Well… I’ll admit that’s the argument that came to mind the last time I discussed this with a friend.
Random 'economic benefits vs social benefits' rambling by a non-economist
Economically speaking, from a short-term, ‘amount of work done’ perspective, it makes sense for employers to say that women will potentially ‘produce less’ if they get pregnant. (No offence meant to any of the women on this thread, who have been making valuable contributions. I’m saying this from a very cold, calculating, numerical perspective, with no human element.) It’s the same sort of logic that makes employers hesitant to hire people with chronic health problems. Anyone who cannot commit fully to working as much as possible for the company is a potential ‘waste of salary money’. This was undoubtedly the sort of logic that motivated employers in Europe and America in the era where twelve-hour work days at factories were common, before massive protests and the like forced reform.
However, a substantial amount of work done by a capable employee is better than passing up on that employee because of a ‘risk’ of absence, and even if it might make economic sense to pay employees less when they’re on leave (be it sick leave, vacation leave or parental leave), making concessions for parental leave helps buy employees’ loyalty, since they’re assured that company policy will support their freedom of choice, which might motivate them to work harder. It’s of course also ‘family-friendly’, since having parental leave with a minimal loss of income makes having children more economically practicable. Also, while women are physiologically obliged to bear the brunt of the effects of child-bearing, we might find that balancing parental leave between men and women allows a quicker return to work (it’s hard for a parent to keep up with work if he/she has to handle most of the child-rearing alone), and that it avoids putting women at an unfair disadvantage when looking for employment, since the company will be expecting to give a person of either sex the same amount of parental leave.
The short version of my argument is that even if it makes numerical, economic sense (in the short term) to pay someone less if he or she is unable to commit as much, generosity and balanced parental leave might help buy employee loyalty and encourage equal sharing of childcare responsibilities. Also, it allows more people (particularly women) to be recruited on the basis of their talents, which enlarges the labour pool. (Part of why Abe’s government has been pushing for more women to enter the workforce is because it would greatly boost Japan’s economy, possibly by 15% if all eligible women returned to work, if I remember correctly.)
Now then… I’ll translate 33, if no one’s done it yet…
@ayamedori PS: I happened to see you starting to type a reply before going off. I hope none of us has said something to offend you. It’s not at all ideal that we’ve been discussing issues affecting women in the workplace without women participating, so I hope we didn’t say anything insensitive.
33
たとえ 意識 を 回復 する 可能性 が １％ しか なかった として も……
even-if consciousness [object] recovery do possibility [subject] 1% not-more exist-not-past consider-TE [inclusion]
Even assuming that the chances of recovering consciousness were no more than 1%...
たとえ: ‘even’ or ‘even if’. I’d say it’s used to strengthen the contrast between the condition that comes after ‘if’ and the main clause. It’s working together with the ~ても at the end of this clause.
可能性: ‘the character of being possible’=the possibility/chances/probability
~しかない: a structure that indicates that what is considered does not exceed ~
として: て-form of とする, which means ‘to take as/to consider as’. I translated it as ‘assuming’ because ‘to take as’ wasn’t as clear here, and ‘considering’ would make it sound like the ‘1% probability’ was a fact, which is something I don’t know.