Key Takeaways
- Even among states with paid leave requirements, the nature and degree of those requirements can vary significantly, with some states adopting relatively minimal paid leave requirements and others with paid leave laws that are significantly more involved and comprehensive
- Employers with operations in different locations or those seeking to expand beyond their city/county/state borders will likely have to take an assortment of paid leave rules into account in crafting and executing their own internal paid leave policies
- While applicable laws certainly shape paid leave policy and expectation from one place to another, employers that operate in areas with relatively unobtrusive paid leave rules often adopt policies that go well beyond the minimum required of them by the government in order to comply with industry/geographic norms and/or gain a competitive advantage with regard to talent attraction and retention
ARTICLE | Top 25 States With Most Employee-Friendly Paid Leave Laws (Part 2)
In part 1 of this 2 part series, we took a look at the 25 states with the most employer-friendly laws and regulations in terms of the circumstances in which the state may require some or all employers to provide some or all employees with paid leave.
In this piece, we’ll review the paid leave rules in the remaining 25 states that have more employee-friendly laws and regulations, which includes a much wider spectrum of regulatory involvement, ranging from a relatively minor paid leave requirements that don’t go much beyond what is required in the states covered in Part 1, all the way up to substantial, robust paid leave mandates and worker protections.
Arizona
Arizona paid leave law requires private employers with $500,000 or more in annual revenues to provide their employees with one hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked.
For employers that have more than 15 or more employees, those employees can accrue up to 40 hours of sick leave per year, while the employees of employers with fewer than 15 employees can accrue a maximum of 24 hours of paid sick leave per year.
Employers can require employees to wait up to 90 days after the start of their employment before they can use any paid sick leave that has accrued, and employers are not required to pay out any accrued PSL upon termination, employees are allowed to roll over paid sick leave from one year to the next.
Arizona employers are also required to provide up to 3 hours of paid leave to enable employees to vote in any municipal, county, state, or federal primary or general election if those employees do not already have 3 consecutive hours available to them when the polls are open and they are not required to be at work.
California
California enacted one of the more robust paid sick leave policies among states, requiring pretty much all employers - with few exceptions, such as railroad companies and airlines - to provide at least 40 hours of paid sick leave each year to their employees, even part-time and temporary workers, who have worked at least 30 days out of the first year of their employment. While employees begin accruing pid sick leave as soon as they begin working, accruing at 1 hour of paid sick leave for every hour worked, employees are not legally allowed to use the accrued leave until they have been on the job for at least 90 days.
California state law doesn’t require employers to offer either paid or unpaid vacations, but if an employer chooses to offer PTO, then any unused hours (not including unused paid sick leave) must eventually be paid out with the employee’s last paycheck.
Further, while California employers are required to allow employees to roll over unused PTO days, as well as up to 80 hours of paid sick leave, they do have significant leeway in determining how many consecutive PTO days an employee can use, preventing employees from using PTO on certain dates, and implementing notice requirements that must be met before leave will be granted.
California law entitles employees to 8 weeks of paid family leave at between 60% to 70% of employee’s income, up to $1,620 each week in 2024, although importantly this leave is not necessarily job-protected, though other state and federal laws may protect an employees job in this situation nonetheless. State Disability Insurance can also be used as support for up to 1 year with weekly payouts of between 60% -90% of income, capped at $1,325 per week.
California employees who don’t otherwise have time to vote also get up to 2 paid hours for voting leave if they provide their employers with at least 3 days’ notice of their intent to be away from their job for the purpose of voting.
Colorado
Colorado state law requires all employers to provide paid sick leave, which accrues at a rate of one hour of paid sick leave for every hour worked. That accrued sick leave can be capped at 48 hours per year, but Colorado law requires employers to allow employees to roll over unused paid sick leave from one year to another.
Colorado employees who earn at least $2,500 per year and have been on the job for at least 180 days are entitled to up to 12 weeks of family leave with partial pay, which can include up to an additional 4 weeks of paid parental leave in the event of pregnancy and/or childbirth complications.
And while Colorado state law does not require employers to offer paid vacation time, Colorado does require employers to pay out any unused PTO in the event that the employee leaves the company.
Colorado law also requires employers to pay employees $50 per day for the first 3 days of jury duty service, after which the state will take over jury service compensation.
Finally, for any employee whose shift starts less than 3 hours after the polls open or ends less than three hours before the polls close, employers must offer up to 2 hours of PTO so that employees can exercise their right to vote, and while employers can choose when an employee votes during the middle of a shift, if the employee requests to vote at the beginning or end of a shift, the employer is obligated to honor that request.
Connecticut
Connecticut law requires employers who had averaged at least 50 employees at some point in the prior year, to provide paid sick leave to employees who work at least 10 hours a week, which accrues at a rate of 1 hour of paid sick leave for every 40 hours worked for up to 40 hour per year, which can be rolled over to the next year if unused. Paid sick leave hours begin accruing immediately, but can not be used until an employee has worked 680 hours on the job. These rules cover most employees, but exceptions include employees who are exempt from overtime and minimum wage rules in accordance with the Fair Labor Standards Act.
Paid family and medical leave is available to most Connecticut employees (including many sole proprietors and self-employed people) for up to 12 weeks per year (with a potential additional 2 weeks in the event of medical complication) so long as the employee has earned at least $2,325 in one of the previous four quarters, is currently employed, and has been employed for the preceding 12 weeks. Qualifying employees can receive up to 95% of their typical income with a cap set at 60 times the state’s minimum wage, currently $15.69 per hour.
Further, for the first 5 days of an employee’s jury duty service, Connecticut law requires employers to pay employees $50 per day before the state then takes over those payments.
While Connecticut voters had been entitled since 2021 to 2 hours of paid time off to vote in special elections and standard elections for state and federal representatives should they request that time off at least 2 days in advance, those rules are set to expire at the end of June 2024, after which time the voting paid time off requirement will no longer be valid absent the intervention of Connecticut lawmakers.
Delaware
Delaware currently has no laws in effect with regard to paid time off requirements, but beginning January 1, 2026, employees who have worked at least 1,250 hours for an employer over the past year are eligible for up to 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave at a rate equivalent to the lesser of $900 per week or 80% of the employee’s weekly pay.
Georgia
Georgia state law requires employers with 25 or more employees to allow those employees who work at least 30 hours per week to accrue up to 5 paid sick leave days per calendar year that can be used to care for close family members in need.
Hawaii
Hawaii state law allows for partial paid leave via Temporary Disability Insurance, which requires that an employee has worked in Hawaii for 14 or more weeks and has worked at least 20 hours and earned at least $400 in each of those weeks, although the weeks need not be in a row and can be spread among multiple employers. Employees can receive up to 67% of their average weekly wages, with a cap that’s currently set around $700 per week.
While pregnancy and childbirth applications of the temporary disability insurance program usually last between 4 and 6 weeks, the disability insurance generally is available for up to 6 months.
Hawaiian employees that don’t already have 2 consecutive hours when they are off work and polls are open are also entitled to up to 2 hours of paid voting leave, though employers can require proof that the employee voted.
Illinois
Illinois state law entitles employees with 1 hour of flex leave for every 40 hours worked (capped at 40 hours per year) that can be used for any purpose. Employees must, however, wait 90 days after their leave time has begun accruing before they can exercise it, and employers are allowed to require 7 days notice before accrued leave can be used and can set a minimum leave usage increment of at least 2 hours.
Whether or not employees are allowed to roll over unused leave depends on whether employers have front-loaded leave (i.e. provided a pro rated 40 hours on the first day of the year to all employees, in which case employee leave does roll over from one year to the next) or whether employees accrue their hours of leave one at a time - 1 hour of leave for every 40 hours worked as described in the preceding paragraph - in which case leave does roll over.
Further, while Illinois does not provide for paid sick leave statewide, Cook County and the city of Chicago both have laws in place guaranteeing paid sick leave for employees who have been with their employer for at least 6 months, worked at least 2 hours within the city/county over the last 2 weeks, and have worked at least 80 hours within the last 120 days. Paid sick leave for qualifying employees accrues at 1 hour for every 40 hours worked, capped at 40 hours annually.
Employees in Illinois are also entitled to up to 2 hours of paid leave in order to vote if their schedule does not already provide for 2 consecutive hours off work during which the polls are open.
While Illinois does not require most unused leave to be paid out upon termination, if leave has been specifically granted as PTO or vacation, then employers must compensate employees for it when an employee leaves the company.
Louisiana
Louisiana employers are not required to provide paid vacation time, but those employers that choose to offer such PTO are required to pay out any unused time at the conclusion of employment if the employee is eligible for a vacation at that time of their departure according to company policy.
Louisiana employers also must provide employees with one day’s wages on the employee’s first day of jury duty.
Maine
Maine law requires that most employers provide employees with 1 hour of paid leave for every 40 hours worked, capped at 40 hours per year - although there are exceptions including employers with fewer than 10 employees and employees that are seasonal or commission-based.
If employers front-load employee paid leave banks to 40 hours at the start of each year (or at the start of an individual new employee’s employment) then that leave is not required to roll over, but if the leave is accrued, then roll over is mandated by law. Employers must also pay out any unused leave at the conclusion of an employee’s employment.
Maryland
Maryland state law requires employers to provide 1 hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked, capped at 40 hours per year, to employees who have worked for the employer at least 12 hours per week for 15 weeks, although the law excludes employees under the age of 18, independent contract workers, seasonal agricultural workers, and those operating under collective bargaining agreements. Further, unused leave can roll over but the bank is capped at 64 hours accumulated total. Employees who work at least 8 hours each week in Montgomery County have their annual sick leave accrual cap set at 56 hours.
For employers with 15 or more employees that do provide paid leave, the Maryland Flexible Leave act provides for paid time off in the event of an illness or death of an immediate family member, as well.
Maryland employers are also required to provide at least 2 hours of paid voting leave if an employee’s schedule does not already provide for 2 consecutive non-working hours when polls are open.
Massachusetts
Massachusetts state law does not require employers to provide paid vacation leave, but employers who have adopted such a policy are required to pay out any unused time when the employee leaves the company.
Massachusetts employees earn 1 hour of paid sick time for every 30 hours worked - capped at 40 hours per year and unusable until the employee has been on the job for at least 90 days - which can be utilized to take care of themselves and/or close family members dealing with physical or mental illness. Employers are allowed to require 7 days notice for appointments that are scheduled in advance, and can also opt to allow employee paid sick leave to accrue on a statutorily-set lump-sum schedule if they don’t want to track the hours worked of individual employees. Employers in Massachusetts also have the option of front-loading paid sick leave for their employees, in which case roll over isn’t required, but roll over is mandated when the leave is accrued.
Massachusetts employees are also entitled to up to 12 weeks of paid family leave and 20 weeks of paid medical leave which can combine to amount to as many as 26 weeks of paid leave in a year.
Further, Massachusetts employers are required to pay out up to 3 days of jury duty leave.
Michigan
Michigan state employers and private employers with 50 or more employees must provide paid sick leave to employees who work at least 25 hours a week for at least 26 weeks a year, which accrues at a rate of 1 hour of leave for every 35 hours worked, capped at 40 hours per year and can roll over from one year to the next if unused. Employees, however, are not allowed to use accrued leave until their 90th day on the job. Employees exempted from these paid sick leave requirements include workers operating under collective bargaining agreements or those exempt from minimum wage and overtime regulations.
Minnesota
Minnesota employees who worked at least 80 hours over the last year in Minnesota can accrue 1 hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked, capped at 48 hours per year - but that paid leave doesn’t become available to employees until they’ve been on the job for 90 days. Unused hours also roll over from one year to the next, capped at 80 hours.
4 cities in Minnesota - Minneapolis, St. Paul, Duluth, and Bloomington - each have additional paid sick laws that go further than the statewide paid sick leave requirements.
Minnesota employers are also required to allow employees paid leave so they can vote, though no minimum or maximum lengths of time for that leave are specified.
Nebraska
Nebraska employers are not required to provide any paid vacation leave, but if they do offer such PTO, employers are required to pay out for any PTO that remains unused when an employee leaves the company. Nebraska state law also specifically forbids Nebraska employers from enacting use-it-or-lose-it policies with regard to earned leave, so Nebraska employees are entitled to be paid out for any remaining unused leave at the conclusion of their employment.
Nebraska law also requires employers to provide paid leave for jury duty, and 2 consecutive hours of paid leave to vote in municipal, country, state, and federal primaries and general elections if the employees schedule does not already allow for 2 consecutive off-duty hours during polling hours, though employers retain the right to determine during which hours eligible employees are allowed paid leave in order to vote.
Nevada
Nevada employers with 50 or more employees must provide flex leave time that can be used for any purpose, which employees acquire at a rate of 0.01923 hours of paid leave per hour worked, which is about 1 hour of paid leave for every 52 hours worked. The law doesn’t apply to temporary, seasonal, and on-call workers, and employers can exempt themselves from the law by providing a flat 40 hours of paid time off each year to each eligible employee. Employers who have been in operation for less than 2 years are also exempt.
Further, Nevada state law doesn’t cap the amount of PTO that employees can accrue, but it does allow employers to limit the amount that employees can use to as little as 40 hours in a benefit year. Employees must also work for 90 days before they are able to use any of the accrued PTO.
Employers are required to provide paid leave for employees to vote, as well: 1 hour of paid leave if the polling place is less than 2 miles away, 3 hours of paid leave if the polling place is more than 10 miles away, and 2 hours of paid leave otherwise.
New Jersey
New Jersey law mandates that employees earn 1 hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked capped at 40 hours per year, and employees must be on the job for 120 days before utilizing any accrued paid leave. Further, employees are entitled to roll over from one year to the next up to 40 hours of unused paid sick leave, but employers can require up to 7 days notice for appointments and can require reasonable documentation for absences that last 3 or more days in a row.
New Jersey state law also enables employees to take up to 12 weeks per year of flexible paid family leave, which is funded by the New Jersey Family Leave Insurance Program via payroll deductions.
New Mexico
New Mexico state law entitles employees to 1 hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked, capped at 64 hours per year, which employees can roll over from one year to the next.
New Mexico does not require PTO accrual, but if an employer adopts a policy of providing PTO and allowing earned/unused hours to accrue, then unused time off must be paid out when the employee leaves the company.
Employers in New Mexico must also allow employees 2 hours to vote if polls are not open for 2 hours prior to the start of a shift of 3 hours after the end of a shift.
New York
New York employers that have between 0 and 4 employees and more than $1 million in revenue and New York employers that have between 5 and 99 employees regardless of revenue must provide employees with 40 hours of paid sick leave per year, accrued at 1 hour of leave for every 30 hours worked. New York employers with 100 or more employees must provide 56 hours of paid sick leave each year.
New York employees are also entitled to 12 weeks of paid family leave per year after they have completed at least 26 weeks in a row of at least 20 hours of work per week. Those leave payments are typically covered through insurance and provide up to 67% of an employee’s average weekly salary, capped at 67% of the statewide average weekly salary, which currently puts the cap at about $1,068 per week.
New York employees are also entitled to collect up to 26 weeks of short-term disability (or 4 to 6 weeks for disability as a result of pregnancy and/or childbirth), but these disability payments are only available during times when an employee is actually, physically unable to perform the job.
New York state law also requires that employers with more than 10 employees must pay $40 dollars a day for each of the first 3 days of an employee’s jury duty service.
New York employees that don’t have 4 consecutive hours during which to vote are also entitled up to 2 hours of paid voting leave, but employees must notify their employers between 2 and 10 days before their planned voting absence, and employers can choose what time the voting leave is exercised.
Oregon
Oregon employers are not required to provide paid vacation leave, but if they choose to offer it and their employment policies and contracts don’t specifically absolve employers of the responsibility to pay out unused PTO at the conclusion of employment, then employers are required to make those payouts when an employee parts ways with the employer.
Oregon employers with 10 or more employees are required to provide paid sick leave at a rate of 1 hour earned for every 30 hours worked, which is capped at 40 hours per year that can be rolled over to the next year when unused (unless the leave is front-loaded), but any accrued leave can not be used until the employee has worked at least 90 days.
Oregon employees are also entitled to up to 12 weeks per year of paid family/medical/safe leave via a social insurance program.
Rhode Island
Rhode Island state law requires employers to pay out any unused PTO upon termination if the employee has been on the job for at least 1 year.
Rhode Island employers that have 18 or more employees are required to provide paid sick leave at a rate of 1 hour for every 35 hours worked (capped at 40 hours per year and capable of roll over from one year to the next), which accrue immediately upon commencement of work but can not be used for the first 90 days of employment.
Rhode Island employees are also entitled to up to 30 weeks of temporary disability insurance and up to 6 weeks of temporary caregiver insurance, each offering up to about $1000 per week.
Tennessee
Tennessee employers with 5 or more employees are required to provide paid leave for jury duty service, though employees must show their employer their jury summons on the day they receive their jury summons or the day after receiving summons in order to be eligible, and employers can deduct any payment received from the court from the wages owed to the employee.
Tennessee employers are also required to provide up to 3 consecutive hours of paid vote leave to any employee that does not already have 3 consecutive hours off work when the polls are open. In order to qualify, employees must request paid voting leave by 12pm on the day prior to Election Day.
Tennessee state employees and some metropolitan employees also are eligible for up to 6 weeks of paid family leave.
Utah
Utah employers are not required to provide PTO, but if they do they must explicitly make clear their policy of not paying out unused PTO upon termination, otherwise unused PTO must be paid out when an employee is terminated.
Utah employees that don’t already have at least 3 hours off during polling hours are entitled to 2 hours of paid voting leave, provided that they give their employer at least 1 day of advanced notice, and employers may still choose when the leave is exercised.
Vermont
Vermont employees earn 1 hour of paid sick leave for every 52 hours worked, capped at 40 hours per year which can be rolled over from 1 year to the next if unused, but employees may have to wait up to 1 year before utilizing accrued leave. In order to be eligible, however, employees must be at least 18 years old, must have worked at least 20 weeks in the last year, and must have averaged 18 hours per week over the year, as well.
Washington
Washington employers are required to provide employees with paid sick leave that accrues at a rate of 1 hour earned for every 40 hours worked, with up to 40 hours capable of being rolled over from one year to the next. Employees may have to wait 90 days before utilizing the accrued leave, at the employer's discretion.
The city of Seattle expands upon the statewide paid sick leave rules by allowing the employees of employers that employ between 50 and 259 employees to roll over 56 hours of accrued paid sick leave per year, while employees of employers with 250 or more employees can roll over up to 72 hours per year of unused leave.
Washington state law also provides for a paid family leave insurance program that enables employees to take up to 12 weeks of paid leave for many family and medical events including childbirth under normal circumstances, and up to 18 weeks given certain qualifying events.
Mployer Advisor’s Take
While the range of regulatory involvement with regard to paid leave varies considerably between states, the bars set by state rulemakers can tend to be on the low-side relative to the actual paid leave benefits offered by companies within those states.
Even in states with no paid leave requirements whatsoever, industry and regional/intra-state norms often set standards that many if not most applicable employers follow, and those norms can sometimes go beyond the heftier mandates laid out by some of the states with more comprehensive regulation, as well.
As a result, in order to maintain a more complete picture of both best practices and talent expectations, it is important to keep up with a changing regulatory environment, both on the state and federal level, as well as benchmarking against comparable employers in the same industry and/or region.
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