Washington Work and Family Coalition

Know Your Rights: Seattle’s Paid Sick and Safe Leave Law

Most people who work in Seattle have the right to earn paid sick days. Seattle’s City Council adopted paid sick days at the urging of the Seattle Coalition for a Healthy Workforce to promote the health of Seattle’s workers, children, families, and businesses.

Here are the basics:

Starting September 1, 2012, people working in companies with more than 4 employees will accrue 1 hour of sick and safe time for every 40 hours worked. In companies with more than 250 employees, workers accrue 1 hour for every 30 hours worked. Full-time, part-time, and contract workers are all covered.

Paid Sick and Safe Time can be used for:
- sickness and preventive health care of the employee or a family member;
- to cope with domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking;
- or if the employee’s place of business or child’s school or daycare is closed due to a public health emergency.

Employees have a right to use accrued leave or carry over into the next year:
- up to 40 hours in firms with 5 to 50 employees
- up to 56 hours in firms with 50 to 250 employees
- up to 72 hours in firms with over 250 employees

What about existing paid leave policies? Employers can continue to provide leave above the standard and in a variety of ways, including as vacation and PTO, as long as the leave can be used for the same purposes and the accrual method meets the standards.

How do you count employees? All the company’s employees are included to determine employer size, no matter where they work, based on a 40 hour workweek. For example, a company with 60 employees who each worked 20 hours per week on average, would count as having 30 employees. But only the people working in Seattle have a right to paid leave.

Are there exceptions? People working for public agencies other than the City of Seattle are not included. Neither are work study students, or people who only work occasionally inside the city limits (less than 180 hours in a year). New employees may have to wait 180 days before they can use leave, and new businesses generally have 2 years before they have to offer paid leave. Workers covered by union contracts may bargain for different policies.

For more information: http://www.seattle.gov/civilrights/SickLeave.htm or call 206-684-4500

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Google’s formula to retain women: Longer maternity leave

From Life Inc. on Today

Google sign image — PHOTO: Mark Lennihan, AP

Many employers end up scratching their heads when women who are seemingly on the fast track to the corner office end up leaving their companies.

Google managers decided to use their expertise deciphering data to figure out why it was happening within their ranks.

A story in the New York Times titled “In Google’s Inner Circle, A Falling Number of Women” discusses how the search engine giant used its own internal data to figure out why some women leave the firm. One of the best nuggets was buried in the next-to-last paragraph of the story.

“Another time Google was losing women was after they had babies. The attrition rate for postpartum women was twice that for other employees. In response, Google lengthened maternity leave to five months from three and changed it from partial pay to full pay. Attrition decreased by 50 percent.”

Bingo!

NYT: Working While Sick

From the New York Times:

More than 40 million American workers get no paid sick leave. They have to work when ill or take unpaid sick days, which can lead to financial hardship, or, worse, dismissal. The best way to address this workplace and public health problem is with a national law requiring businesses to provide paid sick leave — a normal benefit for workers in at least 145 countries.

But since there is little hope for such progress anytime soon in Washington, New York City Council members are taking up the cause. At least 36 of 50 council members support a proposed city law that would require sick leave for more than 1.2 million workers. Christine Quinn, the City Council speaker, has refused to bring a bill to the floor, however.

She argues that the timing is bad given the weak economy and that the benefit could increase compensation costs for businesses by an average of 1.5 percent, which in her view would hurt smaller companies to the point of driving them out of business or out of the city. Some business leaders say that companies will cut jobs if even a few days of sick leave are required.

Little evidence to support such fears has been seen in San Francisco, the District of Columbia and the state of Connecticut, which require many businesses to provide the benefit. There are also economic benefits — lower turnover, higher productivity and morale, and reduced job loss for workers. But Ms. Quinn, who says she supports paid sick days in principle, does not want to consider a citywide sick-leave law until the economy is stronger.

The current council proposal would require firms with 5 to 19 employees to provide workers five paid sick days a year, which could also be used to care for sick family members. Businesses with 20 or more employees would have to provide nine days a year of any type of paid leave. The proposal would not cover independent contractors, interns or most union workers. There would be a one-year grace period for new businesses with fewer than 20 employees.

Ms. Quinn and Councilwoman Gale Brewer, who is the lead sponsor of the bill, should be able to find a workable compromise. The requirement could be phased in slowly, especially for new companies and the smallest businesses. If done wisely, New York City’s version could be the sensible model for federal legislation.

Ms. Brewer, Ms. Quinn and other New York City political leaders should also put more pressure on Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the Legislature to pass a state measure on paid sick leave.

Connecticut’s law, enacted last year, requires sick leave for most businesses with 50 or more employees. That still leaves far too many employees without paid sick days, but it is a start. Gov. Dannel Malloy said recently that the law had not led to more small business failures and that the state had gained jobs since it took effect.

This benefit is also good for public health. A recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that workers who could take sick leave instead of working while unwell were less likely to be hurt on the job.

American workers should have paid sick leave, and New York City could set a standard for the rest of the nation. Workers in the city deserve a sensible and humane sick-leave benefit now.