Paid Sick Leave Now Law in Conn.; Drives Under Way in Denver, Seattle
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Connecticut has become the first state in the nation to have a law requiring employers to provide paid sick days, and efforts to pass similar legislation are under way in several cities and states including Denver, Seattle, New York City, Massachusetts and Georgia. Only two cities in the nation, San Francisco and Washington, D.C., have paid sick leave laws on the books.
In Denver, the AFL-CIO community affiliate Working America is teaming up with a coalition of family and community groups to build support for a paid sick days ballot initiative in this fall’s election. Supporters this week turned in 12,636 signatures—more than three times the required number—on petitions to put the measure on the ballot.
Meanwhile in Seattle, the City Council is considering a bill that would require businesses to provide workers in Seattle up to five, seven or nine days of paid sick leave a year, depending on the size of business and number of work hours accrued. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports that Makini Howell, who runs the small vegan eateries Hillside Quickie and Plum Bistro with some 30 employees, said in a hearing on the bill that she supports the legislation because she doesn’t want her employees handling food while sick.
All of us get sick. I can’t afford losing good employees. And I don’t want to serve H1N1 with your fries…If we can do it big businesses can as well. Read the rest of this entry »
New Patient Safety Initiative Could Save 60,000 Lives
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More than 60,000 lives could be saved over the next three years under a new initiative announced today by Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius that would stop millions of preventable injuries and complications in hospital patient care over the next three years.
Already, Sebelius said, more than 500 hospitals, as well as physicians and nurses groups, consumer groups and employers have pledged their commitment to the new Partnership for Patients initiative.
Speaking at a Washington, D.C., press conference, along with representatives from major hospitals, employers, unions, health plans, physicians, nurses and patient advocates, she said:
Americans go the hospital to get well, but millions of patients are injured because of preventable complications and accidents. Working closely with hospitals, doctors, nurses, patients, families and employers, we will support efforts to help keep patients safe, improve care, and reduce costs. Working together, we can help eliminate preventable harm to patients.
The two main goals of the Partnership for Patients are to keep hospital patients from getting injured or sicker and help patients heal without complication. The initiative will target all forms of harm to patients such as preventing adverse drug reactions, pressure ulcers, childbirth complications and surgical site infections.
Top Earners Get Sick Leave, Not So Much at Bottom of Wage Scale
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Workers at the top of the wage scale are more than four times more likely to have paid sick days than workers toiling near the bottom wage scale, says a new Economic Policy Institute (EPI) Economic Snapshot.
Just 19 percent of low-wage workers have paid sick days, compared with 86 percent of high-wage workers. These low-income workers are the ones who can least afford to lose pay when they are sick. Overall one in four workers have no paid sick days and when they become ill, are forced to go to work sick, or stay home without pay and risk losing their job.
Many of those low-wage workers are also in occupations most likely to have regular contact with the public—food service and preparation, and personal care and service—according to a study earlier this year from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR). And that, says Dr. Robert Drago, research director for IWPR, “raises serious public health concerns.”
The fewer the number of workers who are able to stay home when sick, the more likely it is that diseases will spread, increasing health care costs and causing needless economic losses. We saw this during the 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic when workers without paid sick days were more likely to go to work while infected with H1N1.
Click here for more from IWPR.
Recent surveys show three-quarters of Americans say paid sick leave should be a “basic workers’ right” and Congress should pass legislation that guarantees workers paid sick leave. More than 160 countries provide paid sick leave, but not the United States.
Lack of Paid Sick Leave Is Family and Public Health Concern
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More than 44 million private-sector workers in the United States—42 percent of the private-sector workforce—don’t have paid sick days they can use to recover from a common illness like the flu, according to new research by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR).
The new analysis reveals that more workers lack paid sick days than government reports show because it includes 4.2 million workers who have not been on the job long enough to be eligible for paid sick days.
Debra Ness, president of the National Partnership for Women & Families (NPWF), calls the new data a “jarring reminder that workplace policies in this country are grossly inadequate.”
It should be a compelling call to action for lawmakers at the local, state and federal levels, with unemployment high, jobs scarce and more working families relying on one income instead of two, too many workers forced to sacrifice their health or their financial security when illness strikes or a family emergency occurs.
Public Supports Paid Sick Leave
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Three-quarters of Americans say paid sick leave should be a “basic workers’ right” and Congress should pass legislation that guarantees workers paid sick leave, according to a new survey by the Public Welfare Foundation (PWF).
PWF President Deborah Leff says the overwhelming support for paid sick leave legislation shows
that a majority of people in every racial group and every income level, every age group, every part of the country, both political parties see paid sick days as a basic worker right.
Women’s Groups Send Letter to Capitol Hill Supporting Employee Free Choice
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A dozen of the nation’s leading women’s organizations has called on Congress to pass the Employee Free Choice Act. In a letter this week to every member of Congress, the groups say that restoring the freedom of workers to form unions and bargain for a better life would benefit women and all workers.
The letter notes that unionized women workers earn almost one-third more than nonunion workers—32 percent.
In addition, women in unions are 19 percent more likely to have health insurance benefits and 25 percent more likely to have an employer-provided pension. (Click here to learn more about the union difference.)
The letter was organized by the National Partnership for Women and Families (NPWF).
Massachusetts Moving on Paid Sick Leave Legislation
In recent weeks, we’ve all heard the advice to stay home from work if symptoms show up that could indicate an H1N1 (swine flu) infection. But as the National Partnership for Women and Families (NPWF) long has pointed out, nearly 50 percent of private-sector workers have no paid sick leave. And 76 percent of low-income workers lose a day or more of pay if they stay home sick.
Tomorrow in Boston, the Massachusetts Paid Leave Coalition will make that point and urge lawmakers to make the Bay State the first to require employers to provide paid sick leave for workers.
The coalition, which includes the Massachusetts AFL-CIO, affiliated unions, community and other groups, will gather in the State House in the 4th floor cafeteria and distribute surgical masks and flu “prescriptions” urging passage of legislation (S.B. 688 and H.B. 1815) allowing workers to earn up to seven paid sick leave days a year.
Health Care Reform Must Focus on Patients’ Needs
As Congress begins to consider comprehensive health care reform, one health expert is telling Congress reform must be focused on making sure the most vulnerable patients are served.
Debra Ness, president of the National Partnership for Women and Families, told a Senate Finance Committee’s health care reform roundtable this morning that if “we can make the system work for vulnerable patients with multiple chronic conditions, we can make it work for everyone.” Ness told the panel:
We will not achieve meaningful reform unless we improve our health care delivery system so that more people have access to better, more affordable care and get better value for their health care dollars.
