We Need A Paid Sick Leave Guarantee
A guaranteed paid sick leave allowance, in the context of an ongoing pandemic and the after effects, is a basic necessity for a humane and functional society.
Here is my letter to President Joe Biden, and the Paid Leave For All letter campaign to Congress, and the People’s CDC plan calling on all of the above for, among other things, universal paid leave. (Below are some thoughts on sick leave and links to further reading.) Please join me in writing to POTUS & CONGRESS about this issue by using these letters or writing your own!
— Chloe
White House Contact Page: www.whitehouse.gov/contact
Find your representatives: whoaremyrepresentatives.org
My letter:
Dear President Joe Biden,
If we want a society where services are not disrupted by continuous SARS-CoV-2 outbreaks, the aftermath, and yes, labor strikes — at a bare minimum we need to have A PAID SICK LEAVE GUARANTEE.
People need to be able to isolate and recuperate when contagious and sick. We need to be able to take time off work for preventative care, vaccination, testing, procedures, doctors appointments, and caring for sick family members. Human beings need to be able to address medical problems like those acquired from getting Covid and Long Covid without being forced out of jobs.
It’s essential to the functioning of our civilization to have a paid sick leave guarantee.
Paid Leave For All letter:
Pass National Paid Family and Medical Leave
Dear [elected official],
As your constituent, I’m writing to urge you to stand with working families by supporting and prioritizing permanent paid family and medical leave. If COVID-19 has shown us anything, it’s that our economy depends on care—and that working families need additional protections to stay connected to the workforce when a crisis strikes. No one should lose a job or fall behind on bills because they or a loved one are sick. And no one should miss their baby’s first smile or holding their dying parent’s hand because their livelihood depends on it. Paid leave saves jobs, saves lives, and is critical to our long-term health and stability. Families, businesses, and a fair economy can’t wait any longer. National paid family and medical leave will help get people back to work, keep people in their jobs, reduce public spending on other programs, and give small businesses the support they need to attract top talent and reduce turnover. This is a smart policy that works for everyone. We are asking you to prioritize paid family and medical leave, and work to pass a federal law now.
PCDC letter:
Dear President Biden and Members of Congress,
I’m concerned about the disgraceful new CDC COVID guidelines. 400 people are dying daily in the US alone. Thousands are becoming severely and chronically ill from a preventable disease. Due to the constant evolution of new COVID variants, the US has been in a surge - currently seeing high or substantial transmission in 99% of US counties - since early June. And while elderly, Indigenous, Black, Latinx, immunocompromised and disabled people bear the biggest burden, all are affected as many young healthy adults and children die and are impacted by Long COVID in unpredictable patterns.
The guidelines place the responsibility of public health onto individuals, without providing individuals proper resources or support. This is unacceptable. We need responsible, clear CDC guidelines that will keep our communities and our loved ones safe. We need you to act to stop the unchecked spread of COVID-19, immediately. We need:
- Free access to N95-grade masks for all;
- Free access to PCR and rapid testing;
- Robust, universal, paid sick leave;
- Mask mandates in public places, including schools, public transport and medical facilities;
- Federal funding and guidance for ventilation and filtration updates, coupled with meaningful regulation;
- Universal access to healthcare including continued COVID treatment and testing for uninsured people;
- Updated vaccines and universal access to them globally.
You must choose a healthier, more equitable pandemic response. We all deserve better.
The railroad workers on the verge of a strike are complaining about attendance rules and wanting paid leave and also unpaid sick leave. Most people think of the sick leave as an either / or. Either you don’t have sick leave or you do. The truth is more messy.
In the U.S., no paid sick leave is mandated by federal law. And now most of the more local extraordinary leave for covid has evaporated away with the drumbeat of prematurely declaring victory. An exception is Philadelphia who extended covid leave through the end of 2023.
Even when paid sick leave is provided, it’s not always guaranteed. It can sometimes be difficult to use for various reasons, even in negotiated contracts, since the workers bargaining position has been so weak for so long. Once used up, it’s not always so easy to keep your job and take unpaid sick leave. Unpaid sick leave usually requires FMLA, and if that’s used up, and everything beyond what’s allowed in a union contract and FMLA law — that’s that. Though it’s worth trying to negotiate since workers are gaining more position in some sectors.
Even if FMLA is not used up — if you’re out of paid sick time and have a non-FMLA absence need, what then? Mammograms & cardiac stress tests, for example, are not absences likely to be covered under FMLA unless you’re already diagnosed with breast cancer or a cardiac condition. You see the problem here, right?
I’ve often heard it asked — why is that employer so inflexible that they can’t make exceptions? Surely it doesn’t benefit the employer to be so inflexible to disallow preventative care?
Ah, but sometimes it does benefit the employer to be inflexible.
Employers are incentivized to force out people with health conditions, especially older workers. Why might that be? People with health conditions and anyone older costs the employer more for the employer health insurance plan.
Nobody talks about this blatantly of course, because it is technically illegal age discrimination to make decisions based upon age and disability. But every employer knows what’s going on. I’ve had small business owners and bookkeepers and HR workers tell me that their employer health insurance premiums made a distinct jump up soon after employees had a heart attack or a cancer diagnosis, or just after hiring someone over 50. Coincidence?
The employer health insurance system has long been a suspected source of incentivizing age discrimination. And gaming sick leave rules, and lack of protections, to shed expensive older & sick workers is surely very tempting for those looking to cut costs. Can anyone prove this? Perhaps not. And it’s hard to find any studies on it.
For American workers without a union — it’s even worse! Many workers have no sick leave at all. It sounds bonkers, and it is, but I’ve even heard of people being fired upon the spot when calling in sick with a contagious & debilitating case of SARSCOV2.
Is it any wonder there are “labor shortages” and “a staffing crisis” in some sectors?
Our weak worker bargaining power labor landscape and employer insurance based healthcare system in the U.S. is a case of, Disaster: Just Add Pandemic.
We need to demand better, because the people in charge are not going to just spontaneously become humane or get good at disaster management on their own. There’s zero evidence that’s gonna happen based on the past. And what this says about the future is disturbing.
References:
Health expenses borne by employers rise nonlinearly with employee age, peaking between ages 55 to 64 (Burtless and Koepcke, 2018). This increases the marginal cost of employing older workers, all else equal. Although economists and policy analysts have long expressed concern that the system of employer-sponsored health insurance weakens demand for older workers (e.g., Rappaport and Morrison, 1984), the topic has attracted relatively little empirical analysis.
Payday Report has learned from sources that the key sticking point in railroad contract talks right now — talks that could see 90,000 railroad workers strike on Friday — is the issue of paid sick leave. Currently, workers on the railroad are not guaranteed paid sick leave. Union officials are pushing a proposal to guarantee that workers are at least allowed the right to have paid leave when visiting the doctor. However, the railroads have yet to agree to the provision, and it remains unclear if they will.
Industry Week: Update: Eleventh-Hour Tentative Deal Defers Possible Railroad Strike by Ryan Secard
In a joint statement released September 11, SMART-TD and BLET said workers have been fired for taking sick days or attending doctor appointments: “Our members are being terminated for getting sick or for attending routine medical visits as we crawl our way out of worldwide pandemic,” the statement reads.
Rail workers will finally receive sick leave without being subject to penalties, consisting of unpaid leave and one additional paid day off, according to the Post’s sources. For one track worker, who requested that his name and employer not be published for fear of retribution, this isn’t enough. “It feels like the people that are making decisions for us aren’t trying,” he told FreightWaves Thursday morning. “I mean, one [paid] personal day is pathetic. I’m a single father with two weeks of vacation. I burn a week in days with my kid being sick.”
At least one of the workers who was forced to use their own leave shared their office with a confirmed COVID-19 case. This, as well as the hefty demands of work, have led some employees to flout self-quarantines and return to the office despite doctor’s warnings. “It wasn’t even a question,” said one worker who went back to work early despite a doctor’s note. “It’s an unwritten rule that if you’re out too long … there are ungodly amounts of work when you come back in.”
Aug 24, 2022 WKRN: MNPS board members raise COVID concerns as 100+ teachers test positive by Mye Owens
“If a teacher is not feeling well and they don’t have any more sick days, there’s a chance they may not test at all because then they would be eating through the very little sick days that they have.” The MNEA advocates for teachers and staff, and says it has become a growing problem. “We have hundreds and hundreds of new teachers to the district, and some of them are brand new, some of them have transferred from out of state, of course, those people have not had time to accumulate sick days,” Duran explained.
City of Philadelphia: COVID-19 pandemic paid sick leave resources
Starting March 9, 2022 until December 31, 2023, employers with 25 or more employees must provide up to 40 hours of additional paid sick leave to eligible employees when they are unable to work for certain COVID-19 reasons…
This report uses the new data to assess the labor market impact and economic burden of long Covid, and finds that: Around 16 million working-age Americans (those aged 18 to 65) have long Covid today. Of those, 2 to 4 million are out of work due to long Covid. The annual cost of those lost wages alone is around $170 billion a year (and potentially as high as $230 billion). These impacts stand to worsen over time if the U.S. does not take the necessary policy actions.
Commentary: Elite Panic vs. the Resilient Populace by by James B. Meigs
Disaster researchers call this phenomenon “elite panic.” When authorities believe their own citizens will become dangerous, they begin to focus on controlling the public, rather than on addressing the disaster itself.
Paid sick and family leave is necessary not only for physical health, but for mental health as well—mitigating the stress of illness or family change by providing economic and job security during extended time off work. Significant research has shown, for example, that paid parental leave significantly improves maternal mental health by allowing recovery and adjustment time (Romig and Bryant 2021).)
