Providing for mandatory Statewide employer-paid sick leave for employees and for civil penalties and remedies.
SB13, titled the Healthy Employee and Healthy Workplace Act, would require most employers in Pennsylvania to provide paid sick leave to employees statewide. Employees would begin accruing leave at one hour for every 30 hours worked, with access generally beginning after 30 days of employment and use allowed after 91 days, subject to specified limits. The leave could be used for an employee’s own illness or preventive care, care for a family member, or needs related to abuse, sexual violence, or a public health or public safety emergency.
The bill sets minimum standards for accrual, carryover, notice, documentation, and payment, while allowing employers to satisfy the requirement through an existing paid leave or paid time off policy if it is at least as generous. It also includes anti-retaliation protections, complaint procedures through the Department of Labor and Industry, and civil and administrative remedies for violations. The measure expressly preserves more generous municipal ordinances, existing collective bargaining agreements, and other laws or policies that provide greater leave rights, and it would take effect immediately if enacted.
SB13 would add a new statewide paid sick leave mandate to Pennsylvania law, creating enforceable employer obligations where none currently exist at the state level in the bill text. It would require the Department of Labor and Industry to administer complaints, issue notices/posters, and assess penalties, while also authorizing civil actions by the secretary, the Attorney General, or employees. The bill would affect employers and employees broadly, but it includes exemptions and coordination rules for certain collective bargaining agreements, existing paid leave/PTO policies, and more generous local ordinances or other leave protections.
Based on the bill’s sponsorship and the absence of recorded committee testimony or votes in the provided materials, the available context suggests the measure is being advanced as a worker-protection and public-health policy. The bill’s framing emphasizes healthy families, workplace stability, and access to leave for illness and family care. Because no committee discussion or voting history is included, there is no documented recorded sentiment from debate in the supplied context beyond the bill’s pro-leave policy orientation.
The main points of contention likely concern the cost and administrative burden on employers, especially smaller businesses, versus the benefits of guaranteed paid sick leave for workers. The bill’s detailed enforcement provisions, penalties, and private right of action may also draw scrutiny from employer groups. Another likely issue is the interaction with existing local sick-leave ordinances and collective bargaining agreements: the bill preserves stronger local rules and negotiated benefits, but that structure can still raise questions about preemption, compliance complexity, and whether statewide standards should be mandatory or left to employers and municipalities.