Federal employees have made significant progress on paid leave in recent years, but a gap remains, and a newly introduced House bill is trying to close it.
HR-9261, formally titled the Comprehensive Paid Leave for Federal Employees Act, would guarantee federal employees up to 12 weeks of paid leave for all situations currently covered under the Family and Medical Leave Act. The bipartisan bill was introduced by Senator Brian Schatz of Hawaii and Representative Don Beyer of Virginia, and its sponsors argue it would save the federal government at least $50 million annually in employee turnover and replacement costs.
To understand why the bill matters, it helps to understand where federal employees currently stand. In 2019, Congress passed the Federal Employee Paid Leave Act, which granted up to 12 weeks of paid parental leave for the birth, adoption, or foster placement of a child — a significant and long-overdue benefit that took effect in October 2020. That was a meaningful step forward.
The problem is that paid leave begins and ends there. A federal employee who has a baby gets 12 weeks of paid leave. That same employee, if diagnosed with a serious illness six months later, gets nothing equivalent. There is no federal short-term disability program for government workers. To cover a medical absence, employees must piece together whatever sick leave and annual leave they have accumulated, apply for donated leave through the voluntary leave transfer program, or simply go without pay. The same limitation applies to an employee who needs to step away to care for a seriously ill spouse or parent, or who is dealing with circumstances related to domestic violence or a family member’s military deployment.
HR-9261 would extend paid leave to all of those situations, bringing the federal government’s leave policy in line with what a growing number of large private employers already offer. Among the 100 largest companies in the Russell 1000, more than half currently offer some form of paid family and medical leave beyond parental leave. The broader private sector still lags; only about 27% of private sector workers overall have access to paid family leave, but large employers have increasingly recognized that comprehensive leave policies are a recruitment and retention tool, not just a benefit.
That recruitment angle is central to the bill’s sponsors’ argument. With federal agencies facing ongoing challenges attracting younger workers, the gap between what the federal government offers and what large private employers offer has become harder to ignore.
The bill has been introduced in previous sessions of Congress without advancing, and its prospects in the current environment are uncertain. But for government workers managing a serious illness, a family health crisis, or another qualifying situation outside of parental leave, the safety net has a significant hole in it.
