The Healthy Families Act: safeguarding Americans' livelihood, families and health with paid sick days: hearing of the Committee on Health

Original publisher: Washington : U.S. G.P.O. : For sale by the Supt. of Docs., U.S. G.P.O., 2008. LC Number: KF27 .L27 2007i OCLC Number: (OCoLC)255656681 Subject: Sick leave -- Law and legislation -- United States. Excerpt: ... 11 ability, faith-based, community groups as well as labor unions, health advocates, and leading researchers at top institutions. It in-cludes organizations like 9to5, ACORN, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, AFL-CIO, and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. We are all very different organizations but we've come to-gether to support this bill because millions of Americans are being forced to choose between taking care of a sick child or family mem-ber and losing a day's pay or even losing their job. In a nation that values families, no worker should have to make this impossible choice. Paid sick days are particularly important to women, since women, for the most part, are still the primary caregivers for their families. Half of working moms report having to miss work when a child gets sick and half of those moms also lose pay, which can be a significant financial blow for families at any income level. Paid sick days are also critically important to the well being of children. Children recover from illness faster when their parents care for them and having access to paid sick days also increases the likelihood that working parents can take their children for pre-ventive care and well child visits that can help keep them healthy. Paid sick days are also good for the public health. Our govern-ment, the CDC urges us to stay home from work, to keep our chil-dren out of school and daycare when they are sick but workers without paid sick days don't have that option and we all suffer as a result. Paid sick days are also good for our economy. Studies show that presentism - employees ' practice of coming to work even though they are sick costs our national economy $ 180 billion in lost pro-ductivity annually. Cost-benefit analysis s...