Kabateck also criticized the state for setting a poor example by exempting in-home care workers, who are public employees, while requiring all private-sector employers in the state to comply. “That’s outrageous,” Kabateck said. “It’s a classic example of double standards and hypocrisy in Sacramento.”
In fact, a late amendment was added to the bill to exempt state-funded in-home healthcare providers because including them would have cost the state $106 million annually. “That’s an admission of the fact that this [law] is a burden,” Jose Villa, a member of the National Federation of Independent Businesses California Leadership Council and president of an advertising agency in downtown Los Angeles, told the Los Angeles Times, noting that that burden could disproportionately affect small business in the state.
Villa, whose business employs more than 40 people, told the publication that he already provides paid leave time because the market dictates it and workers expect it. But he said he’s annoyed that the state will now tell him how he should account for and credit those hours. Villa also said he was concerned that the law created a liability for business owners. Employers could face fines of up to $4,000 per day for withholding paid sick leave or violating the bill’s requirements.
Workers taking time off because of an illness was never a “real issue,” Jot Condie, president and chief executive of the California Restaurants Association, told the San Francisco Chronicle. He said that said flexible scheduling or shift swapping in the food-service industry enables employees to take off when they need it without penalty. The state’s requirement adds an unnecessary expense for businesses, he said.