BILL ANALYSIS Ó
SB 406
Page 1
SENATE THIRD READING
SB
406 (Jackson)
As Amended September 1, 2015
Majority vote
SENATE VOTE: 23-16
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|Committee |Votes|Ayes |Noes |
| | | | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
|----------------+-----+----------------------+--------------------|
|Labor |5-2 |Roger Hernández, Chu, |Harper, Patterson |
| | |Low, McCarty, | |
| | |Thurmond | |
| | | | |
|----------------+-----+----------------------+--------------------|
|Appropriations |12-5 |Gomez, Bloom, Bonta, |Bigelow, Chang, |
| | |Calderon, Nazarian, |Gallagher, Jones, |
| | |Eggman, Eduardo |Wagner |
| | |Garcia, Holden, | |
| | |Quirk, Rendon, Weber, | |
| | |Wood | |
| | | | |
| | | | |
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SUMMARY: Expands various provisions of law related to unpaid
SB 406
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family and medical leave under the California Family Rights Act
(CFRA). Specifically, this bill:
1)Provides that the law applies to any person who directly
employs 25 or more employees (compared with 50 or more
employees under existing law).
2)Amends the definition of "child" to include the son or
daughter of a domestic partner and deletes provisions
regarding the age and dependent status of a child.
3)Expands permissible leave to include leave to care for a
sibling, grandparent, grandchild, parent-in-law, or domestic
partner with a serious health condition.
4)Removes an exception when both parents are employed by the
same employer, thereby requiring the employer to grant each
employee up to 12 weeks of leave individually rather than
between both parents, as currently in existing law.
5)Makes related and conforming changes.
FISCAL EFFECT: According to the Assembly Appropriations
Committee, this bill would result in General Fund administrative
costs to the Department of Fair Employment and Housing of
approximately $700,000. The impact to other state agencies is
expected to be minimal since the state generally provides this
benefit already.
COMMENTS: According to the author, this bill ensures that
eligible workers can keep their jobs when they need time off to
care for their families. Over 40% of the workforce is not
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eligible for California Family Rights Act due to the law's
eligibility.
The current definition of family under CFRA includes minor or
adult dependent children, parents, spouses, and registered
domestic partners. Recently, the definition of family members
for Paid Family Leave (PFL), a program that allows workers to
receive partial wage replacement benefits while taking care of
seriously ill family members, was expanded to include siblings,
grandparents, grandchildren, and parents-in-law. This bill
seeks to include these family members under CFRA, allowing
employees to take job-protected leave when utilizing their PFL
benefits. Currently, employees may receive this monetary
benefit when caring for these additional family members but risk
losing their jobs to provide such care. This bill would also
allow for parents that are entitled to leave and employed by the
same employer to receive 12 weeks of family and medical leave
individually in connection with the birth, adoption, or foster
care of a child.
According to supporters, the restrictions on family caregiving
under CFRA fail to account for the diversity of California
households and the importance of caregiving by extended family
members. Supporters bring attention to various study findings
including: a study of Alzheimer's patients which found that 40%
of caregivers were not covered under the narrow definition of
family in CFRA, one study that found that nearly 20% of primary
caregivers for chronically disabled individuals are neither the
spouse nor the child of the person receiving care, and another
finding that one in twelve caregivers provides care to a
parent-in-law, grandparent, or grandparent-in-law.
Supporters argue that most leave taken under the CFRA is short,
minimizing the impact on employers. They state that nearly half
of all leave taken is for 10 days or less. Moreover, they cite
data from the Employment Development Department (EDD) that
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expanding this bill to cover employers with 25 or more employees
will impact less than 6% of businesses in California.
A coalition of employers, including the California Chamber of
Commerce, opposes this bill and argues that it will overwhelm
small businesses by mandating businesses with 25 or more
employees to provide a 12-week protected leave of absence.
Opponents contend that this will put a greater burden on both
small and large businesses while creating an even further
disconnect from federal law. Additionally, opponents argue that
expanding the family members for whom an employee may take a
12-week protected leave of absence to care for to include a
grandparent, a grandchild, and siblings will negatively impact
California employers. Opponents also argue that California
already has extensive family-related protected leaves of absence
and that this bill is therefore unnecessary.
Analysis Prepared by:
Ben Ebbink / L. & E. / (916) 319-2091 FN:
0001630