Paid sick leave has become more common in recent years Share of paid U.S. civilian workers with access to any sort of paid sick leave as an employment beneft 100%
For working people, though, that’s a lot easier to do if you have access to paid sick leave – which 24% of U.S. civilian workers, or roughly 33.6 million people, do not, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics. (“Civilian workers” refers to private industry workers and state and local government workers combined.)
The bureau’s 2019 National Compensation Survey (NCS) found that, for civilian workers, paid sick leave, while nearly universal at the upper ends of the wage distribution, becomes scarcer the less money one makes. For instance, 92% of workers in the top quarter of earnings (meaning hourly wages greater than $32.21) have access to some form of paid sick leave, versus only 51% of workers earning wages in the lowest quarter ($13.80 or less). Among the lowest-earning tenth – those whose wages are $10.80 an hour or less – just 31% have paid sick leave.
Paid sick leave has become more  | common in recent years  | Share of paid U.S. civilian workers with access to any  | sort of paid sick leave as an employment beneft  | 100%  | 76  | 75  | 50  | 25  | '10 11 12 '13 '14 '15 16 '17 '18 19  | but lower-income workers still far  | less likely to have it  | Share of U.S. workers with access to paid sick  | the by average wage level  | 100% Highest 10%  | Highest 25%  | 75 Third 25%  | Second 25%  | 50  | Lowest 25%  | 25  | Lowest 10%  | '10 11 12 '13 .14 15 16 17 18 19  | Note: Includes private-sector and state and local government  | workers  | Source: 2019 National Compensation Survey, U.S Bureau of  | Labor Statistics  | PEW RESEARCH CENTER 