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Washington, D.C.—A report by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) claiming that paid parental leave would not be a major recruiting and retention incentive in the federal workplace “stands as yet another example that this administration does not grasp the magnitude of the government’s human capital problems—nor what to do about them,” the president of the nation’s largest independent union of federal workers said today.

President Colleen M. Kelley of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) said the OPM study, in response to a House request examining the impact of legislation proposed by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) that would provide six weeks of paid leave for childbirth or adoption, “is based on the false assumption that there are already sufficient leave and scheduling flexibilities in place” in the federal sector.

“If that were true,” the NTEU leader said, “the federal government would be a competitive employer with the private sector—which it is not—and federal agencies wouldn’t be facing severe hiring and retention problems—which they do.”

OPM said that while it studies ways to make the federal compensation system more “flexible and competitive” for agencies, it believes that federal workers “can meet their family responsibilities with the many leave and work scheduling flexibilities that are already available to them.”

Kelley called that view “myopic, at best.” She said: “Virtually everyone who has looked at current and looming personnel shortages in the federal sector—including the Comptroller General, the General Accounting Office (GAO) and key members of the Senate—has seen that a critical part of the problem is that current programs are insufficient to attract and retain the people the government needs.”

The NTEU president noted that faced with a large number of potential retirees, the government will need to increase its recruiting efforts among younger workers, including women of child-rearing age for whom paid parental leave could be a major factor in deciding to enter the workforce.

The question, the NTEU leader said, “is not whether we need new and expanded programs, but what shape they should take and how quickly we can put them in place.”

Under the Maloney proposal, half of the 12 weeks of unpaid leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA) available to a federal employee for the birth of a child or placement of a child with the employee for adoption or foster care would be paid leave.

OPM said its survey of federal agency and department human resource directors indicated their view that an additional paid parental leave benefit “would not be a major factor” in recruitment and retention efforts.

Kelley said NTEU intends to continue its efforts to secure this “much-needed and valuable benefit” for federal workers.

NTEU is the largest independent federal union, representing some 150,000 employees in 25 agencies and departments.