Obama Begins Push to Guarantee Paid Sick Leave for Millions

Official White House Photo by Pete Souza(BALTIMORE) — President Obama began his effort to expand sick leave for U.S. workers with a memorandum Thursday mandating federal agencies to give a maximum of six weeks paid leave to employees upon the birth or adoption of a child.

And Obama says he’s just getting started.

On a lunchtime visit to Baltimore’s Charmington’s Café, whose owner supports an increase in the hourly minimum wage, Obama outlined proposals to give part-time workers paid sick leave as well as $2.2 billion in grants to states and cities to implement their own policies.

With an estimated 43 million workers not entitled to sick leave, the president says that puts people in the unenviable position of “having to choose to be able to buy groceries or pay the rent, or look after themselves or their children.”

Meanwhile, Alabama Republican Congresswoman Martha Roby said Thursday said that she would renew her push for Congress to pass the Working Families Flexibility Act.  Under the bill, Roby said workers could take legally mandated overtime as compensatory time.

The White House, Democrats and labor unions, however, contend the WFFA can easily be abused by employers, giving them the opportunity to force workers into taking time off rather than getting paid.

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