This month, the Nebraska Healthy Families and Workplaces Act took effect, extending the right to paid sick time to more than 100,000 Nebraskans! The law passed via ballot initiative in November 2024, when Nebraskans voted yes on paid sick time by a margin of almost three-to-one, securing victory by almost 50 percentage points.
That same Election Day, voters in Missouri and Alaska also voted on the ballot in favor of creating their own paid sick time programs, demonstrating how popular policies that allow workers to stay home and recover when they’re sick—or to care for a sick loved one—are, across political and geographic lines.
In spite of the overwhelming support for this fundamental, common-sense protection for workers, we were disappointed to see Nebraska roll back the law to exclude approximately 140,000 workers in the State from these critical protections, including seasonal agricultural workers, young workers, and anyone working for a small business with 10 or fewer employees. We will continue working to resist these anti-worker and anti-democratic attempts to trample over the will of voters, and look nevertheless forward to seeing covered Nebraskans better able to protect their health and paychecks using these essential protections.
We congratulate longtime partners at Nebraska Appleseed – who led a robust coalition of advocates, businesses, and public health leaders – on this hard-won progress, and we will continue our work to expand paid sick time to more and more workers in Nebraska and across the country.