Etsy and Fidelity Expand Their Family Leave Policies

The benefits arms race is showing no signs of slowing down: Twee online marketplace Etsy and financial-services giant Fidelity both announced expanded paid leave policies on Tuesday. Fidelity doubled its previous family leave offering, upping its paid maternity leave to 16 weeks and parental leave to 6 weeks, the company said in a statement. Etsy went with an all-encompassing parental leave policy, according to a post on its corporate blog. All of its 819 employees are eligible for a full 26 weeks of paid leave when they become a parent, regardless of gender or family circumstance. That also includes adoptive parents, making it one of the more generous leave policies out there.

"We had sense of our talent competitors and where they're at," said Juliet Gorman, Etsy's director of culture and engagement. "This certainly puts in the position of being a leader."

Both companies have enhanced their benefits in an attempt to attract and retain employees. "A generous, fully-paid parental leave policy is a competitive necessity for a company like Etsy," wrote Gorman in the announcement on the company blog. Fidelity called paid leave a "compelling benefit to attract and retain employees." The company has also started offering student debt repayment, another hot, recruitment-friendly benefit. Fidelity will put $2,000 a year toward student loan repayments for employees who have worked at the company for at least six months, up to a total of $10,000. Fidelity estimates that about a quarter of its 42,000 employees have student loan debt.