Since Working Families United for New Jersey, Inc. (WFUNJ) began the campaign for earned sick days, we have not only made incredible progress in our state, but also helped raise the issue to national prominence.

The success of our efforts were most recently affirmed by President Obama’s signing of an Executive Order that requires federal contractors to offer their employees up to seven paid sick days a year. The White House reports that this could benefit more than 300,000 workers out of about 44 million Americans that still lack access to this basic workplace right.

On behalf of the over 256 religious, labor, community, civil rights, student, progressive, women, and retirees groups, that make up Working Families United for New Jersey, Inc. we thank President Obama for his leadership in bringing us one step closer to correcting the injustice of workers who lack earned sick days.

Despite having the world’s largest economy, the United States is one of the only advanced countries that does not guarantee paid sick days to all workers. There is simply no excuse for failing to provide all workers with access to earned sick days. Furthermore, arguments that it places an undue burden on businesses has been proven wrong time and time again. In fact companies and governments that have adopted this measure report increased worker productivity and morale levels as well as reduced turnover and training costs.

As always, we thank all of our coalition partners who continue to make the case to provide earned sick days to the approximately 1.2 million workers in New Jersey who still lack this basic workplace standard. This is a problem that directly affects one in three New Jersey workers as well as impacts public health.

With your continued support, we will succeed in achieving a statewide earned sick days law, and enact a critical workplace standard that will benefit millions of New Jerseyans inside and outside of the workplace.