The Benefits of Paid Sick Leave for Workers, Employers, and Pretty Much Everybody 

Quite literally.

and no paid maternity leave

United States

Couldn’t agree more. 21st century America and I’m forced to go to work (welder) with bronchitis because I have no sick days left. I was given 8 at the beginning of the year which were meant to last until the end of the year 😑

@Nabil It's unpaid in the US and only 12 weeks.

I have dual citizenship both my parents were US military and I had the fortune to be born to two countries because of that but I got to say I am disaffected point in the American fucking government to let its people die just because we don't have money every other country offers health insurance and coverage that's why they're going to survive and we're going to dwindle

This so-called Great American government already killed one of my kids now it's threatening to leave my remaining surviving child an orphan well fucking gun America I put you up there with fucking Hitler and worst in the goddamn third right I really hope you're fucking proud I'm certainly not

nope everything in the US is unpaid. glad to live in europe.

Hopefully that day will come, but for now, we have corrupted unions making profit from making deals with companies and other good unions being shit on by the media whenever possible.

Helping each other is COMMUNIST and communism is UNCHRISTIAN

Unlikely. Not only have unions outlived their usefulness, now causing more harm than good in many industries, with the ever growing size of government, unions will become even more redundant. Unions used to stand for: mandated weekends and holidays, the 8 hour work-day, minimum wage, benefits such as healthcare. The federal government has taken over all of those things and cemented them into law. Why join a union and pay dues if you can simply elect a populist politician and pay taxes? Laws trump collective bargaining agreements.

Joel James Wage theft, lack of universal paid parental leave (disproportionately affecting women since women give birth, thus disproportionately keeping women from advancing in their careers), and the minimum wage's abject failure to keep pace with inflation mean that unions are just as important now as they ever were. Not all employers follow the law, and not all of the laws that we need to protect workers exist.

Joel James I live in a country with good (look, okay) unions. I was almost bullied out of a job last year - union was there. Company wanted to put us immediately on leave without pay while there is no work (due to COVID19) - union stopped that. Our union is responsible for pay rises, good working conditions, PAID SICK LEAVE (2 weeks per year). PAID holiday leave (5-7 weeks per year). And so much more.

And look we’re at now sadly

Yet another reason this is complicated. While my work doesn't have paid leave, they do have a very generous point system for absenteeism and staffing & overtime budgeted to cover missing workers. They put a lot of pressure on people to show up a couple of years ago and it bit them when the whole place just about shut down in the winter with a mass flu outbreak.

Browncoat4Life711 You should totally look into getting staffing ratios from your state nursing board. And you should realize your employer has those options: there are several ways to cover call offs, and it's your employer's responsibility to handle it, not the employees'. You are doing a disservice to yourself and your fellow staff to let your employer pocket money that could be used for call off coverage.

The place I work for has over 5000 employees. Its so big, that its office personnell has its own building miles away from where I work. Because of HCAHPS, we're losing money to the point that we weren't given raises this year like we usually do. They're not going to open the budget for something to keep staffing proper on the floors, especially since they already altered staffing ratios to where the nurses have to take 6 acute patients apiece. I start nursing school in January and work full time currently. I don't have the time, the energy, or the high standing to get anything changed, and I'm not a fan of being told that I'm at fault for this continuing.

And hopefully the education you received to earn that hospital job taught you that the plural of anecdote is not data...

Don't you think you are a risk to people with immune deficiencies? You worked in a hospital...a freaking hospital.

andy serrato capote America is so sad.

Wordavee1 Welcome to the land of freedom.

This could be critical issue with immunocompromised children. Very sad this is not considered higher.

Tony H Don't worry: the hospital provides masks for sick nurses! (That's my sarcastic typing.)

LastRonin I tried to call in the day before my shift a couple weeks ago because I had a fever and I was told I would be penalized if I didn't show up.

Careful bud, or we might just decide you are in need of some freedom for you corporations..... ;-)

nar you won't, we don't have enough Oil here. hahaha

yet americans work per year more hours then the japanese.

There is no national requirement that permanent staff have sick leave so, yes, many do not.

It hasn't been done

if you do that i will never ever happen.

I can promise you about half the US would just be like, "You know what, nah we don't need any sick leave."

Of course. It is totally known out there that being sick is not the same in different states.

recycleonwednesdays Nope, but there are plenty of states that put more value on the money you bring in, than your health and well being. And they will gladly exploit that. "Oh, you're six months pregnant, and have the flu. Too bad you need the money to keep your lights on. We'll see you at work shortly." I live in a "right to work" state. If you don't show up, there's a stack of resumes waiting for people willing to do your job. It's definitely screwed up.

Only Federal contractors were covered.

steveh46 Ok, thanks!

WeAreGRID That's such a load of bullshit. Other countries handle it just fine. We could also expect our employees here to handle the schedule in such a way to be able to handle call offs. If you think I'm wrong, talk to your local SEIU.

WeAreGRID I meant employers, not the employees. It is not the employees' responsibility to make sure there's adequate call-out coverage: it's the employer's.

Eristitia you do watch this channel right? you know how we pay twice as much in our healthcare as the next nation with nowhere near the coverage? Our country is spiraling into debt, every year it grows, if we all of a sudden required the entire country to have paid sick leave, we would have to reduce the minimum wage because 25% of the country would be sick and NOT WORKING. I know it would stress my employer to have to hire more people in a high turnover job, i know that theres no feasible way to have paid sick leave, because our store barely makes a profit. If my boss all of a sudden was required to pay for essentially 1.25 or 1.5x as many hours, we would go into the red, we can barely cover just what the company says we need in terms of man hours, and thats with her coming in in her free time and getting stuff done with the help of her family as free labor. Im saying the country could not currently sustain it, we cannot introduce such large changes into the economy overnight like that. I was having a similar argument with someone about oil earlier actually, they claimed that we could and should completely shut down all oil production and use, only on the basis that "alternatives would have to be used, oil is ruining our planet, we are all going to die!" And of course i agree, we are permanently damaging our planet, but the entire economy would crash overnight because oil is necessary for power, for fuel, both for cars and planes, no one would be able to go anywhere, and we would lose a massive amount of jobs. If we shut down oil all at once its possible a large chunk of the world would be affected, as everything not run off the hoover dam would lose power and the internet would crash, everything centered in america would lose communications, no one could travel, because not even boats nowadays run on anything but gas or diesel. We would be thrown three hundred years into the past, and similarly, we cant all of a sudden multiply the drain on the economy, when the service industry is already underpaid. Youre right, we COULD but we SHOULDNT.

WeAreGRID You are such a massive idiot.

I thought about pulling up the cited Health Affairs study (1:53) to provide a counter point, but I feel like you should do that instead and I'll spend my time on something more productive than an internet argument.

Not to mention some paid sick leave ordinances are paid for through payroll taxes levied specifically on workers. It's a small amount between .5 percent and 1 percent in the cases I've seen. I personally wouldn't mind a small increase in taxes if I knew I was being used to pay for sick leave for everyone.

What if government both mandated businesses to offer paid sick leave *and* then compelled insurers to lower their costs to businesses by either legislation to control costs or a public option that is more price competitive?

Rufei That might work. Too bad we're talking about America where those options aren't on the table. In fact, anything you do to change the health care system in this country turns out to be more expensive. Discouraging isn't it.

Phil Heaton Sure, but people once said that it was going to be near impossible to close the distance between the two shores, yet we've managed to do that in just about every era of US history. There's hope to be had somewhere.

In Germany there is mandatory insurance for small businesses that distributes the cost of paid leave among the insured businesses. That does not take away the cost, but it helps with the risk.

FridgeEating That sounds like a good idea too. Again, America would probably not adopt it because of the mandatory part. Certainly not when the Republicans are in control.

Tyler Garrett Well, your first problem is you seem to think 30k is an acceptable wage here. Second, other countries tend to get four to six weeks paid time off. Our cheese stands mostly alone--and it stinks.

i think we're on the same page here. but people can't expect 50k from an entry level job. either be smart about your career or get an education. and i agree more paid leave is better, but unfortunately America the great isn't #1 in every category. i'm leaving as soon as i can. done swearing myself to one country that can elect trump as its president.

Tyler Garrett Yeah, they can. We just have to start rallying against artificially low wages.

Evidently the government needs to intervene. Why because we need mandated paid sick leave laws. This debate is comparable to saying do we need laws against having sex with a 5 year old??? Um... duah.. Just because some fucked up people seem to think such disturbing behavior is okay as I hope we can agree ITS NOT.. we have laws against it for good reasons. And we as a society DON'T entertain such behavior nor the few disgusting people who try to get society to believe it's actually normal. We need to take the same mindset of not having paid sick leave. It's something we as a society need NOT put up with

William Rutherford I don't understand this. Wouldn't it be cheaper to give the lowest paid workers paid leave? And why is the economic cost more important than the medical benefit?

Because the medical benefit, aka the savings of not treating people who get sick because of sick workers, may not outweigh the economic costs of paid sick leave.

And as they said in the video, you need to offset paid sick leave by lowering employee wages. You can't do that if they make minimum wage.

Here's the thing: most companies will have paid sick leave if the benefits outweigh the costs. If you implement mandatory paid sick leave you're only going to increase the rate at which low skilled workers are replaced by automation, and thus make the mandate irrelevant.

If companies can't afford paid sick leave for their employees, then they *can't afford to have employees*

You do know there are consequences for doing that right?

@@vincentgiasullo What are the consequences and how do you prove that someone is faking sick?

@@mcshaft2760 well a doctors note for one lol.

A week paid sick leave per year sounds reasonable. After that, a doctor's note could be required.