March 27, 2013
By Neal Tepel
NEW YORK NY — A new report by Public Advocate Bill de Blasio warns against watering down paid sick leave legislation, showing that hundreds of thousands of workers could be left without guaranteed paid sick days. The report, "Left Behind: Why New Yorkers Need a Strong Paid Sick Leave Bill," demonstrates the impact of revising upward the size of businesses affected by the legislation, a change currently under consideration according to recent reports.
The current paid sick leave bill would apply to businesses with five or more employees, covering the overwhelming majority of city workers. Were that threshold increased to 10 employees, 164,000 workers would lose guaranteed paid sick days. Were it raised to businesses that have 50 or more employees, a staggering 685,000 workers would lose guaranteed paid sick days.
“We don't need ‘Paid Sick Leave-Lite.’ And we won't allow hundreds of thousands of hardworking people to be denied a fundamental right because of political expediency,” said Public Advocate de Blasio. “The only thing worse than waiting three years to vote on this bill would be to pull the rug out from working families at the eleventh hour by watering it down.”
Of the cities that have passed paid sick leave legislation, Philadelphia and Seattle’s legislation applies to businesses with five or more employees, Portland’s affects businesses with more than six workers, and San Francisco and Washington, D.C.’s apply to businesses of all size.
