Coronavirus revives paid sick leave bill ignored by Congress for 16 years

Good morning, Broadsheet readers! Harvey Weinstein is getting sentenced, we go inside the collapse of Outdoor Voices, and lawmakers rush to pass paid sick leave legislation. Have a nice Wednesday.

– Paid sick leave push. Five years ago, I wrote that the paid sick leave movement “was on a roll” as more U.S. states passed laws requiring employers to provide the benefit. If the idea had momentum then, it’s rocket-powered now, as the coronavirus outbreak puts in stark, urgent terms the need for a federal policy for paid sick days. A quarter of U.S. workers currently have no access to the benefit as the U.S. remains one of the few developed nations to not guarantee it.

Amid the outbreak, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that the sick stay home. That’s sound advice that’s harder to follow when staying home from work (or keeping a kid home from school) means missing a paycheck. People who contract COVID-19 and still go to work risk spreading the disease to others and exacerbating the outbreak.

Sen. Patty Murray (D–Wash.) and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D–Conn.) have repeatedly pushed a bill for paid sick leave; they first proposed it in 2004 and have reintroduced it in every Congress since. They put out revised legislation on Friday that would require all employers to offer paid sick leave and to provide workers with 14 additional paid sick days in the event of a public health emergency (like the current one), including cover for children’s school closures and a family member’s quarantine.

Murray and DeLauro’s past bills have not gotten far in Congress, but this one seems to stand more of a shot since President Donald Trump is reportedly considering relief for employees who must miss work as part of his response to the growing outbreak.

“No one should face the impossible choice of caring for their health or keeping their paycheck or job, especially when a sudden public health crisis occurs,” DeLauro said in a statement.

Some private firms like Darden Restaurants, McDonald’s, and Instacart have gotten the message in recent days, adopting more generous paid sick leave policies for workers.

Paid sick leave is often mentioned in the same breath as paid parental or family leave and can attract the ‘women’s issue’ label. That association is likely due to women carrying out more caregiving responsibilities in the U.S. and, as such, seeming to benefit more from such wage protections. But the coronavirus crisis has revealed in dramatic fashion the universal need for the policy, underscoring that it doesn’t just help the direct recipient, but aids public health as well. Yet it remains to be seen if Washington will answer this most dire call to action.

Claire Zillman
claire.zillman@fortune.com
@clairezillman

Today’s Broadsheet was produced by Emma Hinchliffe.

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