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Of all the corporate perks I’ve enjoyed over the years, my favourite was an all-expenses paid weekend in Venice, when I was an analyst at McKinsey. It was back in the heyday of management consulting, and the entire firm decamped for sand, cocktails and windsurfing lessons on the Lido. I was too junior to be aware of the politics and machinations that were no doubt going on above our heads. At my level, the point was to build our loyalty. It worked. We did such long hours, I remember, that we barely saw our friends and socialised with colleagues.

Fast forward to today, and modern perks now encompass e-bikes, or free cappuccinos (thank you, FT canteen). But there is one that feels more sinister: help with egg freezing.

The trend began in Silicon Valley around a decade ago, after the American Society of Reproductive Medicine removed the “experimental procedure” label from oocyte preservation (egg freezing). Companies such as Google and Facebook started extending their benefits packages to offer time off for IVF and discounts on fertility treatments, including egg freezing. From there it spread to Wall Street, and then to outposts of tech, finance, legal and professional services in Europe. Merck in Switzerland, Amazon in Spain, Centrica in the UK, and many others, have since joined in.

Companies give various reasons for doing this. One is the removal of taboos around fertility treatment. Another is to meet diversity targets, by supposedly supporting women as more of them move into senior roles. The policies are usually sold as helping women to “have it all”: enabling them to pursue their career aspirations now and start a family later. It’s easy to see why employers want to persuade women to stay full-time for longer, rather than risk them going part-time or becoming distracted by family responsibilities. It’s less clear to what extent it’s in the interests of women.

The benefit is so popular that some firms are now coming under pressure from their staff to make it available globally, especially if they already offer such packages in New York or San Francisco. But not everyone is convinced that employers should in effect be encouraging women to postpone children.

I’ve spoken to young women who welcome these offers, and have taken them up. They like the idea of freezing their eggs at a young age, and getting pregnant later. They’ve done their research; they know that female eggs decline in quality and quantity as we age. Female babies are born with around 1mn-2mn eggs; by puberty that falls to 300,000-400,000, and this ovarian reserve keeps shrinking over time. Getting a discount on such an expensive technology is a serious perk, and it can be a lifeline for people with medical issues. But when some of these women use the phrase “peace of mind”, and websites claim that “you can preserve your chances of having a child”, I worry.

Egg freezing is often described as an “insurance policy”. It’s not. An egg is not an embryo, and an embryo is not a baby. Comprehensive data on success rates doesn’t exist, partly because it’s a relatively new technology that few people have used, and partly because clinics are lightly regulated. Success rates for frozen eggs vary widely, but rarely go above 30 per cent, according to the UK’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority. Disappointment can come in various ways, including not freezing enough eggs, or not freezing them early enough. It’s a risky business, and one I’m not sure employers should be involved with at all.

Four Canadian legal researchers, including Katie Hammond at Toronto Metropolitan University, have warned that the policies might create “a moral imperative” to engage in an invasive technology, and that staff could even become indebted to an employer if the contract stipulates that they must reimburse them if they leave too soon after freezing their eggs. Hammond stresses that businesses should be mindful of how they communicate information about the procedure, and not treat elective egg freezing as a substitute for other institutional benefits that foster workplace equality, like paid parental leave.

Caveat emptor is always a good rule. And many women take up this option hoping to never need it. But there does seem to be a lack of standardised reporting and clarity. A 2024 BBC investigation found that 32 out of 78 fertility clinic websites in the UK did not make it clear what a patient’s chances would be of actually having a baby. Most advertised successful thaw rates of 80-95 per cent, but didn’t spell out that because there are many stages to go through before an embryo can be implanted, the chances of having a baby are actually very much lower. There can also be additional costs for storage, insurance and IVF procedures.

I’ve met many fertility doctors who believe passionately in what they do; and what they can do is wonderful. But this is a very different kind of benefit to a discounted subscription, or a holiday in Venice. At its most cynical, this feels like yet another way of trying to control women’s bodies, dressed up as a perk. And that’s not what a perk should be.

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