opinions or positions of Cornell University, the School of Industrial & Labor Relations, or that of Mr. Basefsky and should not be construed as such. The service is unique in that it provides the original source documentation, via links, behind the news and research of the day. Use of the information provided is unrestricted. However, it is requested that users acknowledge that the information was found via the IWS Documented News Service.

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Stuart Basefsky                   
Director, IWS News Bureau                
Institute for Workplace Studies 
Cornell/ILR School                        
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New York, NY 10016                        
                                   
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