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New Jersey Paid Sick Leave?The Trend Continues

The National Law Review
posted on: Thursday, December 18, 2014

We previously blogged about the Jersey City and Newark Ordinances requiring private employers to provide paid sick leave to employees. [Jersey City Implements Paid Sick Leave Requirement and Newark City Council Introduces Paid Sick Leave Ordinance and Update: Jersey City Sick Leave Ordinance Posters Now Available For Employers ]. Several other municipalities have also passed similar ordinances a requiring sick leave. Consistent with this approach, the State of New Jersey appears to be moving closer to passing its own bill.

Ordinances have been passed in Passaic, Newark, East Orange, Jersey City, Irvington, Paterson, Montclair, and Trenton. Each ordinance has its own requirements, effective dates, and methods of administration. For employers that operate in multiple locations, compliance may prove tricky. Employers should review, create, and/or modify policies to ensure compliance with all applicable laws. If an employer is operating in one or more of these jurisdictions, it should become familiar with the new laws, including the reasons employees may use sick time, the amount of sick time an employee may use, and the documentation that employers may request when employees use accrued sick time.

On December 15, 2014, the Assembly Budget Committee approved A-2354, a proposed state-wide, paid sick leave bill. The Committee?s approval sets the bill up for a floor vote in the Assembly. In its current form, this bill would require employers to provide earned sick leave at the rate of one hour for every 30 hours worked to each covered employee. Employees would begin accruing sick leave on the first day of employment, would be able to use the leave to care for themselves or certain other individuals, and be permitted to carry over sick leave (subject to certain caps depending on the size of the employer) or receive a payment for unused hours in certain circumstances.

http://www.natlawreview.com/article/n ... ick-leave-trend-continues

One year later, opinion on Jersey City's paid sick time law is still mixed

By Terrence T. McDonald | The Jersey Journal
September 25, 2014 at 2:34 PM

Jersey City became the first city in the state to adopt a paid sick leave mandate one year ago today, an action that started a cascade of approvals of similar laws across New Jersey as well as a movement to implement a statewide law guaranteeing workers paid sick time.

The law, championed by liberals and opposed by business groups, requires businesses with 10 or more workers to provide paid sick time to all their workers. Full-time workers get a maximum of five paid sick days annually under the mandate.

It was one of Steve Fulop's first splashy moves as mayor. Fulop, a Democrat, cited it as his No. 1 achievement in July when speaking to The Jersey Journal about his first year in office. This week, Fulop said the mandate is "going great."

"There are countless examples of families it has helped, working families," he said. "Despite what people said, that the business community would suffer, our unemployment rate ... has dropped faster than any other urban area in the region."

Fulop's initiative inspired other big cities to pass similar laws, including
Newark, Passaic and East Orange. Earlier this month, Paterson became the fifth
city in New Jersey to pass a paid sick leave law.

Voters in Trenton and Montclair will decide in November whether to their municipalities will join the pack, and liberal activists are pushing for a statewide law.

Read more from the Jersey Journal

http://www.cepr.net/documents/good-for-buisness-2014-02-21.pdf

Title: Paid Sick Leave ? Good For Business?



Author: Eileen Appelbaum, Ruth Milkman, Luke Elliot, Teresa Kroeger


Source: Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR)


Date: March 25, 2014


Abstract: A new report from CEPR and the CUNY Murphy Institute delves into the impact of Connecticut's path-breaking paid sick leave law on business in the state. Drawing from survey data and on-site interviews, the report shows that the policy was not the job-killer that opponents claimed. That employers reported little or no negative effects after the law was implemented has significant implications for similar legislation around the nation.



Link: http://bit.ly/1fXGsRn

Sick Leave in Jersey City

The New York Times
January 30, 2014

To the Editor:

Re ?Quick Work on Paid Sick Leave? (editorial, Jan. 24): The administration of Mayor Bill de Blasio is to be commended for proposing ways to improve New York City?s earned sick leave policy. Officials need only look across the Hudson River to Jersey City, where our earned sick-leave rules ? the first in New Jersey ? just went into effect.

Giving workers earned time off to care for sick loved ones or themselves when ill is a basic human dignity that also protects the public. Often overlooked is that businesses are also helped by reduced employee turnover, as studies show.

STEVEN M. FULOP
Mayor
Jersey City, Jan. 24, 2014

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/31/opi ... -in-jersey-city.html?_r=0

It's also a bit difficult to reclassify workers who were already on a W2 as 1099 contractors. In general, low level jobs that would not have had paid sick days would not be able to meet the IRS and DoL tests for contractors. Too much supervision and control by the employer in most cases.

There would be a greening of labor lawyer pockets if any real number of businesses tried it.

Paid sick leave now mandatory for most businesses in Jersey City

By Terrence T. McDonald/The Jersey Journal
January 24, 2014 at 3:22 PM

When Jersey City in September 2012 became the first New Jersey municipality to mandate that most private businesses provide paid sick leave for its workers, Mayor Steve Fulop predicted a legal fight.

Four months later, and no lawsuit filed, the measure is now law.

Fulop called today ?very exciting.?

?I think it?s going to help tens of thousands of working families in Jersey City,? he said at an event at Saint Peter's University.

Jersey City is the sixth city in the nation to force private businesses to provide paid sick time. The law affects employers with 10 or more workers, and was opposed by state- and countywide business groups.

Read more from the Jersey Journal

Jersey City mayor signs paid sick time bill into law

By Terrence T. McDonald/The Jersey Journal

In a rare public ceremony at a Newark Avenue pizza joint, Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop this morning signed the city?s paid sick time bill into law, and predicted that the measure will eventually be replicated statewide.

Fulop, 36, said the law, which will take effect on Jan. 24, 2014 as the first of its kind in the state, is an effort to bolster the economy and help the city?s ?most vulnerable and most at-risk? workers.


READ MORE

Mandatory paid sick leave in Jersey City: What you need to know

By Terrence T. McDonald/The Jersey Journal

In late January, Jersey City is set to become the first city in the state, and the sixth nationwide, to require that most private businesses provide paid sick leave to their employees.

The measure was applauded by unions and criticized by business groups, but both sides seemed unclear about the expansive plan?s reach.

Here?s a primer

READ MORE

Liberals hail Jersey City for paid sick time law; Hudson County biz group still opposes

By Terrence T. McDonald/The Jersey Journal

Liberal groups and unions didn?t spare the accolades last night as they praised the Jersey City City Council for adopting a measure that makes the city the first in the state to mandate paid sick time for most private workers.

Mayor Steve Fulop and the council showed "courage,? said one. "Incredible," said another. "Terrific," said a third.

READ MORE

Jersey City council OKs paid sick time mandate

by Terrence T. McDonald/The Jersey Journal

Jersey City has become the first city in the state, and the sixth nationwide, to mandate that most businesses provide paid sick time to their workers, thanks to a nearly unanimous vote by the City Council tonight.

The policy requires businesses that employ 10 or more wokers to provide up to 40 hours of paid sick time to each employee, including part-time staff. The requirement, which takes effect on Jan. 24, 2014, sends a signal to the rest of the state, Councilman at large Rolando Lavarro said tonight.

?Economic fairness and justice resides here in Jersey City,? Lavarro said to cheers from the crowd of about 75 gathered inside City Hall?s council chambers.

READ MORE

Jersey City council set to approve paid sick time mandate

By Terrence T. McDonald/The Jersey Journal

Jersey City woman Paulette Eberle says her ill father is an illustration of the need for the city to mandate companies provide paid sick time to their workers.

Eberle?s father was recovering from a staph infection recently when he caught a common cold, and now he?s fighting for his life, she said. The culprits? His home health-care aides, who came to work despite carrying a virus.

?They were forced to make a choice between feeding their children or staying home and keeping their clients safe,? she said. ?That is unconscionable.?

Eberle told her story at a rally in front of City Hall this afternoon, hours before the City Council was set to vote on a measure that would make Jersey City the first municipality in the state to mandate paid sick time for most private firms.

READ MORE

NJBIA to Fulop: Paid sick-leave proposal will hurt Jersey City's businesses



Forcing Jersey City businesses to offer mandatory paid sick-leave to their employees will end up doing more harm to the local economy than good, and a comprehensive study should be conducted before the plan is implemented.

That's the message coming from New Jersey Business and Industry Association in a letter to Mayor Steven Fulop from the industry group's assistant vice president for labor and development.

"While we understand the desire to help workers, we feel that this ordinance will have a negative impact on both large and small employers," Stefanie Riehl wrote. "Given the potential for unintended consequences, we suggest that a comprehensive study be undertaken prior to implementation (as opposed to one year following implementation). Otherwise, we believe the proposal could compromise the economic engine that Jersey City has become and hurt the very people it intends to help."

To the dismay of several business groups, Fulop announced earlier this month that he plans to make the city the first in New Jersey to require that employers provide paid sick days for their workers. In a previous interview with NJBIZ, Fulop called the matter a "human dignity issue" and said the policy would wind up benefiting employers.

Under Fulop's plan, employees would earn one hour of paid sick time for every 40 hours worked with a cap at 40 hours per year. Employers with 10 or more workers will be required to offer both full and part-time workers the opportunity to earn up to five paid sick days per year. Those with nine or fewer employees would still have to offer up to five paid sick days per year.

The matter is set to go before city council Wednesday when it next convenes at 6 p.m.

The NJBIA and a coalition of other business groups also are battling a similar measure introduced in the Assembly last spring by Pamela Lampitt (D-Voorhees). The Lampitt bill would require employers to offer workers one hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked, with a cap at five days per year for businesses with less than 10 employees and nine days for those with 10 or more.

http://www.njbiz.com/article/20130924 ... /130929922/NJBIA-to-Fulopaid-sick-leave-proposal-will-hurt-Jersey-City's-businesses

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This law only applies to full time work. There are federal labor laws that prohibit children working full time. http://www.dol.gov/compliance/guide/childlbr.htm

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So businesses who want to employ children shouldn't be kept from opening? Those are, in fact, good jobs for children and if we prevent those businesses from opening, then we are not letting the free market work...and if the parents of kids don't want their kids to work those jobs then the free market will decide that right? Same for businesses who only want to hire whites and businesses who only want to hire men...

Where do you draw the line?

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I agree.. but the effect of this law could just mean that some full-time employees will be converted to part-time/temp/independent contractors. Which of course means that for these workers, they'll receive less comp and/or benefits.

Also, if these employers "shouldn't open businesses" than that means all of those jobs go away. I don't think that's a preferable outcome, either.

To me, it is as simple as this: If you can't afford to give your employees a few sick days, then perhaps you shouldn't open up a business. This is not a third world country.

Earned sick days are good for N.J. business and the economy: Opinion
By Star-Ledger Guest Columnist, Jon Whiten

Business lobbyists are lining up with guns blazing against proposals to provide earned sick days to workers in Jersey City, Newark and, ultimately, the entire state. They say these common-sense policies will harm businesses, lead to job loss and stifle a fragile economic recovery.

Too bad none of these claims is true.

But don?t take my word for it. Providing earned sick days is a growing trend, and we can look at the experience of the early adopters to see what?s actually happened.

In reality, businesses in cities and states that have extended this benefit to workers have seen no impact to their bottom lines ? which makes sense, because earned sick days policies help strengthen the economy by creating a healthier, more productive workforce. (?Presenteeism,? the cost of employees? lower productivity when working sick, is estimated to cost employers $160 billion a year.)

In each instance, supporters saw the same song-and-dance routine from the opposition. Business lobbyists put on their best Chicken Little outfits and sketched doomsday scenarios that would come as a result of an earned sick days policy. Then what happened?

In San Francisco, which was the first city to implement the policy in 2007, researchers at the Institute for Women?s Policy Research followed up a few years later with a broad survey of employers. The findings? Eighty-six percent of employers polled said the law didn?t negatively impact their profits and only a third reported any difficulties implementing it.

Another study of San Francisco, by the Drum Major Institute for Public Policy, found that job growth in San Francisco was much higher than in neighboring counties (where jobs actually disappeared) in the first three years after the law was introduced.

The number of businesses created was also much higher in San Francisco than in the neighboring counties, in both large and small businesses, as well as the industries most impacted by earned sick days legislation: retail and food service.

Perhaps that?s why, after a few years of reality, two-thirds of San Francisco employers surveyed supported the policy. Even the head of the city?s restaurant association, which lobbied hard against earned sick days, had a change of heart after several years of actual experience with the law. ?(It?s) the best public policy for the least cost,? Kevin Westlye said in 2010.

In Seattle, earned sick days went into effect a year ago. And after a full year under the law, the economy has not collapsed. In fact, the Seattle area has outpaced the rest of the state in job growth, even in the retail and food service industries, according to data analyzed by the Main Street Alliance of Washington, a coalition of 2,500 small businesses in that state.

In short, the economic trends that already existed in Seattle before passage of the ordinance continued, undeterred by the fact that employers were now required to provide earned sick days to their workers.

Closer to home, Connecticut ? which enacted the first statewide earned sick days law in 2011 ? has actually seen job growth, not contraction, in two sectors with large shares of workers who previously lacked earned sick days: leisure/hospitality and education/health services.

The experience of other cities and states can only be taken as a clear sign that New Jersey?s business lobbyists oppose earned sick days only because they ideologically oppose any kind of government regulation, not because it will actually do harm to businesses or the economy

In fact, most successful businesses try very hard to avoid rapid employee turnover, to minimize their recruitment and training costs and to hold on to hard workers. Allowing a worker afflicted with a contagious infection to stay home and get well is not only sensible and respectful of the worker, but also beneficial to co-workers, customers and the economy.

The bottom line is simple: When employers provide earned sick days to all workers, we all win.

Jon Whiten is deputy director of New Jersey Policy Perspective, a nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization.

http://blog.nj.com/njv_guest_blog/201 ... ck_days_are_good_for.html

State Senate Majority Leader, Senator Loretta Weinberg wrote an open letter to Mayor Fulop

Mayor Steve Fulop
Jersey City, New Jersey
September 10, 2013
Mayor Fulop:

I want to applaud you for your efforts to see that employees who work in Jersey City are entitled to paid sick leave as an earned right. I stand with you as you work to have it enacted in Jersey City and I encourage other cities in New Jersey to follow your lead with the goal of building momentum and support for my legislation that would set the same standard statewide.

The time has come to ensure that the men and women who work so hard to support themselves and their families are not forced to choose between their health and their jobs when they become ill. But it will take the efforts of public officials, employees and even employers to see that this smart and compassionate right is made available to all workers. We have to work together in support of what is fast becoming a national movement to see that earned sick leave becomes a basic right in the same way that other rights have become part of the American workplace.

My bill, which is cosponsored by Senator Dick Codey, Senator Ronald Rice and Senator Sandra Cunningham, with companion legislation in the State Assembly sponsored by Assemblywoman Pamela Lampitt and Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver, would allow employees to earn five sick days a year if they work at businesses with ten or fewer employees and seven sick days if they work at larger companies.

Like your proposal in Jersey City, earned sick leave would be as smart for businesses, their customers and clients as it compassionate for employees and their families. It allows workers to get well, it prevents the spread of illnesses and it would allow parents to use the time to care for sick family members. For working people everywhere, this should be a right that accompanies the state law on Paid Family Leave, which has succeeded in New Jersey and elsewhere.

I look forward to success in having earned sick leave enacted in Jersey City, in other cities and in the State of New Jersey.

Sincerely,
Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg


http://www.bluejersey.com/diary/23812 ... -senator-loretta-weinberg

Here is a question: Is there a loop hole? The answer is yes, if the worker is part time. So Jersey City will give small businesses an incentive to hire part time instead of full time workers. This on top of the "Affordable Care Act" incentive to only hire part timers. According to this: http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/2013/09 ... nt-of-net-jobs-added.html

Somewhere between 59 and 63%(and possibly more) of the net new jobs created in the US this year were part time(you have to read down to the updates).



It will also give business a reason to move to surrounding communities if possible. A law like this makes much more sense if enacted on a state wide level. On a city only level it could actually hurt some of the people it is aiming to help.

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This is the right way to view the issue. Five days sick leave (not personal days, not paid vacation) is not a big lift. But it's a big help if you need it.

And do you really want the cook sneezing in the kitchen?

Sorry "Yvonne" did not respond sooner ... as a contractor myself if I didn't work I don't get paid. (oh the irony)! I could not have responded better than "vindication15" - I don't know the mayor's agenda and thus don't know how to answer your question.

I think that this is a fundamental worker's fair compensation issue and if the mayor wants to take the first step I am all for it.

To answer for the special police ... my question back to you is are these special police being contracted as "contractors" then just like everyone else (including me) you get paid for the hrs that you work. This means calling out sick and holidays I don't get paid and the same is true for every contractor that I know of. If the special police are being hired as employees then by virtue of the bill on proposal would they also not qualify for accruing the sick days since city hall has more than 10 employees?

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I think your question is being ignored because the issue is more important than the person. Try framing it like this:

"I believe the special police deserve benefits, esp paid sick time, too" instead of like this

"Fulop/Osbourne/whoever I do not support sucks because XXXXXXX"

+1

I voted for him to cut Healy's out of control spending, patronage and corruption.

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It is very convenient to ignore the question. Why is the mayor advocating something for the business community that he will not do for the special police? If Healy was advocating this, there will be comments all over this forum.

I don't know what the mayor's agenda is. That being said I was commenting on the discussion related to why I personally think that putting a bill to force businesses with more than 10 employees provide 5 "paid" sick days per year.

Personally I have not seen the text of the bill and that being said I don't know if the "employees" are being referred to as persons receiving W2 or persons receiving W2 or a 1099. If a business has 12 employees and of them 5 are on 1099 would that business fall under the bracket? or would it be businesses with at least 10 employees on W2 minimum. Now what if these 10 employees on W2 are all part-time workers how does that affect the businesses?

Look my point is I agree in principal what the mayor is talking about however, (if someone can put the specifics of the proposed bill online) I have to look at the details to really comment on whether the proposed bill will help or harm either the employee and the employer.

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I think if you worked as a child factory worker earning 5 dollars an hour for 80 hours a week, you would have achieved greater things in life - cause you know, you would be more motivated