New York City last week mandated that companies with five or more employees offer at least five paid sick days to their workers, becoming one of only a handful of cities to establish paid sick leave.
Meanwhile, 10 states have passed laws prohibiting local governments from establishing sick-leave laws.
Small-business advocacy groups are staunchly opposed to sick-day legislation, arguing it would cause a drop-off in hiring. But other research reports show that after California’s leave law was established, most employers saw either no effect or a positive impact. And after a San Francisco municipal sick-leave law was enacted, workers took fewer days than they were eligible for.
In a past life, I covered small business, and while it’s true that some entrepreneurs are mostly concerned about their bottom lines, others are genuinely short-staffed. Plus, some business owners say that because turnover in retail tends to be high, they don’t trust their employees not to play hooky:
Read full story: http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/03/poor-and-hispanic-workers-are-least-likely-to-have-sick-days/284232/
