Paid Sick Leave

Paid Sick Leave

More than 44 million workers in the U.S. lack paid sick leave benefits. Workers are faced with the choice of losing income, going to work sick, or facing threats of job loss if they miss a day for a personal or family illness. Many jobs that lack paid sick leave can be found in low wage industries that are particularly vulnerable to disease, including child care, elder care, and food service. San Francisco and Washington D.C. are the only municipalities in the United States that require employers to provide paid sick leave, and Connecticut requires service sector employers to provide the policy to full time, non-salaried workers. Many states and cities are considering establishing paid sick leave legislation.

" [Paid sick leave] is the best public policy for the least cost. Do you want your server coughing over your food?" - Kevin Westlye, executive director of the Golden Gate Restaurant Association

"Since we work in such close quarters and often eat/ drink from the same plates, we used to have times when we had so many sick staff we’d have to close. Now, people stay home when they’re ill, thus not infecting the customers OR the other staff members."
- Jennifer Piallat, Owner, Zazie Restaurant in San Francisco

Commentary

Vote for Paid Sick Leave

The Real Agenda Behind Voter Suppression

October 05, 2011

Chamber of Commerce, Wrong Again

May 19, 2011
Is sick leave paid? It should be.

Let sick workers get well, with pay

October 08, 2010
Sick leave

A New Labor Standard: Paid Sick Leave

September 03, 2010

Cry Wolf Quotes

I’m going to have to raise prices for all my drinks and appetizers a dollar and entrees two dollars. I don’t know how else to do it. We are known as the best restaurant city in the world, but we are going to start lagging because there will be a lack of service, a lack of staff in the dining hall. Something has to give.

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Dave Stanton, managing partner of Tres Agaves a the Mexican restaurant near AT&T Park. The San Francisco Chronicle.

Proposition F Sticks it to Neighborhood Businesses….Like kids in a candy store, our Supervisors never tire of gobbling up every bad idea that some special interest group dangles before them, particularly when it means hurting productive people who pay taxes.

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San Francisco Republican Party Chairman Mike DeNunzio.

How can we afford this? You can only charge so much for a hamburger, and then people will stop coming. I'm 52 and was hoping to do this until I retire, but the city is going to force me out of business.

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Richard Crain, owner of the Village Grill, a San Francisco restaurant, The San Francisco Chronicle.

'San Franciscans have a history of voting their social conscience as long as someone else writes the check.’… He said consumers would be hurt, predicting that restaurants would raise prices… The higher prices, he said, might cause some restaurants to lose business — and perhaps close. ‘There’s no such thing as a free lunch on something like this.’

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Kevin Westlye, executive director of the Golden Gate Restaurant Association. The New York Times.

Evidence

Backgrounders & Briefs

Serving While Sick: High Risks and Low Benefits for the Nation’s Restaurant Workforce, and Their Impact on the Consumer

87.7 percent of restaurant workers report that they have no access to paid sick leave.

The Work, Family and Equity Index: How Does the United States Measure Up?

The Project on Global Working Families is a study that measures worldwide social safety nets.

Resources

Institute for Women’s Policy Research is a prominent think tank that is largely focused on American women's issues. This covers everything from pay equity to welfare reform to domestic violence.

MomsRising focuses on "bringing important motherhood and family issues."

The National Partnership for Women and Families leads the national fight for paid sick days and paid family and medical leave.

Family Values at Work is a advocacy network that fights for family and sick leave policies across the U.S.