Posted on 08/23/2005 12:57:22 PM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
A proposal to guarantee all workers in Madison paid sick days got a warm reception during the first town hall meeting organized to help shape the potential ordinance.
Only one speaker, an accountant who said he was representing only himself, criticized the "Healthy Families, Healthy City" proposal as the audience of 100 or so groaned around him Monday night.
Jim Cavanaugh, president of the South Central Federation of Labor and one of the leaders of the coalition that's pushing for paid sick leave, said the City Council could have a proposal by its Sept. 6 meeting.
Other labor leaders were among those who championed the initiative. RobertKraig, state political director of the Service Employees International Union, said, "The lowest-wage workers have to hold multiple jobs just to afford housing."
As standards rise over time, Kraig told the audience Monday, society has put limits on what companies can do to compete, noting the elimination of child labor in the last century. He said allowing all workers some paid time to attend funerals, care for sick family members or recover from illness is a moral obligation that companies must face.
"This is an extremely important step," he said.
After a study last year found that the United States was behind 139 countries that offer paid sick leave and was on par with Lesotho, Papua New Guinea and Swaziland in offering new mothers no guaranteed paid maternity leave, there was a push for federally guaranteed paid sick leave. But with the nation's current leadership, that proposal appears to be going nowhere.
Several local church leaders, who are teaming with labor to advance the issue, said Madison has the opportunity to lead the nation on the issue.
Mary Kay Baum, executive director of Madison-area Urban Ministry, was among a handful of speakers who suggested paid sick hours, rather than days, to accommodate the irregular shifts and part-time hours of many workers. She proposed a method based on what she does with her own employees.
Under her plan, workers could earn sick leave for up to eight typical shifts per year. For each month of work completed, they'd get one-twelfth of their total possible sick leave. For example, a worker who typically works standard 40-hour weeks would have about five hours of sick leave after a month, about 10 hours after two months and 64 hours - or eight days - at the end of a year.
"We need to convince the community that this is the right thing to do," Baum said.
After researching employment patterns in Madison, she said she was shocked at the number of workers who do not have sick leave - estimated at nearly half - and the family income statistics kept by the Madison Metropolitan School District.
She noted that about 40 percent of young students qualify for free or reduced lunches, and that more than 80 percent of African-American children qualify for free or reduced lunches.
"There is a race code in our employment patterns in Madison," she said, adding that the lack of sick leaves makes matters worse for families on the edge of eviction.
Brian SeptMatthews, a pastor in Madison, said workers are sometimes penalized and coerced to not take sick leave they might have. He said if a new ordinance were put in place, it would help families through difficult times and allow a faster recovery.
"Nothing is like the love of a parent or a close relative," he said. "If they're there, you get better. If mom kissed your knee, all of a sudden it felt better."
In a fiery speech that chastised labor leadership for breaking up their organizations and not doing enough, the Rev. J. W. Goldstein told those assembled that the forces against paid sick leave would be powerful.
He said that in the end, business leaders "don't give a damn about workers."
"If you expect to get this done, expect a lot of work," he said.
Others in the audience reacted to the matter personally, telling of the days that they spent sick at work.
Mike Quieto, a bartender and a University of Wisconsin-Madison teaching assistant, said he could call in sick for one job, but not the other. "I didn't infect my students, but I did sneeze in your cocktails," he said. "And I'm sorry for it."
Mike Goodman of Madison called paid sick leave "a stopgap measure" while a better solution, universal health care coverage, remains a distant possibility.
He said he was frustrated and angry that getting such basic benefits for workers met with such resistance while "there's an insatiable supply of housing at the $500,000 to $1 million level."
"I don't think that this will impose any severe financial burden," he said.
The accountant opposed to the proposal, Bret Willoughby, said individual unions should bargain for paid sick leave for part-time workers and that applying the standard citywide would be "sticking your hand in the hornets' nest."
The Greater Madison Chamber of Commerce has also spoken out against the proposal, but it was not represented with a speaker at the town hall meeting Monday.
Of those who registered at the forum, 65 indicated that they supported mandatory paid sick leave, nine gave conditional support, two opposed the proposal and another two indicated no preference.
this for the low wage workers. the ones who probably already get a bunch of federal money anyway? free insurance, food, housing assistance, huge tax breaks, paid daycare...
look people, i'm glad you at least work, but mcdonalds shouldn't have to pay you to be sick. this can and will lead to abuse of the system. also this isn't fair when you think about the fact that most of these "low wage jobs" have to call someone else in to cover the work the sick person isn't doing.
Exactly!
I employ 5 people here at the store. If one of them calls in sick, I have to pay one of the others to cover. I can't also pay the sick one. Providing coverage for them would cost 3 times the annual mortgage on the building. I just don't have it. The grocery business is very low margin. And I'm a single, independent, not a chain.
If the state of VA were to mandate health care, the store would be closed in 24 hours.
I can't afford to get sick. No one pays me to be out. I worked with pneumonia last year. Took my meds and wore a mask.
"Who pays the self-employed when they get sick?"
I'm self-employed. I compensate for sick days by hogging all the profits for myself, so it all balances out if I have to take a day off. ;)
I can't believe Madistan hasn't found a way to screw the self-employed yet. I can see Austin King scribbling in his little notebook already, "Note to self: Find way to screw self-employed citizenry NEXT! Untapped resource for city funds!"
I hate these people.
100 hard-working and put-upon Liberals in the crowd, and 1 Conservative who hasn't worked an honest day in his life!
Well, that's how Howard Dean would describe the scene, anyway... ;)
This has been run up the flag pole forever. It's BS. The mildly ill are only too infirm for work, go to the mall see how many show up there.
Simple business solution #2: tell City Council to "stick it" and make it stick.
I wonder why the "crowd" was not at work?
How may were municipal employee's given the time off to show at the meeting? How many were dead beats looking for a place to get in some air conditioning?
How many were SS recipients already living off the government?
You are really smart, smarter than 99% of the speakers at that meeting!
Why should the company have to pay for this by mandate...shouldn't this be a bargained for exchange? Why should the government stick its nose in here? Bad, bad, bad...
What about those that don't have a job? Huh? This proposal is discriminatory.
My place of employment figures sick time in with pto time, at the rate of 16hrs/quarter for a 1.0 fte. They used to separate sick time and pto. I really think putting the two together must work at getting fewer 'sick' calls since it has continued.
Separating the two (as is done at another similar institution) seems to ensure that most employees will call in sick enough times to make sure they don't lose the extra hours, which seems to punish those who never call in sick even tho they lose that 'extra' time off and end up taking up the slack for those that do.
I kinda like the way my employer does it better, since i seem to be healthy enough not to ever actually have to call in sick.
In a socialist regime, there is no provision for self-employed people. In their perfect world, we would all work for the state.
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