Incentivizing Sick People to Come to Work Spreads Illness

People should support labor policies such as paid time off based on nothing but concern for their own health and well-being.

“Yeah, I’ve just been feeling really sick this week.”

I pick up my head, looking around to see whom I’ve overheard. Two baristas have struck up a conversation behind the register.

“I don’t know what it is. I almost wasn’t able to come in today,” one says. I turn back, noticing the now empty coffee cup and now half-eaten bagel the sick barista had given me. I push the rest of the bagel to the back of the table.

Improved work conditions are usually spoken about in terms of worker’s rights, of the need for respect and improved quality of life for those working in low wage industries. When arguing in favor of such policies, one is typically asked to empathize with these workers, and to try to understand the impact that such concepts as a living wage or paid time off can have on their individual happiness. This is something we ought to strive for regardless, yet we achieve it far too rarely.

This is perhaps nowhere more clear than on the issue of public health. Food service and grocery store workers are the face of the new labor movement, with employees at McDonald’s and Walmart some of the most visible faces of the “Fight for 15” while other movements are also demanding improvements in the workplace. These are people with whom we all interact, often on a daily basis. These are, in other words, people whose health has a large bearing on the health of the overall population.