Masuda Funai Employment Newsflash - Sick of State and Local Paid Sick Leave

For employers with employees in multiple states or cities, designing a uniform paid sick leave policy that treats all employees equally is often the hardest part of updating an employee handbook. State and local paid sick leave laws often have different eligibility, accrual, usage, notice, and carryover requirements. Currently, about twenty-two states have a paid sick leave requirement. In addition, various cities and towns within these same states may have their own paid sick leave requirements. For example, California has a state-level paid sick leave law and several cities within California have their own paid sick leave laws that provide greater benefits. 

Although the goal in updating an employee handbook is often to design a paid sick leave policy that complies with the most favorable paid sick leave law where employees work, it’s not uncommon for employers to become frustrated by the process of trying to design a uniform policy. To save time, they might develop individual state-level paid sick leave supplements for insertion into the handbook.

When updating an employee handbook, the following states’ paid sick leave laws should be reviewed along with any city or towns within these states.