A first-of-its-kind tool is helping parents access paid family leave benefits.
Whether you’re making student loan payments or applying for unemployment benefits, government websites are notoriously difficult to navigate — and that’s especially true for new moms, who are often juggling a baby and a full-time job, too. But what if there was a tool that could seamlessly help parents apply for paid leave benefits, driven by AI technology?
Moms First, a nonprofit parent advocacy group, has created PaidLeave.ai, a first-of-its-kind chatbot that’s designed to tell New Yorkers exactly how much paid time off they’re entitled to, and help guide them through the application process.
The reality is that even if you’re lucky enough to live in one of the few states that has a generous paid family leave, you still have to jump through hoops to access it. And oftentimes, parents give up, leaving tens of thousands of dollars on the table. For instance, even though New Yorkers have been increasingly taking advantage of paid family leave since it was first rolled out in 2018, with a record of more than 163,000 claims filed last year, it’s still being utilized by just 2 percent of eligible workers.
As a mother herself, CEO Reshma Saujani doesn’t think it should be this difficult to access benefits that families are entitled to — and she’s betting that her new AI-driven tool can help close the gap. “When you’ve just had a baby, you have a thousand things going on, so you want paid family leave to be simple and easy,” she tells Katie Couric Media.
Wondering if this tool is also available in your state? We spoke with Saujani about the incredible possibilities of New York’s PaidLeave.ai, and her plans to expand it to the millions of women who need it elsewhere.
What is PaidLeave.ai?
PaidLeave.ai is a chatbot that you can access by visiting www.paidleave.ai. It marks one of the first applications of AI for public service, and you don’t have to pay a dime to use it. That’s because Saujani wanted to create a system that would, first and foremost, benefit low-income families and moms.
“I believe that the next generation of AI can close inequality gaps, but that means being very intentional with the way we use this technology,” says Saujani. “We have to get AI in the hands of women, young people, people of color, and low-income communities.”
The AI is able to respond to questions in a variety of languages, including Spanish, Chinese, and Japanese — including questions that someone might be too afraid to ask their human resources department. But PaidLeave.ai isn’t just a handy tool for employees — Saujani says HR teams have also found it useful, because they often find themselves fielding leave-related queries from employees. “Most companies are small and don’t have a lot of resources,” she says. “So to be able to have this site and this tool is huge for them.”
The idea for her innovation first grew out of a concept that Saujani pitched to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, who passed it along to the team at the AI start-up Novy.ai, which developed the chatbot. (The project was also backed by Craig Newmark Philanthropies, created by the billionaire founder of the online marketplace Craigslist.)
As the founder of the nonprofit Girls Who Code, which aims to increase the number of women working in computer science, Saujani is admittedly obsessed with technology, and how AI can help eliminate inequities. “I’ve spent my life trying to [get Congress to] pass paid leave and affordable childcare,” she says. “And as the founder of Girls Who Code, I’ve been entrenched in technology and its power to make change.”
How does PaidLeave.ai work?
If you’re technologically challenged, don’t fret. Here’s how it works: Visit the website www.paidleave.ai and click on “Get Started,” which takes you to a chatbot where you can ask any question about paid leave in New York; it’ll give you a conversational, almost-human response.
If you’re not sure which questions to ask, the website suggests some common queries, such as, “Can I take state-paid leave AND paid leave from work?” or “What’s the maximum I can receive for family leave?” You don’t have to ask the question in a certain format, either, so there’s no wrong way to ask.
Though there have been concerns about AI providing accurate information in the past, you can trust that you’re getting only correct and relevant details on the site. Elias Torres, lead developer at Novy.ai, explains that PaidLeave.ai’s chatbot is unique because it’s only trained on official government documents, as opposed to having access to the entire internet — which is often riddled with outdated or inaccurate stats. (But the website still advises users to “verify PaidLeave.ai’s answers with the links it provides you, and do not rely on its responses as a substitute for professional advice.”)
Is PaidLeave.ai available in all states?
For now, it’s just being piloted in New York, but Saujani hopes to roll it out across all 12 states that currently offer paid leave, as well as Washington, D.C. “We’re already talking to governors in those states,” she tells us.
Those who live outside of New York can still visit PaidLeave.ai, but they’ll be directed to a drop-down menu where they can choose their state. If their home state isn’t among the 14 that offer paid family leave, they have the option of downloading an AI-generated sample letter calling on their state representatives to take action on the issue.
In creating PaidLeave.AI, Saujani was also thinking about how it could not only boost overall utilization of state-level benefits, but also help bolster the case for federal paid leave legislation — a policy change that has lost steam in recent months. In February, Democratic Sens. Brian Schatz and Don Beyer reintroduced the Comprehensive Paid Leave for Federal Employees Act; the bipartisan legislation, which remains stalled in Congress, aims to expand federal paid leave to include 12 weeks of family and medical leave.
Saujani believes making paid family leave available to everyone won’t just require changing the law, but also changing America’s mindset toward childcare. Women represent nearly half of the U.S. workforce, but they’re 23 percent more likely than their male partners to say they’re the only caretaker for their children, according to a study published in the National Library of Medicine at the height of the coronavirus pandemic in 2021, when these gender disparities were especially felt.
“The problem is that moms are America’s social safety net and they often suffer in silence,” says Saujani. “That is very deeply entrenched and it takes time to change people’s consciousness — but that’s what we’re trying to shift.”
