Ministry of Employment and Labor rolls out 'three-part spousal support package'
First 3 days of miscarriage and stillbirth leave paid
Parental leave also allowed for partners facing high-risk pregnancies
Workers whose spouses suffer a miscarriage or stillbirth will be entitled to up to five days of leave, and paternity leave will be available starting 50 days before the expected due date under new rules taking effect Friday.
The Ministry of Employment and Labor announced Thursday that it will begin enforcing the "three-part spousal support package" on Friday, filling a gap in support for male workers that had been concentrated largely on the period after childbirth.
Under the new rules, workers whose spouses experience a miscarriage or stillbirth may take between one and five days of leave, provided they apply within 20 days of the event. The first three days are paid.
Workers at small and medium-sized enterprises designated as priority support targets will receive full reimbursement of their ordinary wages for those three days from the government, up to 84,210 won ($62) per day and 252,630 won for three days combined. The leave must in principle be taken consecutively, though employers may allow it to be split.
The window for taking paternity leave is also being widened. Previously, workers could only use paternity leave within 120 days of their spouse giving birth. Going forward, they may take it from 50 days before the expected due date through 120 days after delivery.
Paternity leave totals 20 paid days and may be split into up to three separate periods. Workers may use all 20 days before the birth, all after, or a combination. Those at priority-support small and medium-sized enterprises will receive 100 percent of their ordinary wages, up to 1.68 million won.
Male workers will also be permitted to take parental leave before a child is born if their pregnant spouse faces a risk of miscarriage or premature birth. Applications must be submitted at least seven days before the intended start date. The period used counts against the worker's total parental leave entitlement but does not count toward the limit on how many times parental leave may be split.
According to the ministry, about 269,000 people received work-family balance benefits — including parental and maternity leave — from January through August this year, a 16.7 percent increase from the same period last year. The number receiving paternity leave benefits rose 45.1 percent to about 22,000.
"Male caregiving participation will be significantly broadened across the entire journey from pregnancy to childbirth," said Cho Jeong-suk, the ministry's director general for employment support policy. "We will continue developing measures to ease the burden on working parents — including employees at small and medium-sized enterprises and those in special-employment and freelance arrangements — as they balance work and child-rearing."
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