this post was submitted on 21 Oct 2023
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Good god is that illegal in Europe. Employees are entitled to sick pay if they're sick, if no reason other than to ensure they don't come into the office and get everyone else ill as well. Also employees are actually required to take holiday pay, last year I got called into a meeting and got told I had to take more holidays because I wasn't taking enough.
Again illegal in Europe, PTO and sick pay are independent of each other. There's no limit on the number of sick days you can have, although if you go beyond a certain number you do require a doctor's note, but as long as you have that you're golden. In theory this is abusable, but because everyone gets PTO anyway, and actually get a decent number of days, there isn't really the incentive to do that.
It's bizarre the way the United States operates.
Two jobs ago (in the States) my employer was extremely stingy with any paid time away from work.
I got six days. Total. (Not counting holidays.)
Six days for any and all purposes that one might need to not be in the office.
They even had the gall to say they offered sick days, "because you can use your PTO to stay home when you're sick".
Fuck that.
I came to work no matter how sick I was. I knew exactly how much I made in a day, and as soon as my boss or anyone else would complain about how I shouldn't be there, I'd ask them if they were willing to pay me my daily wage to go home. Because I only got six days, so fuck me if I was going to use any of them for anything other than my own enjoyment. If I was sick, I was miserable and less productive anyway, might as well get paid for that, and not burn any of my precious PTO.
On one occasion, I was so sick my boss actually agreed to send me home and pay the rest of my day without taking PTO...but of course the stingy bastard couldn't just give people more sick days.
Huh. Similar thing in post-Soviet with vacations. If you are not taking vacations for too long, employer will get nervous, if you are not taking vacations for two years, employer required to send you to vacation no matter what.
Also what is holiday pay? Quick search says that it is extra pay for working during holidays. Well, here holidays are non-working days, so working during them counts as overtime.
Overtime is 1.5x the hourly wage in the U.S. This is federal law.
Holiday pay is usually 2-2.5x the hourly wage if the company requires people to work on set holidays. If it's a day off, then it's paid as PTO. This is not required by federal law but some states have requirements.
Shitty companies that view employees as costs, don't pay Holiday pay. Around 20% of the workforce.
Good companies that view employees as assets have policies to keep employees. Like my companies most recent e-mail about the holiday schedule.
Fo some reason have zero issues with recruiting good staff and keeping them.
Here regular overtime is at least 1.5x for under 2 hours, 2x for over.
Holiday time paid at least 2x or 1x if employee chooses to add day to PTO(which in practice I never heard anyone did).
Both are in federal law too.
Huh. I always assumed holiday pay was also 1.5x. I haven't had many chances to earn it. I'm pretty sure it was at my last job. I haven't found out about my current job yet.
In the US for every employer I've seen, holiday pay is usually 8 hours of straight time (assuming you have an 8 hour shift) plus 1.5x for the hours you worked. So if you worked your normal 8 hour shift you get 2.5x pay. But it's not. If you worked less then 8 you get 8 hours straight plus 1.5x the hours you worked. It's also common that if you worked 40 hours before the holiday that straight time becomes overtime. Usually only applies to Thanksgiving/black friday. And occasionally Christmas when it falls towards the end of the week.
Needless to say this varies among employers. If you have a union you likely get double or even triple time for hours worked on a holiday, but likely still the same straight time pay for the day itself. Legally the company doesn't have to pay anything extra for holidays for time not worked.
It's literally you just being paid even though you're not working. Employers are required to do it in Europe. The pay is the same rate as if you were working but it's got a different name for tax purposes so companies can differentiate between employees being compensated for working and employees just being paid to be off.
Also you have what are called "unsociable working hours compensation" Which means nights, and weekends. And "unsociable working dates compensation" which means national holidays.
Unsociable working hours is usually 1.5x base rate, and unsocial working dates is 2x base rate. So a night shift over the Christmas period would be both so it would be 2.5x base rate. So in other words if you work for 1 hour, you get paid as if you'd worked 2 hours 30 minutes.
The United States operates a different system and companies can get out of it sometimes which isn't really possible in Europe.