Castanet

https://www.castanet.net/news/BC/264783 ... sick-in-BC

Across the board, public sector employees are sick more often than private sector. Big surprise?

^Sick time is negotiated into the contract. Employees PAY part of their wages into their sick time benefit. Meaning it is an employee paid for benefit.

BTW: Because it is negotiated and ratified by both employees and management, there is NOTHING untoward about it. This has been debated time and time again. Give it up.

flamingfingers wrote:^Sick time is negotiated into the contract. Employees PAY part of their wages into their sick time benefit. Meaning it is an employee paid for benefit.

BTW: Because it is negotiated and ratified by both employees and management, there is NOTHING untoward about it. This has been debated time and time again. Give it up.

Yeah, right, workers "negotiate" that they are gonna be sick 10 days this year, and pay for it themselves. Now I've heard everything!

^^Yes, they do negotiate a standard number of paid sick leave days which they can bank from year to year in case of a devastating illness, or which they can use to contribute to top up other members who suffer a long term illness. However, at the end of their employment, they are not allowed to receive a cash-out of their banked sick leave. I appreciate the fact you are staunch anti-union; however, you do not seem to comprehend the nuts and bolts of negotiated contracts.

not many places allow you to bank them anymore its use them or lose em hence the reason people use them

On the most part i don't think it is because they are sick more often but more that people are like me and can not afford to take a day off when they are sick because they don't get paid for it. I work many days sick i have no choice or my kids don't eat.But i do know there is some government works who take days off just because they can and get paid for it such as my ex wife did all the time..

Froskii wrote:On the most part i don't think it is because they are sick more often but more that people are like me and can not afford to take a day off when they are sick because they don't get paid for it. I work many days sick i have no choice or my kids don't eat.But i do know there is some government works who take days off just because they can and get paid for it such as my ex wife did all the time..

Yep. They paid for it themselves. Pity you are forced to go to work when you are sick....probably not very effective and probably share your virus around to your co-workers/customers, but such is the travail of the private sector workers.

I’ve heard some parts of B.C. government can be awful to work for. Maybe the employees need all of the sick days they can get.

TerriJ73 wrote:https://www.castanet.net/news/BC/264783/Workers-not-as-sick-in-BC

Across the board, public sector employees are sick more often than private sector. Big surprise?

It's a big surprise to me. I went to work many days sick because I wanted to save my sick days in case I needed them for something worse. After ten years, it happened, and I needed them. But I had to get my Association Rep to go to bat for me, they were going to try and short change me. I was in absolutely no condition to work and too sick to even fill out the paper work. So please don't make presumptions about people in general.

God forbid people take a sick day once in a while that they paid for.

Some employers, such as mine, don't give you X days per year, but you do accrue a small amount of it each pay period. Our sick time is expressed in hours, not days, as we work varying shift lengths. It can grow to quite a large amount if you never use it, but it does cap out at a point.

One of my co-workers, who in 15+ years on the job had virtually never taken a day off sick, had a devastating fall at home...broken bones and the whole deal. He had enough sick time to cover his entire three month recovery.

Incidentally, our sick time pays out at 80% of our wage.

I would say that employees who have paid sick leave generally would take more sick days than those who don't. It seems obvious to me.

Even Steven wrote:God forbid people take a sick day once in a while that they paid for.

I think the concern is more one of faking being sick, simply to have a day off with pay, or conveniently falling ill on the Friday of a Monday holiday long weekend.

I'm also not buying FF's contention that the employees pay for these sick days. They may be contributing a pittance but I highly doubt they are paying in the same amount as they get out.

JayByrd wrote:Some employers, such as mine, don't give you X days per year, but you do accrue a small amount of it each pay period. Our sick time is expressed in hours, not days, as we work varying shift lengths. It can grow to quite a large amount if you never use it, but it does cap out at a point.

One of my co-workers, who in 15+ years on the job had virtually never taken a day off sick, had a devastating fall at home...broken bones and the whole deal. He had enough sick time to cover his entire three month recovery.

Incidentally, our sick time pays out at 80% of our wage.

I would say that employees who have paid sick leave generally would take more sick days than those who don't. It seems obvious to me.

Is this typical for government?

flamingfingers wrote:^^Yes, they do negotiate a standard number of paid sick leave days which they can bank from year to year in case of a devastating illness, or which they can use to contribute to top up other members who suffer a long term illness. However, at the end of their employment, they are not allowed to receive a cash-out of their banked sick leave. I appreciate the fact you are staunch anti-union; however, you do not seem to comprehend the nuts and bolts of negotiated contracts.

I clearly comprehend the nuts part . Just not sure if its the union or the government.
Wait a sec … government .. I take that back! NDP/G are in power it should read "totally nuts"!

Urban Cowboy wrote:I think the concern is more one of faking being sick, simply to have a day off with pay, or conveniently falling ill on the Friday of a Monday holiday long weekend.

I'm also not buying FF's contention that the employees pay for these sick days. They may be contributing a pittance but I highly doubt they are paying in the same amount as they get out.

So what? Heaven forbid someone take a bit of time to have a life. I don't understand this race to the bottom mentality. Life is for living, work is just one part of it.