As California goes, let’s hope the rest follow
by digby
Good news for anyone who eats in restaurants in California:
Early on Saturday morning, the California Senate passed a bill guaranteeing at least three paid sick days a year for about 6.5 million workers, sending it to Gov. Jerry Brown (D).
Brown’s office said it supports the bill, and in a statement after it passed he said, “Tonight, the Legislature took historic action to help hardworking Californians.” Assuming he signs the bill, California will become just the second state ever to guarantee paid sick leave and the law will be the tenth in the nation.
The bill would require employers to provide sick leave to employees who work 30 or more days within a year, allowing them to accrue at least one hour for every 30 they put in. Currently, about 44 percent of the state’s workers don’t have access to a single paid day off if they or a family member gets sick.
I will never in a million years understand why employers insist that their employees come to work sick. They can’t work efficiently, they infect their co-workers and if it’s a job working with the public or for the public, they can infect their customers. It’s ridiculous.
California just took a step toward making paid sick days compulsory. On Labor Day week-end no less. We’re not perfect here in the land of fruits and nuts, God knows. But sometimes we’re pretty good.
(I have another idea — how about neighborhood clinics like they have in Japan where anyone can get looked at on a walk-in basis. That way employers could even insure that their employees aren’t malingering. Awesome for everyone, right?)
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