Proposal To Mandate Sick Time Lands On Beacon Hill | Retailers, restaurants and construction companies could feel burden of new state regs
Robbin Ahlquist, owner of three popular Worcester restaurants including The Sole Proprietor, 111 Chop House and Via’s Italian Table, gives employees three paid sick days per year.
But if an employee is sick, Ahlquist does not want that person coming into work, even if the employee doesn’t have sick days to take.
If legislation pending on Beacon Hill passes, Ahlquist and every other business owner in the state will be required to provide seven paid accrued sick days per year to employees.
“Margins are already so tight in this business and with the economy the way it is, these are the types of burdens that when they’re put in place will simply put some places out of businesses,” said Ahlquist.
Other restaurant, retail and business leaders in the region said the same.
“This is a big deal for small businesses,” said Francis Colanotnio, owner of Colantonio Inc. in Holliston and chairman of the MetroWest Chamber of Commerce’s board of directors. “Most businesses already have sick days built into their plans. This is just another regulation, one more way businesses are going to be told what to do. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”
Opposing View
Proponents of the bill, however, say the system current system is broken.
An estimated 40 percent of private sector workers nationwide do not get paid sick time from their employers, according to a study from the Washington, D.C.-based Institute for Women’s Policy Research. The same study also found that more than two-thirds of low-income workers did not have paid sick time.
“It’s an issue of fairness,” said state Sen. Jamie Eldridge, D-Acton, who is one of dozens of co-sponsors for Senate Bill 688, which has already passed through a legislative committee and is scheduled to be taken up by the state’s House and Senate.
The proposed legislation, according to Eldridge, is “about having the ability to take a couple of days off to get better or to take care of a sick family member. Not being able to do so leads to unhealthy workers and an unproductive workforce.”
In fact, the Institute for Women’s Policy Research argues that implementing paid sick day legislation, as the city of San Francisco has already done, actually saves businesses money.
With sick day benefits in place, workers are more likely to stay at a job and less likely to get coworkers sick, said Kevin Miller, a researcher with the Institute.
He said the industries that are least likely to give sick days include retail, restaurants and construction.
Restaurant and retail industry folks in the area, however, said the issue should be handled at the employer-employee level, not with a government regulation.
Peter Sarmanian, president of Classic Restaurant Concepts, which owns Big Papi’s in Framingham and two other restaurants in Boston and Cambridge, said even with a written policy on how many sick days an employee has, “we’re pretty flexible.”
“We’re all in competition to be good employers,” he said. “If you’re not a good employer offering good benefits, you’re not going to be keeping employees.”
Peter Christie, director of the Southborough-based Massachusetts Restaurant Association, said his board of directors could be in favor of the legislation if it only applied to full-time workers. But, as the legislation is written, it allows any worker to accrue one hour of sick time for every 30 hours worked.
“That’s a logistical nightmare for small businesses,” Christie said.
The restaurant business, he said, is fueled by part-time workers, mostly at small businesses. Tracking employee hours and sick time, he said, would be a regulatory burden for those businesses.
It’s not just restaurants concerned about the issue.
Christopher O’Neill is the CFO of Component Sources International in Westborough. He said the company already offers five sick days per year for employees.
“We have a pretty good policy and it seems to work,” he said.
He and other business owners worry that if additional sick days are mandated they will get abused by workers taking them when they are not actually sick, decreasing productivity.
“This is just one more thing that makes Massachusetts noncompetitive,” he said. “It’s just one more thing to overcome compared to other states.”
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