Paid Sick Days

July 28, 2010

The legislative session is over in Maine. It came to a close in April, and while the session came to a close during one of the warmest springs on record, unfortunately lawmakers legislature left workers out in the cold . That’s because they once again failed to pass L.D. 1665, a bill that would...

MomsRising Together

Laura Harper

Paid Sick Days

July 28, 2010

North Carolina workers aren’t alone in their desperate struggle to balance the competing demands of work and family. Half of North Carolina’s private sector workers— 1.6 million to be precise —lack a single paid sick day to care for themselves or a sick family member. Here is the great Tar Heel...

MomsRising Together

Louisa Warren

Paid Sick Days Blog Carnivals

July 28, 2010

Every day in the United States, more workers than many of us imagine face an impossible choice: go to work sick, or forgo a paycheck and risk job loss or workplace discipline. More than 40 million private sector workers in this country do not have access to even a single paid sick day. And when it...

MomsRising Together

Vicki Shabo

Paid Sick Days

July 28, 2010

Here at the Maine Women’s Lobby, we’ve been researching family leave insurance for nearly ten years. It’s passed in three other states (California, Washington, and New Jersey), and many more are actively working on legislation. Right now, in Maine, when working families welcome a new baby or face a...

MomsRising Together

Laura Harper

Paid Sick Days Blog Carnivals

July 28, 2010

My name is Tasha West-Baker, I am 34 years old. I am a mother of three, my kids range in age from 15-10. I am a cashier at one of the largest grocery chains in the United States (Safeway); I have worked for this company for the past seven years, which in the grocery industry is a long time. Thanks...

MomsRising Together

Tasha West-Baker

Paid Sick Days Blog Carnivals

July 28, 2010

(Looking for a fourth reason? It’s good for you and your family.) We can all agree that when people are sick, the best place for them to be is home or in the hospital in order to get the care they need and prevent the spread of illness. But in Pennsylvania, 46 percent of all workers have no access...

MomsRising Together

Kathleen Scully

Paid Sick Days Blog Carnivals

July 28, 2010

In the advocacy world, talking points to support paid sick days have been developed to fit every constituency: To appeal to working parents, labor and women’s advocates, you might highlight the fact that paid sick days are a modern necessity in a society where many families have both parents in the...

MomsRising Together

Megan Curran

Paid Sick Days Blog Carnivals

July 28, 2010

We need federal legislation like the Healthy Families Act to guarantee paid sick time to all working Americans. But it’s possible to make significant progress even when Congress is slow to act. States and cities across the nation can take action independently to ensure that their own residents can...

MomsRising Together

John Petro

Paid Sick Days Blog Carnivals

July 28, 2010

It’s summer -- a time for neighborhood barbeques, family road trips, lazy and hazy days. Summer fun is an American tradition, reminding us that we all occasionally need a break from the stresses and challenges of our lives. Summer is a perfect time to remind ourselves that low-wage working women...

MomsRising Together

Linda Meric

Paid Sick Days Blog Carnivals

July 28, 2010

“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.” -Mahatma Gandhi It wasn’t long ago that paid sick days didn’t register even a blip on the political radar. Outside the offices of a few dedicated policy wonks, it was virtually a non-issue. The problem was already...

MomsRising Together

Joe Dinkin