Doing the Right Thing in a Time of Crisis Doesn’t Have To Be So Hard.

It might even result in customer devotion and employee loyalty.

Many businesses that rely on low-wage labor are “double-crossing” the public and their employees to preserve profits or stave off insolvency. On March 14, 2020, the New York Times article entitled “The Companies Putting Profits Ahead of Public Health, “the Editorial Board of the New York Times, states that “As the coronavirus spreads, the public interest requires employers to abandon their longstanding resistance to paid sick leave.” Essentially the article argues that companies must agree to pay workers for sick leave while they are out of work sick. This action is especially crucial in times like these because many workers who don’t have paid sick leave often come to work ill and risk making others sick by doing so. These workers can’t afford to take a day off if they are sick, so they come to work even though they are suffering, to get a paycheck.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported in 2014 that 20 percent of food service workers had come to work at least once in the previous year, “while sick with vomiting or diarrhea.”

It’s not just the food service workers that don’t get paid sick leave. “The Shift Work,” a nationwide survey conducted by sociologists Daniel Schneider of the University of California, Berkeley, and Kristen Harknett of the University of California, San Francisco, showed that workers at major supermarket chains, retailers, and large restaurant chains do not receive paid sick leave as well. The list of companies that do not offer their low-wage employees paid sick leave contains some of the biggest names in the retail, supermarket, and restaurant chains in business today.

Several large companies have recently announced that they will offer a temporary change to their policy to provide paid sick leave during this crisis. Additionally, President Trump signed a relief package on Wednesday, March 18, 2020, to provide sick leave, unemployment benefits, free coronavirus testing, and food and medical aid to people affected by the pandemic. However, even with these recent announcements, these efforts are only temporary. In this article, I’ll explain why this is such a big problem for businesses, their workers, and their customers.

Stress and the immune system

The coronavirus hysteria and the fear of getting sick are enough to stress anyone out. Still, the thought of not being paid because you are sick is another level of stress altogether. To understand how this can compound the spread of viral infections, we must look at how stress affects our bodies. All animals handle stress in the same way. When we face stress, actual or perceived, we either fight back or flee from the danger. This reaction is often called our fight-or-flight response. During this response to a threat, our body will shut down the functions that use energy to use that energy for the fight-or-flight response.

Interestingly, in the short term, this can boost our immune system, but if the stress lasts a long time, it has the opposite effect and can cause immune suppression. This is where being human becomes a problem. Most animals can turn off their fight-or-flight reaction after the stressing event is over. However, we humans tend to ruminate or continuously worry about past events or think about what could happen in the future, like how will we pay our bills if we get sick. This rumination causes our bodies to continually trigger our fight-or-flight response and potentially lower our immune system’s ability to fight off infectious disease.

Robert Sapolsky, the Stanford University Endocrinologist and stress expert, states that over time, continually activating the stress response may interfere with the immune system. How this affects your disease risk, Sapolsky suggests, depends on your risk factors and your lifestyle, including your degree of social support.

If a company’s workers are sick and can’t work, the company losses productivity. You would think that companies would want to create an environment where their employees felt safe and didn’t have to worry about how they were going to pay their bills if they fell ill. To add further evidence to the case for paying employees to stay home when they are sick, a recent study by the University of Pittsburg’s Department of Epidemiology showed that paying sick workers to stay home reduced the spread of influenza.

Why Not Pay for Sick Leave?

Thinking about all of this, I started to wonder why companies still do not pay their low-wage employees paid sick leave. I’ve been told by business leaders that “our people are our greatest resource.” If this is true, then why don’t they pay them when they are sick so that they can stay home and get well before returning to work?

I’ve heard many business leaders argue that they can’t afford to pay their workers paid sick leave and is a longstanding belief that I have fallen for in the past. My thoughts were that if the business owner or leader says it’s too expensive, then it must be true. However, after researching the subject, I believe companies can’t afford not to pay their workers for sick leave. Plenty of profitable companies offer their hourly workers paid sick leave. And, in 13 states in the US, paid sick leave is required by law.

Another study by the National Bureau of Economic Research reported that paid sick leave cost employers 2.7 cents per hour per employee. This expense doesn’t seem to be something that would drive a company to be unprofitable. It’s also one-sided; it doesn’t consider the losses due to lower productivity caused by workers being out of work sick. So, if it’s not the cost of paying the sick workers, then what is it? I can’t help but think that this is an effort to preserve profits. By not paying their employees this 2.7 cents per hour per worker, that cost goes directly to their bottom line.

What these companies are saying is that their profits are more important than their employee’s and customer’s health. They are double-crossing them by telling us that their employees are their “greatest resource” and that their customers are their “number one priority,” but making choices that only benefit their bottom line.

Getting it Right

During times of crisis, we see the best and worst of people and businesses. Recently many large retail companies have put statements out about how they intend to close stores to curb the spread of COVID-19. Additionally, some have stated that they intend to continue to pay their employees while the stores remain closed. These are great examples of how some companies understand that doing the right thing even in tough times is essential. When it comes to the health of their employees and customers, there should be no questions about what they should do.

A shining example of how one company made the right decision in a time of crisis was during the terrorist attacks on Mumbai that began on November 26, 2008. One of the targets of the attacks was the Taj Mahal Palace and Towers. In a NY Times article entitled “Our Hotel Was Attacked,” Raymond Bickson, the hotel’s Chief Executive, stated, “While reopening the hotel was important, our first response was to our fellow employees and guests. Within 24 hours of the attack, we set up five outreach centers for our associates and guests. We had 15 experts in post-trauma counseling talking with people individually and in small groups. It’s a process that will continue for quite some time.” Additionally, the hotel owners decided to pay their employees while the hotel was being rebuilt.

Conclusions

To slow the spread of COVID-19, we can’t afford to have people going to work sick and risk spreading the illness. The pandemic that we are facing is scary. There will be many changes to our way of life as a result of this pandemic. People are getting sick, laid off, and the world economy is suffering.

There are, however, countless stories of health care workers that risk their health to help others that are sick and companies that are taking care of their employees and customers. I hope that we learn from Executives like Mr. Bickson and other leaders who have done the right thing during times of crisis and not hide behind the excuse of having a “duty” to the shareholders to make the most money that they can for them. I know that not all companies can pay their employees while they close stores or reduce operating hours, but one thing we can agree on is that we should change the long-standing belief that we can’t afford to pay employees for sick leave. We can’t afford to have them come to work ill, and no one should have to worry about how they are going to pay their bills if they do become sick.

What will be the reward for these companies that do the right thing? If the Taj Mahal Palace is any indication, it will result in customers’ enduring devotion and your employees’ undying loyalty and the profits that come with it.

References:

The Immune System and Stress. https://consumer.healthday.com/encyclopedia/stress-management-37/stress-health-news-640/the-immune-system-and-stress-645924.html

Our Hotel Was Attacked — The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/08/jobs/08boss.html

Opinion | The Companies Putting Profits Ahead of Public …. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/14/opinion/sunday/coronavirus-paid-sick-leave.html

Kumar S1, Grefenstette JJ, Galloway D, Albert SM, Burke DS. Policies to Reduce Influenza in the Workplace: Impact Assessments Using an Agent-Based Model. Am J Public Health. 2013 Aug;103(8):1406–11.