Obama to announce sick time is a "right"

[Sean88gt]

Golfing days.

[Forever_frost]

The type of paid time off and sick days other countries gets fucking sickens me when we compare it to what our slave drivers "give" us.

I'm all for more sick time/pto.

Then start a business and offer all the paid time off and sick days you like.

[Baron Von Crowder]

The USA is one of the only major countries that doesn't mandate a number of days off in a year.

Take Australia for example, they require 4 weeks of paid vacation time every year, in addition to that, they get 10 paid sick/personal days that carry over from year to year if not used. Not to mention the paid maternity/paternity leave.

The type of paid time off and sick days other countries gets fucking sickens me when we compare it to what our slave drivers "give" us.

I'm all for more sick time/pto.

I guess it's a matter of perspective. I'm straight commission at work, and even taking an hour at lunch costs me sales. I take a day off here and there, but got murdered over the Christmas holiday in loss of sales. PTO only counts for the day I take off, and does nothing for the few days after that I dont have anything going out to get paid for.

If I take two weeks off, It would kill a month for me. One of the guys I used to work with told his employees that if they can take two weeks off, they are expendable.

[JC316]

I guess it's a matter of perspective. I'm straight commission at work, and even taking an hour at lunch costs me sales. I take a day off here and there, but got murdered over the Christmas holiday in loss of sales. PTO only counts for the day I take off, and does nothing for the few days after that I dont have anything going out to get paid for.

If I take two weeks off, It would kill a month for me. One of the guys I used to work with told his employees that if they can take two weeks off, they are expendable.

Moral of the story, straight commission blows.

[Baron Von Crowder]

Moral of the story, straight commission blows.

I guess, but the money is good. Sitting at home broke isnt something I like to do.

[The King]

One of the guys I used to work with told his employees that if they can take two weeks off, they are expendable.

Everyone is expendable in the workplace, some just choose to believe otherwise.

[Baron Von Crowder]

Everyone is expendable in the workplace, some just choose to believe otherwise.

Truth.

[CexMashean]

Then start a business and offer all the paid time off and sick days you like.

Which business do you run, or which company do you work for right now?

Oh, that's right. . .

[CexMashean]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/01/15/more-than-a-third-of-american-workers-dont-get-sick-leave-and-theyre-making-the-rest-of-us-ill/

Today, President Obama's proposing legislation that would give American workers 7 days a year of paid sick leave. The U.S. remains the world's only wealthy nation that does not mandate a minimum of paid sick leave, vacation leave or parental leave.

Nationally, nearly 4-in-10 private sector workers -- 39 percent -- do not have access to any sick leave at all. Zero. Zilch. None. According to Betsey Stevenson of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, that amounts to 43.5 million workers who may be compelled by financial reasons to come into the office when they're sniffling, sneezing, barfing, and generally feeling under the weather, making the rest of us ill in the process.

Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that access to paid sick leave varies considerably by occupation. 88 percent of private sector managers and financial workers have access to paid leave, more than double the rate among service workers (40 percent) and construction workers (38 percent).





Paid sick leave is also a factor in the nation's income inequality, although whether it's a cause or effect isn't clear. The top 10 percent of private sector wage earners are more than four times as likely (87 percent) to get paid sick leave as the bottom ten percent of workers (20 percent).




The business case for paid sick leave is a strong one. A study last year of Connecticut's paid sick leave law found that employers saw little effect on their overall expenses, while 15 percent saw increased productivity, 20 percent saw a reduction in sick workers coming to the office, and 30 percent saw a notable improvement in employee morale. A year and a half after the law went into effect, more than three quarters of employers were supportive of it.

A 2003 study in the Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine found that working sick cost American employers about $160 billion in lost productivity annually. Put succinctly, "Employees who work sick endanger business profits by putting the health and productivity of other workers – as well as customers and the public – at risk."

Paid sick leave is also, frankly, a public health issue. According to the American Public Health Association, during the 2009 H1N1 pandemic "an estimated 7 million additional individuals were infected and 1,500 deaths occurred because contagious employees did not stay home from work to recover." 1,500 deaths! 1,500 people died because a cadre of mucous troopers were unwilling or unable to stay home while infected with the flu. If a terrorist attack caused 1,500 deaths it would be a national crisis. But when those same deaths are caused by workplace sneezes we shrug.

Even setting the economic arguments aside, I'm all for any policy that's going to encourage workers to not contaminate the nation's transit systems and workplaces with their nasty icky sneezy wheezy sick germs. Adding the economic arguments makes it a no-brainer. Paid sick time is good for workers, good for employers, and good for the economy as a whole. From a policy standpoint it's about as close to a free lunch as you're gonna get.

[YALE]

Let me try to get this right. If you're more valuable, you're treated as though you're more valuable? Is that right?

Congress ain't passing this shit.

[Gasser64]

Another one of those "not sure if necessary" bs things the government wants. Ive never worked a single job that didnt come with paid sick days, voluntarily on the part of the company. Im guessing some of you guys have, but it seems to be something thats becoming rare for them not to offer it

[Forever_frost]

Which business do you run, or which company do you work for right now?

Oh, that's right. . .

You are more than welcome to enlist and go to war as an infantryman if you would prefer to have what I do. I do warn you however, to be like me, you either have to serve for 30 years or be injured in combat so badly that the military, VA, and independent doctors all agree that you are fucked up for life.

I'll be expecting a post up of your enlistment contract.

[Forever_frost]

Another one of those "not sure if necessary" bs things the government wants. Ive never worked a single job that didnt come with paid sick days, voluntarily on the part of the company. Im guessing some of you guys have, but it seems to be something thats becoming rare for them not to offer it

That's the difference between having skills the company needs and is willing to pay to acquire versus doing things that any monkey off the street can do and you are easily replaceable. Also why Rangers and Airborne guys get paid more than a supply clerk. More demand, more specialized skill set that is harder to come by.

[03mustangdude]

Railroad gets us 9 per 90 days but none are paid and if you use all of them you are investigated for not working enough lol

[LANTIRN]

Railroad gets us 9 per 90 days but none are paid and if you use all of them you are investigated for not working enough lol

That is pretty fucked up. But like was said above I have never worked for a company who didn't voluntarily offer all employees paid sick time, or PTO as most call it these days. Another government bill that is not necessary.