BENEFITS DIGEST

Writing from a financial-services perspective, Chuck Greenblott argues the employee assistance programs most employers lean on weren’t built for chronic caregiving demands or the planning questions of workers approaching retirement. His examples are hypothetical employees rather than measured cases. The piece separates clinical care from practical care navigation and from financial and coverage planning, and it recommends employers review what their program actually covers, add navigation where it’s missing, and teach managers the handoffs.

A former Bank of America employee alleges the bank disciplined her for absences tied to caring for a family member, put her on a performance improvement plan, and configured its leave system so she couldn’t request family leave afterward, until she resigned on August 20. The complaint pleads constructive discharge rather than an express firing, meaning conditions allegedly left no real choice but to quit. Eight counts span discrimination, retaliation and interference with federal family-leave rights, including a disability claim based on her association with the person she cared for, a theory that does not create a general right to caregiver accommodations. All of it is allegation, untested in court.

A manager said she had been terminated months earlier. HR said she was still employed. That conflict is central to a sales specialist’s allegations against Rare Beauty and staffing company Allwork after approved leave to care for her mother. She says the companies encouraged additional leave, then left her without work and retaliated after she complained, eventually driving her to resign. Her claims include family-leave violations and discrimination based on her association with her mother’s disability. She also argues that the companies’ representations prevent them from denying her federal leave eligibility. The complaint raises a practical coordination issue for employers using staffing firms. Who approves leave, communicates employment status and controls the return to work?

Mercer argues that longer working lives change benefits design across health, caregiving and retirement at once. The article’s report-based estimates illustrate how interruptions compound, with a five-year career break reducing retirement savings by an estimated 29% and a one-year caregiving break combined with the gender pay gap leaving women 24% behind on average. The recommendations run to prevention, return-to-work support, caregiving flexibility and gradual retirement rather than treating longevity as an investment problem alone.

Lerch Early walks employers through the District of Columbia’s October 1 reductions. Family-caregiving leave drops from 12 weeks to 6 and an employee’s own medical leave from 12 weeks to 10, with the weekly cap down from $1,190 to $1,100, while parental leave stays at 12 weeks and prenatal leave at 2. The action items are updated notices, which are required at the worksite, annually, at hire and at relevant leave requests, and a fresh look at whether policies that top up public benefits now cost more.

The District of Columbia reduced benefits under its Universal Paid Leave program effective October 1, 2026. DLA Piper explains that medical leave falls from 12 weeks to 10 and family caregiving leave from 12 weeks to six, while parental and prenatal leave remain at 12 and two weeks. The maximum weekly benefit is $1,100. Employers should use the updated notice and review communications and any benefits that coordinate with the program. The duration reductions run through September 30, 2030; employers shouldn’t assume every changed dollar amount automatically returns to its former level then.

Venable’s Lisa Tavares and Carissa Davis map a patchwork of menopause laws that now reaches both HR policies and health plans. Rhode Island already requires reasonable accommodations and written notice to employees. The Illinois Menopause Equity and Care Act takes effect January 1, 2027 and adds an insurance mandate for hormonal and non-hormonal therapy starting in 2028. Philadelphia’s accommodation ordinance also starts in 2027. On the coverage side, Maryland, Louisiana and New Jersey have enacted mandates, and Louisiana’s bars prior authorization and step therapy on hormone replacement prescriptions. The key distinction for sponsors is funding. State insurance mandates generally apply to insured coverage, while self-funded ERISA plans generally aren’t subject to those mandates. Employers still need to consider workplace accommodation requirements no matter how they fund their health benefits. The authors note New York has four bills pending and that California and Virginia governors vetoed coverage mandates this fall.

KFF’s new survey of women ages 18 to 49 puts numbers on the leave gaps employers are asked to fill. Among recently employed mothers, 52 percent took paid parental leave, 35 percent took only unpaid leave and 13 percent took none at all, and more than a third of leave-takers were back within eight weeks. Mothers still shoulder much more of the caregiving. When a child is sick, 58 percent of working mothers say they usually stay home, against 20 percent of fathers, and 53 percent of those mothers lose pay to do it, rising to 76 percent among lower-income households. Support from employers could influence decisions about having children, with 43 percent of women saying employer-provided paid parental leave or childcare support would make having a child more likely, a figure that climbs past 70 percent among women already considering children. The survey fielded in March and April with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 points.

Lee Hafner’s data piece treats menopause as a retention problem, not a wellness perk, arguing that support is what keeps mid-career women from scaling back at work. The number that frames it comes from a Stanford study, which found women’s earnings drop 10 percent in the four years after they first seek menopause-related care. The article collects current statistics, accommodation ideas and employer examples for benefit teams building support that goes beyond simply referring employees to an employee assistance program.

Northwestern Mutual’s 2026 Planning and Progress Study, a Harris Poll survey of 4,375 adults fielded in January, finds 61 percent of adults expect to need long-term care and 73 percent would rather receive it at home, yet 54 percent have made no financial plan for it. The study prices a home health aide working eight hours a day at $99,280 a year in 2025, citing illumifin’s cost of care data. Caregiving is already reshaping younger workers’ finances. About a fifth of Gen Z and Millennial respondents are currently providing care, and 10 percent of current and former caregivers report reallocating retirement funds to cover it, per the study. For sponsors, the study reads as a case for pairing retirement education with long-term care planning before the costs arrive.

Carrot founder Tammy Sun on why menopause benefits have moved from niche to mainstream since the company launched its virtual midlife clinic in 2022. Sun says only about one in five OB-GYNs is trained in menopause care, so routing employees straight to a knowledgeable provider could help them find appropriate care sooner, and she puts the cost of replacing a senior leader at $200,000 or more. She argues that better care can reduce costs and help employers retain experienced workers, and her pitch to finance chiefs is framed in exactly those terms.

The cuts come from the District's Fiscal Year 2027 Budget Support Act. The number of available weeks falls only for family caregiving and medical leave. Parental and prenatal leave keep their existing durations, but the lower weekly payment cap applies across the program. Employer obligations are unchanged. The program remains fully employer-funded with payroll deductions still impermissible, and the sliding-scale wage replacement formula, up to 90 percent, stays. The action items are the mandatory workplace notice, which must be updated, and helping workers planning leave around October 1 confirm which benefit limits apply.

Segal's read of the section 129 proposed regulations puts the testing mechanics up front: the eligibility test pairs a reasonable-classification standard with a numerical safe harbor, no more than a quarter of total benefits may flow to five percent owners, and average benefits for the non-highly compensated must reach 55 percent of the HCE average, counting only employees who actually use the program. The correction path may matter most in practice. Certain failures can be cured by reporting excess benefits as taxable income on the affected W-2s by the deadline. Sponsors may rely on the proposed rules now; comments close September 25.

An argument that menopause is a benefits design problem, not an awareness problem: $1.8 billion a year in lost productivity, roughly 6,000 U.S. women reaching menopause daily, and a Mayo Clinic finding that 13 percent experienced an adverse work outcome from symptoms. With the FDA's removal of the warning that long discouraged hormone therapy now driving demand—and a shortage of estrogen patches—direct to consumer vendors are rushing into the gap, some initiating hormone therapy without a physical exam or mammogram. The prescription is integrated primary care built into the plan rather than point solutions, with Rhode Island's first-in-the-nation menopause accommodation mandate a sign of where this is heading.

Seyfarth finds the practical wins in the proposed Section 129 regulations. The average benefits test now counts only employees who actually receive DCAP benefits, which should make the 55 percent threshold easier to satisfy, and salary reduction arrangements may disregard employees earning under $25,000. A new correction mechanism lets an employer cure a failed average benefits or owner concentration test by moving the excess into affected individuals' W-2 income, preserving tax favored treatment for everyone else. Comments close September 25 with an October 15 hearing, and employers may rely on the proposal now.

Public-sector workers who cut back hours for caregiving likely do not know what it costs them at retirement, a new Pew study finds. A career worked at 20 hours a week produces roughly half the annual retirement income of a full-time career in a defined contribution plan, and the reductions run steeper still in defined benefit plans.

Childcare issues are putting pressure on working parents and employers alike. What benefit leaders should know about costs, tax credits and care.

Illinois amended its Human Rights Act on August 7 to establish workplace protections for employees experiencing menopause-related conditions, effective January 1, 2027, and reaching employers with a single Illinois employee. Littler on the compliance build-out between now and the effective date.

Jackson Lewis on the same statute from the accommodation side: Illinois joins Rhode Island and Philadelphia in making menopause-related conditions a protected status, and employers should review handbooks, leave policies, and benefit designs before the January effective date.

The benefits-design case: menopause-related productivity loss costs U.S. employers an estimated $1.8 billion annually while only 18 percent treat it as a material benefits issue. The new state laws will force the gap onto agendas.

With the market projected to reach tens of billions of dollars by 2030 and a growing wave of state coverage mandates prompting employers to add menopause benefits, the opportunities are expanding fast, and so is the regulatory scrutiny.

Benefits that effectively support employee caregivers have a dramatic impact on their ability to remain healthy and productive at work.

Today's blog addresses the question: Could medical marijuana and psychedelics soon be covered under employee benefit plans? Recent executive orders could impact health plan strategy and design.

Employers can’t reliably address working caregivers’ needs through policies and employee benefits alone, said Wendi Safstrom, president of the SHRM Foundation.