Paid Time Off MattersA (slow) progress report

Microsoft and 'affordable' housing in Puget Sound

On January 16, 2019, Microsoft announced it would "commit $500 million to tackle affordable housing crisis in Puget Sound region'. That's "good" but why did it take so long for Microsoft to act? Microsoft 'temps' were/are among the ones most affected by the difficulty/impossibility to find affordable housing that would be close to the Microsoft's campuses. I remember how hard it was for most/all of my coworkers to find housing they could afford, except very far away, involving extra long and costly commuting hours. I also remember Microsoft had buses for its employees housed far away but those buses were not accessible for contractor's employees :( 

Another sad example of double standard and discrimination. What is the situation now? Has anything changed? As for the $500 million and the affordable housing crisis: how will this be monitored, what about the other big tech companies, what about the Gates and Allen Foundations?

Any connection between paid time off and affordable housing? Of course because the farther you have to live the longer you spend on commuting, the less time you have for your family or anything else. I'd be curious to know what's the average commuting time for direct employees and temps?

 

One year later, how do Microsoft's contractors implement the new paid parental leave policy?

One year ago a new paid parental leave requirement was announced in the Microsoft's blog by Corporate VP  Dev Stahlkopf with the headline: Paid parental leave matters. Fast Company selected her among most creative people 2019 for her work at Microsoft. How have those changes been implemented? We remain concerned about the status of the 10 public holidays: for Microsoft direct employees they come on top of the paid vacation days.  As we wrote in 2018, organizing a survey of the contractors employees to collect their assessment of their situation and making public the results, would be useful. Why? Having Xmas day and all 10 public holidays taken out of your 15 days of paid time off seriously  reduces the real number of your paid vacation. That would be in violation of Microsoft commitment to its own Global Human Rights Statement of 2006. So can we get the details of the present situation?