FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 12, 2021
CONTACT
Neil Sroka, neil@paidleave.us, 847-219-8491
Paid Leave for the U.S. (PL+US) hosts Instagram conversations with Biden Administration Officials, Business Leaders including Alexis Ohanian
Paid Leave for the U.S. (PL+US) hosted Biden administration officials and business leaders in two different Instagram Live conversations on the positive impact that the Build Back Better plan’s paid family and medical leave program will have on working families and businesses in the U.S.
Participants joining PL+US Executive Director Molly Day on Instagram included U.S. Department of Commerce (USDOC) Deputy Secretary Don Graves, Small Business Administration (SBA) Assistant Administrator Natalie Madeira Cofield, Levi Strauss & Co. Senior Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer Tracy Layney, and Former Executive Chair of Reddit and Founder of Seven Seven Six Alexis Ohanian.
Left: PL+US’s Molly Day with Levi Strauss & Co.’s Tracy Layney and SBA Assistant Administrator Natalie Madeira Cofield; Right: Seven Seven Six’s Alexis Ohanian, PL+US’s Molly Day, and USDOC Deputy Secretary Don Graves
“The lack of paid leave disproportionately affects women and people of color… Two million women have left the workforce during the pandemic,” said Levi Strauss & Co.’s Tracy Layney during her conversation with SBA’s Assistant Administrator Natalie Madeira Cofield and PL+US’s Molly Day. “This has real economic impact on this country. We need to get women back to work, and paid leave does that.”
Establishing a national paid leave program is about doing right by working people, noted SBA’s Assistant Administrator Natalie Madeira Cofield, but it’s also about doing what’s good for business. “From illness to personal health and wellbeing, giving people the ability to take care of themselves or take care of their family produces a more efficient and healthy workplace,” Cofield said.
During his conversation with PL+US’s Day and Seven Seven Six’s Alexis Ohanian, USDOC Deputy Secretary Don Graves gave voice to the basic principle that underscores the push to establish paid leave for all working people in the United States. “You should never be put in a place where you have to choose between work and taking care of your loved ones,” Graves said.
Ohanian concluded the Instagram Live conversation in even starker terms: ”If this country supports the family values we all talk about, [passing paid family and medical leave] is a great way to live up to it.”
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About PL+US
PL+US (Paid Leave for the United States) is the national campaign to win paid family and medical leave for every working person in the US. PL+US has helped win paid family leave for nearly 8 million people through our transformative workplace campaigns at companies like Walmart, Starbucks, CVS and more in partnership with employees, employers, consumers, and investors. Learn more at: http://paidleave.us/