Sick leave (or paid sick days or sick pay ) is an employee benefit in the form of paid leave, which workers can use during periods of temporary sickness or to stay home and address their health and safety needs without losing pay or their jobs. In some places of employment it is a workplace policy, and in many jurisdictions it is codified into law. Some policies allow workers paid time off to attend doctor visits or to care for family members.
Introduction
Paid sick days, sometimes referred to as sick leave, guarantees workers time off to stay home when they are sick without losing pay or their jobs. Some paid sick days policies also allow paid sick time to be used to care for sick family members, to attend doctor or medical appointments or to address health and safety needs related to domestic violence or sexual assault.
Nearly half of workers in the private sector (48 percent) do not have a single paid sick day to recover from illness or to care for a sick family member. As a result, they face difficult choices: lose a day’s pay or even their jobs, or go to work sick and risk infecting coworkers and customers. Parents who lack paid sick days are often forced to choose between their jobs and their sick children. Nearly half (49 percent) of working mothers miss work when a child contracts a common illness.
Three in four low-wage workers (79 percent) do not have a single paid sick day. These workers are least able to afford to take unpaid time off or risk losing their jobs. They also are most likely to have jobs requiring frequent contact with the public in the restaurant, retail, child care and health care industries. Seventy-eight percent of food service and hotel workers lack paid sick days. without a basic workplace standard of paid sick days, one in six workers report being fired, disciplined or threatened with discipline or termination for taking time off for illness.
Many employers offer paid sick days to their employees on the understanding that it can reduce turnover, increase productivity and reduce the spread of contamination in the workplace.
Benefits of Paid Sick Days
Benefits to Workers
The Centers for Disease Control asks workers to stay at home if they are sick and to keep sick kids out of school. Without paid sick day policies in place, millions of workers cannot afford to take time off without pay, or can’t risk losing their jobs, so they are unable to follow the CDC instruction.
Not taking time off during illness also can exacerbate health problems and extend recovery time. One-quarter of women don't seek needed medical care because they simply can’t find the time and cannot take off from work.
Benefits to Children
Access to paid time off is the primary deciding factor in whether a parent stays home with a sick child. Without paid time off, workers may be forced to send children to school sick where they spread illness and experience negative short- and long-term health outcomes.
The already-high rates of infections are exacerbated when parents have no choice but to send sick children to child care centers. Alternately, children who are left home alone may be unable to obtain accurate diagnoses or medications—or even summon emergency help if their condition deteriorates.
Studies of hospitalized children show that parental presence and participation in their care leads to shorter recovery time, better vital signs and fewer symptoms. Parental presence also has been shown to shorten children’s hospital stays by 31 percent. Shorter hospital stays mean lower medical bills and less interference with the child’s education.
Benefits to Employers
Research confirms what advocates for working families and many employers have long stated: when businesses take care of their workers, they are better able to retain them. And when workers have the security of paid time off, they experience increased commitment, productivity and morale, and their employers reap the benefits of lower turnover and training costs. Furthermore, studies show that the costs of losing an employee (which can include advertising for, interviewing and training a replacement) is often far greater than the cost of providing short-term leave to retain existing employees. The average cost of turnover is 25 percent of an employee’s total annual compensation.
Paid sick days policies also help reduce the spread of illness in workplaces, schools and child care facilities. In this economy, businesses cannot afford “presenteeism,” when sick workers come to work rather than stay at home. Presenteeism costs the U.S. economy $180 billion annually in lost productivity. For employers, this costs an average of $255 per employee per year and exceeds the cost of absenteeism and medical and disability benefits.
Benefits to Community Health
There is substantial evidence from the United States that absence of paid sick days can lead to behaviors that increase the risk of spreading contageon. Despite the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s new requirement that workers with stomach flu-like illnesses restrict their work until 24 hours after symptoms subside, if a worker cannot afford to lose pay, they will likely ignore the health restrictions. 68 percent of workers report they have gone to work with the stomach flu or other contagious disease. Nearly half reported that they went to work sick because they could not afford to lose the pay. As a result, contagion is spread and 40 percent of workers report they contracted the flu from a colleague.
In addition to their colleagues, workers who choose to go to work sick risk getting customers ill. Nearly half of outbreaks caused by the stomach flu are linked to ill food-service workers, who are among the least likely to receive paid sick days. In 2008, health officials said a sick employee at a Chipotle restaurant in Kent, Ohio might have caused an outbreak resulting in over 500 people becoming violently ill. The outbreak cost the Kent community between $130,233 and $305,337 in lost wages, lost productivity and health care costs.
The stomach flu accounts for over 23 million cases of food-borne illness a year, all stemming from some contact between a contagious worker and the food ingested by the public.
Existing Provisions
United States
In November 2006, the voters of San Francisco passed a ballot initiative which made their city the first jurisdiction in the country to guarantee paid sick days to all workers in the city. The measure received overwhelming support, with 61 percent voting in favor. Under San Francisco’s law, workers earn one hour of paid sick time for every 30 hours worked. Workers in businesses with 10 or fewer employees earn up to five days per year, while workers at larger businesses earn nine days per year. Workers use paid sick time to recover from illness, attend doctor visits or care for a sick child, partner or designated loved one.
In March 2008, the Washington, D.C. Council voted unanimously to pass legislation guaranteeing workers paid sick time. Under the Accrued Sick and Safe Leave Act, workers in businesses with 100 or more workers earn up to seven days of paid sick leave each year, workers in businesses with 25 – 99 workers earn five days, and workers in businesses with 24 or fewer workers earn three days. This paid time off can be used to recover from illnesses, care for sick family members, seek routine or preventative medical care or obtain assistance related to domestic violence or sexual assault. Amendments, including exemptions for some restaurant workers as well as workers in the first year of their jobs, reduced many of the bill's original intended impacts, but more than 100,000 workers who did not previously have paid sick time will now have it under the provisions of the bill, including many low-wage workers. The D.C. law is also the first in the U.S. to include paid “safe” days for victims of domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking.
In November 2008, paid sick days were put to a vote on the Milwaukee ballot, and voters passed the measure with 69 percent of the vote, enacting a law that guarantees paid sick and safe days for all workers in the city. The ordinance will allow all workers in the city of Milwaukee to earn one hour of paid sick time for every 30 hours worked, capped at nine paid sick days a year. Workers in businesses with fewer than 10 employees would accrue at a rate of one hour for every 50 worked, up to five days a year. Workers will be able to use the time for their own illness, family illness, medical appointments or any absence necessary due to domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking.
The U.S. guarantees only unpaid leave for serious illnesses, like cancer, through the Family and Medical Leave Act, which does not cover employers with fewer than 50 workers and employees who have not worked for their employer for at least 12 months prior to taking the leave.
Australia
Sick leave has its origins in trade union campaigns for its inclusion in industrial agreements. In Australia, it was introduced into "industrial awards" in 1922
Under the Federal Governments industrial relations legislation (WorkChoices) eligible employees are entitled to:
- ten days of paid personal/carer’s leave per year (including sick leave and carer’s leave);
- two days of unpaid carer’s leave per occasion; and
- two days of paid compassionate leave per occasion.
Paid perso
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