Crs Report for Congress

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-of-service 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) …