If a few hundred dollars topples your whole business plan–like some of you are claiming–then you truly are lousy at business management. You should close up shop and stop wasting space in the mall or wherever you are.

Paid sick leave makes sense – some do abuse it, just like they sometimes abuse emergency rooms for non-emergencies. I feel it's safer to have a sick person stay home rather than spread illness. If it helps keep people honest, require a doctor's note for absences of more than 3 days.

I agree that hiring and training a new employee is far more costly than losing good employees because they can't afford to work for you. And if sick leave is abused, then that employee may not be worth keeping, and can be grounds for termination.

When the minimum wage was increased in Illinois to 7.50 per hour, we did what we had to stay competitive with our out of state competitors: We had to let our three employees go. My wife and I now do all of the work. That is government not having a clue about economics and how small business works.

The government is not attempting to collect more dollars from all of us to head of this unavoidable financial crisis. All governments from local to federal have one theme in mind…collect as much tax as possible from each citizen. When you are on sick leave you are not paying taxes! We do not have a national health care plan due to the simple fact that all the people working just for health benefits will then quit! They no longer would be on the tax paying rolls for government. College graduates could take time off before their careers begin under a national healyh plan to enjoy life. However, they would not be paying taxes to the government!!!!

Bottom line….your only function is to make money and give a huge portion to the government. They have no use for you(with the exception of being a soldier) if you are NOT paying taxes. DO NOT TAKE ANY DAYS OFF FROM WORK! It costs all the really smart people we sent to D.C. money. HAHA!

First, the sick leave doesn't kick in until after a person has been employed a year. A year is a nice period of time for you to determine if your employee is reliable enough to keep around. Second, part time employees accrue time more slowly than full time, so a person working 20 hours a week will earn a whopping 1.5 sick days per year.

People already get sick and miss work. The only difference is that, under the new law, your loyal and reliable employees (full time, worked with you over a year) will be paid for 3 of those sick days per year. Lets say you have a municiple mandated minimum wage of $10/hr for 8 hours a day. That means that a worked will receive a maximum of 24 hours of paid leave, costing you $240 plus taxes (which are partially offset by the tax deduction you get for paying income). If $240 per year is too much to pay for a loyal and reliable employee, I dare say that you may want to rethink your management strategy.

Look at the lists of best places to work. The ones most highly rated by their their employees are the ones that have perks like better time off policies. They aren't even the highest paying employers, but their perks like that make up the difference.

I would also add for those employers who think your employees are out to screw you by taking a sick day: If your business is that marginal, maybe you shouldn't be in business.

In regards to Susan's comments about being a Small Business Owner you are correct that your work is required for the company to make money. BUT that is one of the risks you took when you started your company. You knew that going into this. I applaud your courage to start an enterprise but that is part of the benefits of working for yourself.

There was a time when employers were 'loyal' to employees by providing excellent health-care, pensions, vacation-time, and sick-days. There was a healthy balance between the amount of profit made at the cost of their employees. Employees in return, were steadfastly loyal to their employers.

Today, we have companies, even small ones, where the top dogs earn millions a year, get millions more when they get fired after screwing the company into the ground, and these same employers skimp and cut every possible corner/'benefit' to the disadvantage of their employees. If you want health-care, you'd better be ready to pay a hefty portion of the cost, plus co-pays. Time off is now PTO, and total number of days allowed has been reduced in the process. Pension? What's a pension? The new-deal is, if you want to be able to retire and survive, you're on your own to save and invest for yourself.

I'm a 20-year retired Air Force Veteran. I have family in Quebec, Canada, and lived three years in Europe. Member nations of the EC all provide six (6) full weeks of paid vacation as well as at least five or more sick-days per year, by LAW. These countries also have very effective socialized medicine. Pensions are provided at the 'federal' level and provide for a very good retirement, as well as security. These countries are all very financially viable.

If the U.S. wants to seen as a true leader/success in the eyes of the world, we HAVE to enact Federal legislation to force employers to take care of their employees and get away from just looking at profit-margins. It's apparent that U.S. employers effectively don't give a crap about their employees anymore, including Congress for the veterans. Personally, my pension from the Air Force was CUT by nearly $450/monthly, retroactively years after I had enlisted.

Even though I'm a retired vet, I don't have that much pride in my country anymore.