When Joan Van is sick, she is not paid.
The East St. Louis-area restaurant server and single mother of three said she worked double-duty to earn money when she or one of her children fell ill.
“You can’t let your kids see you breaking down because you’re tired and exhausted, because you have to keep pushing. You have to. And if you don’t, then who’s going to?” she says .
She may not have long to do so. Expansive paid vacation legislation requiring Illinois employers to grant workers time off based on hours worked, to be used for any reason, is set for action by Democratic Gov. JB Pritzker, who has declared that he would sign it.
Requiring paid vacation is rare in the United States – only Maine and Nevada have similar laws – although common in other industrialized countries.
Fourteen states and Washington, DC, require employers to provide paid sick leave through similar laws, though employees can only use it for health issues. What sets the new Illinois law apart is that workers will not have to explain the reason for their absence as long as they provide notice in accordance with the employer’s reasonable standards.
Maine and Nevada also allow workers to decide how to use their time, but substantial exemptions apply. Maine’s paid vacation law only applies to employers with more than 10 employees, and Nevada’s exempts companies with fewer than 50. Illinois will affect nearly all employees and has no limit in depending on the size of the company.
Seasonal workers such as lifeguards will be exempt, as will federal employees or college students who work part-time temporary jobs for their university.
The legislation would come into effect on January 1, 2024. Employees will accrue one hour of paid leave for every 40 hours worked up to 40 hours in total, although the employer can offer more. Employees can start using time once they have worked for 90 days.
“Working families face enough challenges without fear of losing a day’s wages when life gets in their way,” Pritzker said on Jan. 11, when the bill passed both houses.
The Cook County and Chicago ordinances already require employers to provide paid sick leave, and workers in those locations will continue to be covered under existing laws rather than the new bill.
Johnae Strong, an administrative worker at a small media company in Chicago, said paid sick leave helps her care for her two children, a 10-year-old and a 6-year-old. But it would be useful to extend the time to use for some reason.
“Life happens,” she said, adding that she hopes Chicago updates its law to make it more flexible, like the state bill.
The Chicago and Cook County ordinances served as pilot programs for statewide legislation and appeased critics who predicted mass business closings that did not materialize, a said Sarah Labadie, director of advocacy and policy at Women Employed, a nonprofit that has fought for paid leave since 2008 and helped pass the legislation.
“Obviously, weird things happened during the pandemic, but before the pandemic, that wasn’t the case. Chicago was a thriving economic engine,” she said.
Peoria Democratic Rep. Jehan Gordon-Booth sponsored the bill, which she said will “help uplift working families” and “immediately help people.”
Newly elected House Republican Leader Tony McCombie said the mandatory benefits could have a “detrimental effect” on small businesses and nonprofits “in an already hostile business climate.”
“We all want a great work environment with a fair work/life balance,” she said in an emailed statement. “However, Senate Bill 208 has not addressed the concerns of those who provide this work environment.”
For Leslie Allison-Seei, who runs a lottery promotion and management company with her husband in DuPage County, taking care of their three full-time employees is a priority, but it’s “difficult” to compete with the Company paid vacation policies.
“We are delighted that this has passed and that it has been signed. But it’s also kind of scary because, you know, a week’s worth of time — I don’t know what that would do for our business,” Allison-Seei said. “I think a lot of companies are doing their best to stay afloat.”
Small business advocacy organisation, the National Federation of Independent Businesses, opposes the bill, saying it “imposes a single mandate on all employers”.
Small business owners are facing high inflation, rising fuel and energy costs and a lack of skilled workers, and the requirement will be an “additional burden”, said the director of the NFIB State Chris Davis in a statement after the bill passed. “The message from Illinois lawmakers is loud and clear: ‘Your small business isn’t essential. “”
However, the potential burden on small businesses comes up against the needs of their workers, especially those with children.
Van, a parenting manager with Community Organizing and Family Issues, said she doesn’t have paid leave until she’s worked for a year. Knowing that she will miss a payday when she or one of her children falls ill is a constant stress for Belleville’s mother, but the guaranteed PTO “would be great”, giving her peace of mind and alleviating some financial worries.
Molly Weston Williamson, a paid leave policy expert and senior fellow at the Center for American Progress think tank, called the Illinois legislation a “big step in the right direction.”
In addition to establishing the right of workers to paid time off, the bill prohibits employers from retaliating against employees for using it. That’s key to making sure “low-income workers or other more vulnerable people are really, practically able to make the time,” Williamson said.
Paid leave is both a labor rights issue and a public health issue, Williamson said. Service workers like Van who handle food and beverage without paid time off are more likely to go to work sick and send their kids to daycare sick, “then they make everyone sick “, she said.
“Especially now that we’ve been in a global pandemic for over three years, I think we all have a much more visceral understanding of how all of our health is linked,” Williamson said.
NBC Chicago
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