Importance of Paternity Leaves!

Though it’s the mother who actually delivers the child, undeniably a father plays a much greater role and is expected to be emotionally and physically available for the mother and child, both before and after the delivery and so Parental Leave for fathers is very important for working families.

Paternity leave can promote parent-child bonding, improve outcomes for children, and even increase gender equality at home by sharing the cores. Paid parental leave for fathers, as well as for mothers, provides a real advantage to the family. A father on paternity leave will be available for his child 24*7, during this tenure he would not only expertise in changing diapers, bathing and feeding the baby but would also be proficient in decoding which sound represent hunger and which ones meant sleepiness. Once father is confident of handling the baby, he can give mother the kind of rest and sleep she needs post delivery by taking care of the new born.

The concept of fathers taking paternal leave helps not just children but moms, too, by changing who changes the diapers and the whole culture around work and family. Dads these days exhibit a kind of cognitive dissonance against the traditional thought of woman being the hole and sole for the baby. Men say we want to spend more time with the kids, and that parenting should be an equal responsibility of both parents. Having said this with unequal parental leave policies a woman is often left with the traditional arrangement of wives being primarily responsible for childcare.

Paternity leaves are also associated with increased father engagement and bonding, longer leaves mean dads have more time to bond with a new child, more likely to be actively involved in the child’s care which not only includes feeding, changing diapers but also getting up in the night. Fathers who take more paternity leave will be more involved in caring for their children right from the start. This approach would set a pattern that lasts long even after the leave ends, which would also help in building a long lasting and loving relationship of the father with his kid.

When fathers take leave, it can increase employment and pay for mothers as she can go back to work whenever she wants. Finally, when fathers take more paternity leave, it may increase the ability of mothers to engage in paid work, with a positive effect on female labor force participation and wages.