Sen. Jehlan deserves credit for pointing out the irony of ironies during yesterday’s Senate debate on the pandemic prepardness bill.
It’s nice to have a pandemic prepardness plan that includes encourging those with symptoms to stay home. But what if you are one of the tens of thousands of Bay State workers (or millions of American workers) who do not receive any paid sick days?
What’s particularly troubling is that one of the demographics most likely to contract swine flu (lower-income immigrant workers) are also the ones most likely to not be able to afford to miss work due to a lack of pay, or even the possible loss of their job.
Sen. Jehlan deserves kudos for bringing up this very point yesterday, when she offered a measure allowing those quarantined during a pandemic paid sick days.
We are warned right now that if we are sick and have flu-like symptoms we should stay home for at least 7 days. It’s particularly important for people in food services and personal care industries to stay home. Yet these are the people most likely to be low-income. We need to protect public health.
Sen. Jehlan ultimately withdrew the amendment before a vote was taken, likely because Senate leadership knew that this state’s warm-hearted corporate interests would send out a flurry of press releases decrying Massachusetts’ unfriendly business climate, and ultimately kill a bill that ultimately would update the state’s pandemic laws for the first time since Calvin Coolidge.
Personally, I think its disgusting that a measure allowing those quarantined during a freakin’ national pandemic to receive paid sick days is cosidrered too hot of a political issue.
What does it say about this nation as a culture, when the health of the average worker is worth so little when compared to a corporate bottom line?
The Senate updated Coolidge-era pandemic laws yesterday. It’s about time we update Coolidge-era worker safety laws as well.
Based on what I saw on CNN last night, many Mexicans are in the same position, and the government is preparing to shove a law through the government to force all employers to grant sick leave to everyone with H1N1.
It’s nice to know we have some of the same labor laws as Mexico.
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p>Actually, apparantly we’re going to soon have less progressive labor laws than Mexico.
Mandatory PAID sick leave in the event of a pandemic (and is Mexico planning on PAID leave?) is a great idea. But if the state mandates it, it might be required to reimburse employers. And how would you force the self-employed, etc., to stay home? Would they be eligible for state reimbursement (when it’s hard to know how to calculate a daily/hourly wage for them)?
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p>So when you update the laws, you need to consider the repurcussions – that may have been Jehlen’s motive to withdraw after starting the discussion.
You raise a good point about the self-employed, but government routinely put mandates like these on employers. E.g., employers are mandated to offer health insurance, and if they dont there’s a (ridiculously modest) penalty.
Healthy Families Act, Ted Kennedy (Sen) and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (Rep) are planning on reintroducing the act. It will provide a guarantee of 7 paid sick days.
While Senator Jehlan deserves credit for championing this important issue, her amendment would have made the pan flu preparedness bill considerably more difficult to pass. As it stands, the senate passed a zero-cost bill that makes necessary updates to the state’s authority to combat a public health emergency.
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p>Paid sick leave, however laudable, would have added an economic impact to employers and, thus, would have likely killed the bill. Paid sick leave follows the philosophy of the state’s historic health care reform law, but it needs to be debated at a more appropriate time. In sum, it was properly withdrawn so not to unnecessarily impede the passage of a long overdue and critically important bill to protect public health.
Which is why Im hoping she refiles it as a Senate budget amendment.
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p>Perhaps that’s a bit of an unfair tactic. But not as unfair as forcing people with Swine Flu to choose between their health and a paycheck.
I wasn’t there – but the Great flu Epidemic is part of my families history, and still a raw nerve. My mother was born in 1917. Her mother died in the Great Flu Epidemic of 1918. Of the 20-40 million – correct, that is right million who died in that epidemic – one was my maternal grandmother when my own mother was 18 months old, leading to a difficult, neglected beginning as a partial orphan.
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p>See: http://virus.stanford.edu/uda/
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p>Combining a world wide pandemic with a world wide depression could lead to major social change – what I do not want to see is the dark synergy leading to some form of tyranny.
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The Spanish flu struck young adults first and heaviest, not children and the elderly as most viruses do. That is also what H1N1 is doing. I think the fulcrum point is the prognosis of Americans down with the disease…if fatality rates match those in Mexico from this virus, we’d have reason to me worry about the long-term impact — demographic and social — of this epidemic.
This is a bill in the senate and house right now (SB688/HB1815), fully fleshed out and clear on who is and isn’t covered. The AFL-CIO has a fact page on this, folks can call the legislature and urge its passage.
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p>The AFL-CIO has a facts page, and the group MomsRising is taking the lead on passing it. Yesterday would have been a good day for this to pass.
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p>The bill does not reimburse anyone for the days and it doesn’t look like small businesses are exempt (which is a nice change). It only applies to employees, so I think independent contractors would be exempt, but self employed would get the days and it would be illegal to take action against someone using their days.
Can’t help feeling that way, having been on vacation while this story broke (and not being glued to the Internet), and also seeing the many responses here of “how do we expand mandated sick days?”
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p>http://www.smh.com.au/world/on…
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p>I’m not going to discount this situation, but when I read that Tamiflu deals with it effectively (we’re not exactly talking rocket science to deal with this) plus the fact that we are entering the warm months rather than the winter, think that there are some ulterior motives with this latest crisis.