Most Men Don't Take Paternity Leave

By Amy E. Feldman

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - When it comes to taking Paternity leave what the law allows and what men actually do is different.

When an employee in Philadelphia told his department head that he wanted to take 12 weeks off for Paternity leave, the supervisor began teasing the newly man-to-Dad about what he was going to wear to Gymboree that day. But when he stopped taunting the supervisor granted the leave.

Would your boss if you ask?

Under the Federal and Medical Leave Act a company that employs more than 50 employees within a 75 mile radius has to provide up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave for the birth or adoption of a child to a qualified employee, either female or male. Interestingly, though the law protects men & women equally, new statistics show that only 43% of men took any leave after the birth of a child and of the men who did, more than half took a week or less.

Whether that's because men feared reprisals, are not able to take the burden of unpaid leave, or simply didn't know what to wear to Gymboree are still not clear.