Obama has moved to expand paid-sick-leave policies for federal employees and has expressed support for the federal Healthy Families Act, first proposed in 2009, which would allow employees to earn up to seven paid-sick-leave days per year.

Business leaders cautious about new mandates

Business groups have generally opposed new mandates on paid sick leave. In some cases, business groups have gone to court to stop such laws from going into effect. In others, they have lobbied hard against the mandates. A group of 18 Vermont business associations recently wrote an open letter to the Vermont House of Representatives opposing a paid sick leave law (H.R. 187) currently being considered.

"As a one-size-fits-all approach, H.187 and any similar legislation would inevitably impose unwarranted expenses increasing the cost of employing Vermonters," the letter said. "Moreover, employers need the continued flexibility to determine benefits that appeal to their workforce and that they can afford."

Lisa Horn, director of congressional affairs at the Society for Human Resource Management, says her group recognizes the value of paid time off for workers.

"We think businesses need to be able to do that on a voluntary basis, in a way that meets the needs of their individual workforce," she says. "We feel these efforts to mandate paid time off is frankly the wrong approach."

Paid time off — a more flexible option

According to Horn, many companies are now offering paid time off, instead of the traditional dual option of paid vacation and paid sick leave. With paid time off, employees are given a set number of paid leave days, and they can use them as they choose.

Horn said the added flexibility of such an arrangement is popular with both employers and employees. "Employers can get out of the role of 'sick day police,'" she says. "Employees don't care what it's called; they just want some predictability about [their paid time off]."

Many who caution against mandates for paid sick leave note that it's not unusual for companies to offer more options for paid time off than the legislative solutions would create. They fear that by enacting a government-sanctioned standard, companies may just adopt that standard, in effect reducing the number of options for employees.

Juanita Phillips, director of human resources at Huntsville, Alabama, based Intuitive Research and Technology, says her company offers a range of paid-time-off options, and fears that legislative mandates could hamper innovation in this area.

"The difficulty with managing this legislatively is that it may bring up some people on the bottom, but it brings down a company that's trying to do a lot of things in a flexible way," she says. "My difficulty is not people running out of leave; my trouble is getting them to use what they have."

Voter support for new laws

The opposition from the business community has had some effect, but there seems to be strong popular support for at least some of the paid sick leave initiatives.

Last November, 60 percent of Massachusetts voters approved a referendum calling for a statewide paid sick leave law. In Oakland, California, 81 percent of voters approved a paid sick leave law. And a national study by the University of Chicago found that 86 percent of those surveyed supported legislation to mandate paid sick leave.

Sherry Leiwant, co-president and co-founder of A Better Balance: The Work & Family Legal Center, said her group has been advocating family-friendly work policies for almost 10 years. Paid sick leave, she said, is an issue whose time has come.

"When people realize that about 40 percent of the private workforce doesn't have a single day of paid sick time, it makes a lot of workers who do have it think, 'That's just not right,'" she said. "It's a fairness issue; it's a public health issue. It just should be a basic minimum benefit, like the minimum wage."

Leiwant rejects the argument that paid-sick-leave laws will hurt companies that offer paid time off or other flexible leave arrangements.

"I don't think it's that complicated," she says. "It's very easy for businesses to adapt to; workers earn one hour for every 30 worked. Every law that we pass says quite clearly that if there's PTO, or any other kind of paid time off for illness, that counts."

The law wouldn't cut back on other arrangements after the minimum paid sick time requirement is met, she adds.

Data on the effect of paid-sick-leave laws are spotty, but at least one study finds minimal negative effect for businesses. The Center for Economic and Policy Research published a report in 2014 that said Connecticut's paid-sick-leave law created real benefits for workers while limiting the burden on employers. "This path-breaking legislation has brought paid sick leave to tens of thousands of Connecticut workers, with modest effects or none at all on the state's businesses," the study found.

The problem of part-time workers

The changing realities of the post-recession economy in the United States also are playing a role in the debate, researchers say.

Ken Matos, senior director of research at the New York-based Families and Work Institute, says that a recent study by his group and SHRM found that the vast majority of employers have some type of paid time off—for full-time employees. But only a third of employers provide that benefit to part-time workers.

That matters, Matos says, because an increasing percentage of the workforce is depending on one or more part-time jobs to provide for their families. "Previously, the concept of the part-time job was something you did on the side. You were getting your benefit from another job, or from a spouse or partner," he says. The increasing number of people who have only part-time jobs is creating new problems, he adds.

"As employers are thinking about using part-time workers or contingent workers … they should be thinking about how that's going to play out," he says. "They need to establish their own policies or procedures that make sure people's lives are cared for as employees."

Next steps on paid sick leave

Leiwant said that with gridlock in Washington, it's unlikely a federal paid-sick-leave law will pass any time soon. But she says her group and others will continue to push for local and state laws.

"We'd love to see statewide bills passed," she says, but added that most of the action has been with city policymakers. "Cities tend to understand there's a real public health problem," she says. "I'm a believer in home rule if a locality wants to do something."

For those who question the need for paid-sick-leave laws, it's worth noting that state legislatures have moved in some cases to block local communities from passing such laws. A recent article in Fortune noted that 11 states have passed laws banning municipalities from passing paid-sick-leave mandates.