Should Minimum Paid Sick Day Policies Be Required?

A majority of the state’s residents support paid sick day policies, according to a study released by the Center for Women and Work (CWW) at Rutgers University on Wednesday.

The study documented in "It’s Catching: Public Opinion toward Paid Sick Days in New Jersey" found that 83 percent support the policies. It also finds that 37 percent of New Jersey’s residents don’t have access to paid sick days.

In May, Assemblywoman Pamela R. Lampitt, a Democrat from Camden County, introduced a bill that would set minimum paid sick day standards for employers in the private sector, according to northjersey.com. The state currently doesn’t require private employers to offer paid sick time to employees.

The study released on Wednesday found this group includes Hispanic and Latino workers, as well as young workers, part-time workers and those earning less than $50,000 a year.

According to CWW affiliate fellow, assistant professor at Widener University and co-author of the report Linda Houser, 50 percent of those workers won’t take time off from work to recover from an illness due to fears of job loss or bad performance reviews, or general financial concerns.

The report follows a telephone poll conducted by the Eagleton Center for Public Interest Polling at Rutgers that surveyed 925 New Jersey residents in September. That poll had an error margin of plus or minus 3.2 percent.

“Not only do most New Jerseyans – over 83 percent – support paid sick days policies, but one of our most striking findings is that this support spans all economic and racial groups, both genders and even political affiliations,” said Danielle Lindemann, research director and assistant research professor at CWW and co-author of the brief. 

 “Our findings show that New Jersey’s low-wage workers, the majority of whom are women, are those least likely to have access to paid sick days,” said Karen White, director of the Working Families Program at the Rutgers center and co-author of the brief. “Yet they are the ones who most need this workplace standard so that they don’t have to choose between losing a day’s wages and caring for a sick child of themselves.”