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Across the country, the increasing number of reported coronavirus cases has led employers to take new measures to protect their offices: Telling workers to stay home and do their job remotely.
But federal data shows that a large chunk of the Vermont population will have trouble following that advice. And experts say those employees — hourly workers and those employed in the service industry — are less likely to have sick leave or job protection if the epidemic spreads further.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, more than 26,000 Vermonters are employed in the food service industry. Another 28,000 work in sales and related occupations, which includes jobs like cashiers and retail employees.
A federal survey of American work habits found only 10% of service workers spent any time working from home on an average day, compared to a third of management and business workers. Even fewer construction, production and transportation workers have worked from home.
“For people whose jobs involve direct contact with people, you’re not going to be working remotely. That’s insane,” said Elaine McCrate, a professor of economics at the University of Vermont.
Emily Beam, also a UVM professor, said many hourly workers depend on getting enough hours in to make their paycheck for the week. “If you’re making the choice between not getting infected and not paying your rent, that’s a very difficult choice,” she said.
Vermont law permits for 40 hours of paid sick leave for workers who are not part-time or seasonal employees. That includes anyone who is recovering from an illness or is caring for a close relative, but not someone remaining at home due to concern about potential exposure.
Going beyond the law, research shows that low-income families are less likely to have access to sick leave than higher-income families. McCrate said the current epidemic shows the need for broader access to paid leave, an initiative considered by the Vermont Legislature this year before being shot down by the governor.
“When sick leave was being considered in the Vermont Legislature, many of us screamed and yelled, ‘this is a public health issue!’” McCrate said.
Even if workers feel healthy, they may soon run into another problem: Businesses taking a hit due to public fears, Beam said.
“If fewer people are going out to shops and restaurants, even a mild drop like 10, 20 or 30 percent, it can have a big impact on businesses with small margins,” Beam said.
Those businesses may decide to cut back on their workers’ hours to deal with a slowdown, and to those workers, “a cut in hours means a cut in wages,” Beam said. They, too, are living in the margins, living from paycheck to paycheck.
Parents could also be scrambling to figure out how to stay home if their children are sent home from school or daycare. While Vermont’s paid sick leave law allows family members to take off work to care for their children due to a “public health” matter, it still limits that leave to the legal yearly limit.
“School closures or child care closures because of illness are going to be a real scramble for families who cannot work from home,” said Sue Minter, executive director of Capstone Community Action, an organization that works with low-income Vermonters.
Minter said her organization is also scrambling to prepare to provide basic needs for the people it works with if coronavirus limits public gathering. Capstone runs a food bank and a Head Start preschool program, and helps people get access to local resources.
She is particularly concerned about low-income Vermonters getting access to food. Those people may not have the savings needed to buy food in advance or stock up in the event of an emergency, she said. Their children may also soon lose access to free lunches and other meals provided by the school district.
Nicole Whalen, director of communications at the Vermont Foodbank, said the organization has convened an emergency task force to prepare for any scenario that could make it harder to distribute food or could increase need.
“We’re asking questions like, ‘can we do double deliveries of food now, so that people have extra food in case we have a disruption later?’” she said.
The federal and Vermont government have begun to discuss how to help struggling workers. President Donald Trump proposed a payroll tax cut — a measure McCrate said was unlikely to help service workers and low-income households to stay home.
“People are more likely to come in, rather than less,” she said.
Minter said the tax cut would also reduce government revenue at a time when the government may need to start spending more to help others. She believes the clearest way for the government to help is to help employers provide sick leave to their employees.
“It is always the most vulnerable who are the most impacted by any disaster, natural or otherwise,” she said.