Paid leave sounds nice, but looks like job-killer

Democrats, who in November won control of both the state House and Senate, already are working to add to the regulatory burden of the state’s private employers.

That burden had eased a bit during the 2003 legislative session, when the Republican-led Senate and Democrat-controlled House lowered state unemployment benefits from the nation’s highest to among the nation’s highest. But state-mandated business costs remain a critical concern among business groups, a concern that should be shared by anyone who wants to see significant job growth.

Now Democrats are pushing bills that would require businesses, no matter how small, to give employees up to five weeks of paid ($250 per week) family medical leave a year, and guarantee they’d still have a job when they return. The program would be administered by the state, and would be funded by a 2-cent tax on each employee hour worked.

Who pays that 2 cents per hour – the employer, the employee or both – is being debated. But no matter who pays, employers will incur new costs. Just holding a job open for five weeks likely will require paying overtime to someone else, a burden that would fall especially hard on small businesses that can’t easily absorb a missing worker’s duties.

Businesses that employ 50 or more workers already are required by federal law to allow employees 12 weeks of unpaid family medical leave a year. Smaller businesses were exempted from the federal bill – Bill Clinton’s first major legislation success as president – for a good reason: it’s a job-killer.

Washington’s economic recovery is tentative at best. Employers’ health care costs are skyrocketing. Lawmakers should be making it easier for employers to hire people by helping them reduce costs, not creating new ones.

Gov. Christine Gregoire campaigned as a pro-business candidate. She should promise to veto this and similar efforts by fellow Democrats, heading off job-killing ideas before they have a chance to scare potential employers away.