Raney Aronson-Rath Quotes

I always supported the women I worked with having time off to go to parent-teacher conferences and doctors' appointments or bringing their infants into the office.

Since coming to Congress in 1971, I have been fighting to help create an environment where the goals of the National Work and the Family Month can become a reality.

How do you give smart, accomplished, ambitious women the same opportunities as men to reach their goals? What about universal preschool and after-school programs? What about changing the corporate mind-set about the time commitment it takes to move up the ladder? What about having more husbands step up and take the major load?

I have a supportive family and an outstanding team, but I also have a flexible work schedule that allows me, at least some of the time, to get to the kids' school program or the doctor visits when I need to. So family-friendly work schedules have become more of a passion of mine, and the cost of childcare is also a huge issue.

I would be excited if we could reimagine workplaces that start from a premise that women are going to be a central part: Women are going to bear children, people are going to raise those children, and it's not going to be a nuisance - it's actually going to be understood as part of the deal.

More and more companies are updating their leave policies to reflect an understanding that being family-friendly is a smart investment in their workforce and America's future.

I want every version of a woman and a man to be possible. I want women and men to be able to be full-time parents or full-time working people or any combination of the two.

Avon is a unique place to work; we've got family-friendly policies. We have more senior women in high-level management than any other company; 46 percent of our officers are women.

I think the rules will change and I think more and more young women are going to decide that having a family and taking care of a home is not a bad choice, but how do we subsidize it - not necessarily European-style socialism. It'll have to be a new more creative, dynamic and local solution.

I'm particularly fortunate to be in a position where I can bring my child to work and be able to get good child care. Not a lot of women have that.

The When Women Succeed, America Succeeds economic agenda will enable women to achieve greater economic security, raise wages for women and their families, and better allow working parents to support and care for their families.

In Sweden, both parents take care of the children.

It isn't that women are less ambitious, but women want to find a balance between work, love, and family.

The strategy we need to pursue is one of recovering our time - to push back on our hours of work. We need to form a new alliance between feminist groups, labor unions, child advocates, progressive corporations, and the federal government insofar as it's willing to pursue a family-friendly agenda.

Maternity leave and parental leave is absolutely vital for strengthening families. It's an issue for men and women.

We don't have enough support for maternal leave and the kinds of things that some of the European countries do. So we still make it hard on women to go into the work force and feel that they can be good at work but then doing the most important job, which is raising your children in a responsible and positive way.

We need to push for work-family practices and policies that allow individuals to customize their work lives according to their changing individual preferences and family obligations, not just their traditional gender roles.

I think that the female workforce is so valuable. And if we're going to champion women in the workforce, which our economy seems to want to do, we have to deal with the realities, which is that they have children, and they need a way to take care of their children in a supportive work environment.

It's embarrassing to be in the only westernized economy that doesn't have paid family leave and flex scheduling, and that disproportionately helps women.

As women, we're presented this false choice that is either our children or our work. But I don't think I fully understood the paradox until I had a child. I bring my son to work and let other parents do the same. I am very intentional about the workplace that I create, and my son is a big part of that.

We all want to support our working mothers. Allowing them simple accommodations can ensure they are able to continue working and provide a living for themselves and their families.

Paid family leave, for instance, has strong backing in scientific literature as an effective means of enabling families who want kids to have them.

It is the responsibility of all of us to create a culture that encourages and enables fathers to spend more time with their families.

To create a society that is supportive of child-rearing parents is a role of the government, and we are also working to realize a society where women can shine.

Publishing parental pay benefits will let employers show that they're family-friendly and enable them to better attract talent, potentially spurring on some very healthy competition.