No commentary on my part about this particular regulation. But when I see this I wonder how much money Austin is throwing a way getting sued over this stuff.
Austin will be consumed by Texas eventually, it seems.
COA is very fiscally irresponsible. Tax revenue is much higher over the past several years and like most, they spend beyond their means creating future obligations. It will be interesting to see how they behave when an economic contraction is upon us. All we have to do is look back to '09. I believe these days are not too far in the future and they will have learned/prepared very little.
It’s a shame that Austin is put into the position of spending tax dollars to fight to do the right thing …
I think the question comes down to more of how much of a regulated market do we need. I agree it is the right thing and as a small business owner we actively encourage people to stay home when sick. It is often harder than you think! Peoples work ethic or competitiveness often makes them feel like they should “tough it out” and come in. In our case it hasn’t been a case that the person would not be paid. It’s actually that they want to work. I imagine my businesses are different than the ones targeted by these regulations, but in my mind there are lots of “right things” - not all of them need to be regulated.
I would add that I haven’t paid too much attention to this, because, as I said it’s something we already do. But I question Austin’s ability to enforce it. The ability for it to be abused. And the cost of these lawsuits.
IMHO things like this make for good headlines and give people the warm fuzzies for supporting “the right thing” but at the end of the day end up costing a lot of money and resulting in very little actual change for the people we are trying to help. Texas employment law generally completely favors the employer. If these companies want to “penalize” people for staying home when they are sick, there are lots of ways they can do that. In other words, if you’re already not a “good guy” in this regard, the regulation probably won’t change that.
JP: “IMHO…”
In the interest of accuracy, please omit the “H” in future postings. Thanks.
Take it outside 
You have to start somewhere JP.
Indeed. Well I’ll be interested to see how it works in practice. Again it is just upsetting how much money is being spent on lawyers.
We definitely agree there.