Flu season fuels debate over paid sick time laws
NEW YORK (AP) — Sniffling, groggy and afraid she had caught the flu, Diana Zavala dragged herself in to work anyway for a day she felt she couldn't afford to miss.
A school speech therapist who works as an independent contractor, she doesn't have paid sick days. So the mother of two reported to work and hoped for the best — and was aching, shivering and coughing by the end of the day. She stayed home the next day, then loaded up on medicine and returned to work.
"It's a balancing act" between physical health and financial well-being, she said.
An unusually early and vigorous flu season is drawing attention to a cause that has scored victories but also hit roadblocks in recent years: mandatory paid sick leave for a third of civilian workers — more than 40 million people — who don't have it.
Supporters and opponents are particularly watching New York City, where lawmakers are weighing a sick leave proposal amid a competitive mayoral race.
Pointing to a flu outbreak that the governor has called a public health emergency, dozens of doctors, nurses, lawmakers and activists — some in surgical masks — rallied Friday on the City Hall steps to call for passage of the measure, which has awaited a City Council vote for nearly three years. Two likely mayoral contenders have also pressed the point.
The flu spike is making people more aware of the argument for sick pay, said Ellen Bravo, executive director of Family Values at Work, which promotes paid sick time initiatives around the country. "There's people who say, 'OK, I get it — you don't want your server coughing on your food,'" she said.
Advocates have cast paid sick time as both a workforce issue akin to parental leave and "living wage" laws, and a public health priority.
But to some business owners, paid sick leave is an impractical and unfair burden for small operations. Critics also say the timing is bad, given the choppy economy and the hardships inflicted by Superstorm Sandy.
Michael Sinensky, an owner of seven bars and restaurants around the city, was against the sick time proposal before Sandy. And after the storm shut down four of his restaurants for days or weeks, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars that his insurers have yet to pay, "we're in survival mode."
"We're at the point, right now, where we cannot afford additional social initiatives," said Sinensky, whose roughly 500 employees switch shifts if they can't work, an arrangement that some restaurateurs say benefits workers because paid sick time wouldn't include tips.
Employees without sick days are more likely to go to work with a contagious illness, send an ill child to school or day care and use hospital emergency rooms for care, according to a 2010 survey by the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center. A 2011 study in the American Journal of Public Health estimated that a lack of sick time helped spread 5 million cases of flu-like illness during the 2009 swine flu outbreak.
To be sure, many employees entitled to sick time go to work ill anyway, out of dedication or at least a desire to project it. But the work-through-it ethic is shifting somewhat amid growing awareness about spreading sickness.
"Right now, where companies' incentives lie is butting right up against this concern over people coming into the workplace, infecting others and bringing productivity of a whole company down," said John A. Challenger, CEO of employer consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Paid sick day requirements are often popular in polls, but only four places have them: San Francisco, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and the state of Connecticut. The specific provisions vary.
Milwaukee voters approved a sick time requirement in 2008, but the state Legislature passed a law blocking it. Philadelphia's mayor vetoed a sick leave measure in 2011; lawmakers have since instituted a sick time requirement for businesses with city contracts. Voters rejected a paid sick day measure in Denver in 2011.
In New York, City Councilwoman Gale Brewer's proposal would require up to five paid sick days a year at businesses with at least five employees. It wouldn't include independent contractors, such as Zavala, who supports the idea nonetheless.
The idea boasts such supporters as feminist Gloria Steinem and "Sex and the City" actress Cynthia Nixon, as well as a majority of City Council members and a coalition of unions, women's groups and public health advocates. But it also faces influential opponents, including business groups, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who has virtually complete control over what matters come to a vote.
Quinn, who is expected to run for mayor, said she considers paid sick leave a worthy goal but doesn't think it would be wise to implement it in a sluggish economy. Two of her likely opponents, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and Comptroller John Liu, have reiterated calls for paid sick leave in light of the flu season.
While the debate plays out, Emilio Palaguachi is recovering from the flu and looking for a job. The father of four was abruptly fired without explanation earlier this month from his job at a deli after taking a day off to go to a doctor, he said. His former employer couldn't be reached by telephone.
"I needed work," Palaguachi said after Friday's City Hall rally, but "I needed to see the doctor because I'm sick."
A school speech therapist who works as an independent contractor, she doesn't have paid sick days. So the mother of two reported to work and hoped for the best — and was aching, shivering and coughing by the end of the day. She stayed home the next day, then loaded up on medicine and returned to work.
"It's a balancing act" between physical health and financial well-being, she said.
An unusually early and vigorous flu season is drawing attention to a cause that has scored victories but also hit roadblocks in recent years: mandatory paid sick leave for a third of civilian workers — more than 40 million people — who don't have it.
Supporters and opponents are particularly watching New York City, where lawmakers are weighing a sick leave proposal amid a competitive mayoral race.
Pointing to a flu outbreak that the governor has called a public health emergency, dozens of doctors, nurses, lawmakers and activists — some in surgical masks — rallied Friday on the City Hall steps to call for passage of the measure, which has awaited a City Council vote for nearly three years. Two likely mayoral contenders have also pressed the point.
The flu spike is making people more aware of the argument for sick pay, said Ellen Bravo, executive director of Family Values at Work, which promotes paid sick time initiatives around the country. "There's people who say, 'OK, I get it — you don't want your server coughing on your food,'" she said.
Advocates have cast paid sick time as both a workforce issue akin to parental leave and "living wage" laws, and a public health priority.
But to some business owners, paid sick leave is an impractical and unfair burden for small operations. Critics also say the timing is bad, given the choppy economy and the hardships inflicted by Superstorm Sandy.
Michael Sinensky, an owner of seven bars and restaurants around the city, was against the sick time proposal before Sandy. And after the storm shut down four of his restaurants for days or weeks, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars that his insurers have yet to pay, "we're in survival mode."
"We're at the point, right now, where we cannot afford additional social initiatives," said Sinensky, whose roughly 500 employees switch shifts if they can't work, an arrangement that some restaurateurs say benefits workers because paid sick time wouldn't include tips.
Employees without sick days are more likely to go to work with a contagious illness, send an ill child to school or day care and use hospital emergency rooms for care, according to a 2010 survey by the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center. A 2011 study in the American Journal of Public Health estimated that a lack of sick time helped spread 5 million cases of flu-like illness during the 2009 swine flu outbreak.
To be sure, many employees entitled to sick time go to work ill anyway, out of dedication or at least a desire to project it. But the work-through-it ethic is shifting somewhat amid growing awareness about spreading sickness.
"Right now, where companies' incentives lie is butting right up against this concern over people coming into the workplace, infecting others and bringing productivity of a whole company down," said John A. Challenger, CEO of employer consulting firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Paid sick day requirements are often popular in polls, but only four places have them: San Francisco, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and the state of Connecticut. The specific provisions vary.
Milwaukee voters approved a sick time requirement in 2008, but the state Legislature passed a law blocking it. Philadelphia's mayor vetoed a sick leave measure in 2011; lawmakers have since instituted a sick time requirement for businesses with city contracts. Voters rejected a paid sick day measure in Denver in 2011.
In New York, City Councilwoman Gale Brewer's proposal would require up to five paid sick days a year at businesses with at least five employees. It wouldn't include independent contractors, such as Zavala, who supports the idea nonetheless.
The idea boasts such supporters as feminist Gloria Steinem and "Sex and the City" actress Cynthia Nixon, as well as a majority of City Council members and a coalition of unions, women's groups and public health advocates. But it also faces influential opponents, including business groups, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who has virtually complete control over what matters come to a vote.
Quinn, who is expected to run for mayor, said she considers paid sick leave a worthy goal but doesn't think it would be wise to implement it in a sluggish economy. Two of her likely opponents, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and Comptroller John Liu, have reiterated calls for paid sick leave in light of the flu season.
While the debate plays out, Emilio Palaguachi is recovering from the flu and looking for a job. The father of four was abruptly fired without explanation earlier this month from his job at a deli after taking a day off to go to a doctor, he said. His former employer couldn't be reached by telephone.
"I needed work," Palaguachi said after Friday's City Hall rally, but "I needed to see the doctor because I'm sick."
More from the Obama generation.... GIMME, GIMME, GIMME!!!!
If I was an employer I'd offer paid sick days BUT I would also require a doctor's note. Keeps people honest.
 @Tattooed_Angel Just make sure to either pay them well so they can go see a doc when they are sick, or offer at least some basic health insurance.
If I am not feeling well I do a WFH day... therefore I don't go out of the home but... my work at least does not fall behind...when I did not have the option in previous positions I had to take NON-PAID Day before sick days could be used.. thank you people using sick days for 'vacation' it is a problem for sure.. but companies should be more accommodating if someone is seriously sick...how you keep people from abusing it is the other hard question!
The simple solution is flex time. From my own experience as a manager, if given vacation and sick days, many employees consider the sick days as extra vacation days and make sure they use them by the end of the year. Rather than seeing sick days as a courtesy given by an employer they see it as unused entitlement. With flex time, you burn up all of it on sick days it is all gone. On a purely economic side, many small businesses cannot afford to give vacation time and forcing them to do so, which in reality is what happens, they could easily go out of business. If there is a requirement to show proof from a doctor someone was really sick that would protect the interest of the business but people donât like that idea at all.
 @Nitroxman The problem with the doctors note requirement is that if the company doesn't also offer health insurance than they may not be able to afford to go to a doctor to get checked out. I know my boss told one of my coworkers who had to call in sick due to food poisoning that she needed a doctors note in order for it to be an excused absents, and making what we do there she couldn't afford to do that. Thankfully, our manager didn't push it after my coworker kindly pointed out that there was nothing in our handbook about needing a doc note if we only missed one day of work due to illness.
I wish that if my employer offered any sort of real benefits that it would be a few paid sick days a year, especially since we work around a lot of customers. I've been really lucky that I haven't gotten seriously sick in a while, but I know a few of my coworkers have been out with the flu.
I think it's a give and take. Â Employers should be logical enough to know if you have a good employee who for the most part takes care of themselves and falls ill with the flu, they may be due some compensation. Â If you have another employee who goes out and parties all the time is always calling in sick, well then they shouldn't get payed. Â If it's that important to you, you will find a job that has sick leave. Â I do think that you should be able to stay home and not be forced into work if you are indeed sick, but being payed for that is up to the employer and always should be. Â
As if having an employee out sick is not enough of a disruption for employers and cost dollars, now they want mandatory sick pay as well. Seems a lot of folks think employers have bottomless bank accounts.
 @Alert Eagle Yeah..just another example how people just seem to think they are entitled to everything.
 @cyclops  @Alert Eagle What is going to happen when and if this economy ever gets better; when all your employees quit on you? Will you provide sick pay and benefits then? Or are you a business owner who freaks out if a employee even calls in sick, or has to go to the doctor or maybe their children are to sick for daycare or school?  Remember, a employer may be paying the employee's but the employee's are still providing their services and employee's can also destroy a business too.
 @MoonDragonWitch - exactly!  Actually, I wouldn't mind living in Europe, Germany particularly. But I'm an American and I still think we are the best country, despite the cyclops ... lol.
 @cyclops - blame the unions, I believe they (the early unions) were the ones that got this terribly horrible godawful benefit for the workers...
 @MoonDragonWitch Oh...I thought wages were a thank you...as well as paying medical benefits and even donating to a 401k.  But wait there is more.....you also want to get paid for a month  without doing anything.  Gotta love it.
 @Elaine2 What a typically American response.
 @cyclops  @@amber@ Paid vacation, if offered by the company, is a thank you for the work the employee has done during the year, and is paid according to average hours worked. The employee does not have to take it if they do not wish to.
 @Elaine2  @cyclops Actually Europe has a better paid vacation system then we do...they also offer a paid maternity leave, and I'm not talking a week or two, but up to a few months.
@cyclops - so move to Europe then.Â
 @@amber@ So you want vacation pay too?  How does that work?  You get paid for producing nothing during that time.  Drives up the cost of everything.  Americans sense of entitlement amazes me.
 @@amber@ I am happy my employer does not pay sick pay, it leaves more money for them to spend elsewhere, like keeping our healthcare premiums lower.  Personally I am healthy and don't get sick much at all.  I can also work from home if I have to.  It works for our company and we are very happy with the situation we have so why does it have to change?
 @@amber@  If you get compensated you should save your money for when you are sick. Your comment is interesting, because you seem to indicate you understand the free market, yet you are advocating mandatory sick pay. I am a business owner and yes, under threat of my employees quitting I would have to either let them go or give them what they demand. But it is my choice as it is theirs to quit. I don't need or want anymore Government intrusion into my business. We can all see how well Government runs its affairs. By the way I do pay for sick days.