
Associations Among School Absenteeism, G.I. and Respiratory Illness, and Income - surfallday
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/68/wr/mm6809a1.htm
======
umanwizard
The headline here is incredibly misleading. The CDC is not making the factual
claim that "low-income parents send sick kids to school due to lack paid sick
leave".

The actual truth: a paper from the CDC finding an apparently quite weak link
between poverty and rate of school absence due to sickness stuck that in as
_one of many_ somewhat plausible explanations, in a very speculative
discussion section.

To emphasize: the headline of this story is _not_ one of the factual
scientific claims of the paper.

~~~
renholder
Upboat for rationalisation.

Also, from the European perspective (and specifically speaking of the
technology sector, as that's what I have first-hand experience with), taking
sick leave to take care of a child at home isn't a thing, whatsoever. You
would just send an email to your team saying that you're sorry but you're
working from home because your kid is sick and that would be the end of it.

No compulsion to take vacation.

No compulsion to take sick leave.

No punitive punishments for being human and for your family members being
human.

It really _is_ a different world, over here. However, given the American
exceptionalism showing up in the thread, I'm going to wager that this probably
going to see some vitriolic response.

~~~
crankylinuxuser
On the converse... I'm an American whom lives in Indiana. Let me share my
experiences.

I worked at Starbucks for 5 years. When I got sick, I showed up to work. I
know I worked while having the flu, and making drinks for people. If we didn't
show up, our hours for next week would be messed up badly and intentionally.
We would go from 35 hours to 15 hours, or we'd be scheduled "clopens" \- close
at midnight, and open at 4:45a the next morning. If you wanted your job, you
showed up and vomited on the floor.

I also worked at wal-mart. I was a 3rd shift stocker. I was fired for getting
injured on the job by a faulty pallet jack falling on my foot, and "costing
the company money" (exact quote). I even have my discharge paper stating that.
Needed x-rays and a tetanus shot. And with someone at the time who had little
money, lawsuits are out of the question, especially for a corp like Walmart.

I'll take some of that 'commie socialistic European perspective', if you don't
mind :)

~~~
mruts
Well would you prefer to have a crappy job or no job at all? Don’t labor under
the assumption that government mandates don’t affect the decisions of
businesses.

~~~
allannienhuis
So it's ok with you if companies treat people like crap, because the
alternative is fewer jobs? By that logic, it's ok for companies to kill off a
few of their workers through horrible safety practices, than not offering any
jobs at all, because ++ jobs is more important than anything. We've spent the
last couple of centuries trying to correct that line of thinking, why hang on
to it?

The alternative to crappy business practices isn't people starving in the
streets because of lack of jobs. The alternative is that the people with
excess resources distribute some of those resources to others that would
otherwise starve.

There are many nations out there with working systems that don't accept that
sort of abuse of it's workers - why do people insist on choosing ideologies
that are so obviously not in the interests of the majority of the people?

~~~
kortilla
>why do people insist on choosing ideologies that are so obviously not in the
interests of the majority of the people?

Because policies that depend on taking from the economically productive to
prop up the unproductive eventually become unsustainable.

Does it upset you that people work jobs instead of voting to receive a million
USD annual stipend? Would you vote for a policy giving that to every person?

Back to the Walmart story. There is more we aren’t being told. There are
thousands of lawyers drooling to take a case against a company the size of
Walmart firing people for simply getting hurt due to the company’s
incompetence. OP more than likely was at fault for the accident, which would
be grounds for termination in most European countries as well.

~~~
allannienhuis
> Because policies that depend on taking from the economically productive to
> prop up the unproductive eventually become unsustainable.

1) There are many very stable nations that have had long-term policies of
treating their disadvantaged much better than you seem to be proposing, so
this point is demonstratively false. Why do you believe it's true?

2) There are many people in every country that aren't economically productive
- the elderly, the very young, the chronically ill, etc. Most countries manage
to afford to take care of these people in some manner without collapse. It's
possible because technology has driven our average productivity extremely high
in historical terms, and there are more than enough resources available to
take care of them. Doing so doesn't cause those societies to collapse. I'd
suggest it makes them more stable when fewer people are desperately poor.

I'm not saying you're arguing that those example groups of people don't
deserve assistance. But you do seem to be saying that _some_ economically
unproductive people shouldn't be helped to survive. What is special about the
second group of people? Why does helping them somehow lead to an unsustainable
society when supporting other groups doesn't?

------
jelliclesfarm
Children are expensive. And it’s not about money. It’s about time and energy
and effort and incessant tending and bonding.

I honestly think people need counseling and planning before they start to
think about starting a family. They need back up plans and contingency
strategies.

It used to be that we lived in small communal groups and non nuclear families.
Usually matriarchal wherein the post menopausal grandmother plays a crucial
role in the post reproductive years to give the attention children need.

Clearly this system worked. We will be hitting 10 billion by 2050 due to
exponential population growth. But the world has changed. Coping with the new
resource strapped crowded new world is not by handing over the responsibility
of child rearing to the state or the tax payers.

There is NO village that will raise YOUR child. It’s time for responsible
procreation and talk about such things without fear or shame of being
chastised. We can now store our genetic material. People should be given a lot
of advice and caution before they want bring children into our future.
Responsible parenting must be incentivized and not just procreation in the
form of tax breaks and taking over of child rearing by the state. This issue
really stresses me and I only see it getting worse.

I don’t know why there isn’t enough funding or initiatives to address this.

~~~
rayiner
Children are difficult, but not as hard as you make it out to be. Out of my
circle of friends, more than half the kids were unplanned (including our first
child). It was no big deal—grandparents swooped in to keep things on the rails
(something that is true for people of all income levels). For lower income
people, a bit of help with childcare during work is all that’s necessary.

The “responsible parenting” approach you suggest would basically lead to lower
income people never being in a position to have kids. And that would be a
tragedy. Having children is one of the greatest joys in life. There is a
really remarkable Gallup poll: [https://news.gallup.com/poll/164618/desire-
children-norm.asp...](https://news.gallup.com/poll/164618/desire-children-
norm.aspx)

Americans 45 and older were polled, and asked what they’d do if they had to do
it over again. Just 7% of those with kids said they would’ve had zero kids. By
contrast, 55% of those without kids would’ve had at least one. Indeed, while
just 7% of people with kids would’ve had none if they did it over again, among
those who never had kids, fully 18% wish they would have had _3 or more._

What other incredibly expensive, labor-intensive life choice has that kind of
customer satisfaction rating?

~~~
grigjd3
You are very fortunate that your parents could help you raise your first kid.
That is not something universally available and my first year as a parent was
very rough.

~~~
rayiner
It was fortunate, but I don’t think it was particularly fortunate. The average
American lives 18 miles from their mother:
[https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/12/24/upshot/24up-f...](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/12/24/upshot/24up-
family.html).

The reason I bring up grandparents is because OP’s post struck me as pretty
ignorant of the circumstances of the people (disproportionately lower income),
who are actually having kids in this country:

> The data reveal a country of close-knit families, with members of multiple
> generations leaning on one another for financial and practical support.

Raising kids is not that hard and nearly everyone does it. We don’t need
counselors telling people not to have kids until they can meet whatever
criteria upper middle class people think are a necessary prerequisite for
raising children. They need cheaper daycares to make life a little easier.

~~~
grigjd3
I'm not saying having kids is unnatural or anything, but I'd have been damned
grateful to have a single night off every eight weeks after my child was born.
Having capable grandparents around is a terrific benefit. You're right that
even just a little help would have made a world of difference, but my wife and
I didn't have that.

~~~
jelliclesfarm
I was raised by my grandmother with a brood of cousins and all her children
lived under the same roof. I did not know that nuclear families were the norm
and that not every family was as large as ours until I was well into my teens.
I think that being raised the way I was had a very positive impact on me. It
wasn’t just having so many adults around but also having cousins who were
sibling like and of various ages as peers to learn from and also to teach...
Plus there was the ‘grandmother effect’.

I had always considered myself as a rather staid somewhat conservative person
with orthodox views of my own volition. Until I realized that ‘feminists’
considered my views as fringe. That’s the ‘grandmother effect’..a matriarchal
upbringing is entirely different from a feminist upbringing. The former is
about freedom/owning power and the latter is about competition/struggle(in my
understanding)

Every family needs a support system. And every human person does NOT have to
be a parent. Parenting is a big scary and A Very Important Job.

I am reminded of Robert Wright’s Moral Animal where he beckons altruism and
the chapter on kinship. That’s the ‘grandmother effect’.

It’s a topic worthy of a proper thesis.

------
raincom
This is well known to anyone who has worked in a public school system. My
friend used to work as a sub. One day, she found a sick student and sent him
home. Later, she was admonished by a teacher there: this kid lives in a
garage, where they don't have a heater. At least, this kid can feel better in
a warm class room. This happened in Milpitas, CA, last year.

~~~
ddingus
Damn

------
lqet
I am European, and the comments in here talking about how this would never be
a problem in Europe are a bit elitist. It may be true that you may work from
home if you a software developer, but if you do shift work, for example, it
may be very difficult (or impossible) to find a replacement for you if you
realize that your 6-year has a cold 60 minutes before your shift starts. It
may be very possible that your co-workers or your boss wouldn't even
understand why you have to be at home if your kid has a common cold. My mother
was working shifts in a supermarket when I was a kid, and I found it
completely normal to be alone in bed for 6-8 hours during my mothers shift
when I had a slight cold.

You can't compare upper-level office jobs in Europe with lower-level shift
work in the US.

~~~
Escolte
Because here in Western Europe, our healthcare doesn't depend on your
job/income.

Plus, I've found that on average Americans are more health anxious (for
example, if I search in Google Spain in Spanish "I just accidently hit my head
with a wall" the treatment results I'll get will be "if you feel fine
afterwards, and you didn't black out or anything like that, it's okay" while
if I do the same search on google.com/ncr in English the second result tells
me to go to the hospital now and demand a CT scan of my brain to check for an
internal hemorrhage) than Europeans are.

~~~
lqet
> Because here in Western Europe, our healthcare doesn't depend on your
> job/income.

It doesn't? At least where I am from, the _cost_ of healthcare very much
depends in your income, as the insurance rates are calculated like taxes (with
an upper limit, of course). And this only covers basic medical care. Anything
that is viewed as "luxury" or "cosmetic" is either only covered partly, or not
at all, for example artificial dentition, and you need additional insurance
for that, which not everyone can afford.

I am almost amazed when Americans think that healthcare in Europe is basically
free. Nearly 1/10 of my monthly income is spent on medical insurances. The
only difference is that it is quite hard to "opt-out" of the insurance.

~~~
Escolte
Well, when I said free, I of course meant paid through taxes that are adjusted
to your income level. Here in Spain your public healthcare quality won't
change depending on if you make €1000 or €4000. You won't be put on top of a
medical waiting list because you contribute more taxes wise to the system.

Dentistry is another thing altogether.

Also opting out of "public health insurance" is impossible here in Spain,
because it's a right. You can however choose to get private insurance/get
treated by a private healthcare company.

------
awad
"Although the likelihood of missing any school days during the past year
decreased with reduced income, among children missing school, those from low-
income households missed more days of school than did children from higher
income households. Although the reason for absenteeism cannot be ascertained
from this analysis, these data underscore the importance of preventive
measures, such as hand hygiene promotion and education, and the opportunity
for both homes and schools to serve as an important point for implementation
of public health preventive measures, including hand hygiene practice and
education."

~~~
docbrown
That’s another issue itself buried inside of this report. Here’s the meat of
what the report is bringing awareness to.

>Among children who had gastrointestinal illness, 84.6% (family income
<$35,000), 86.1% ($35,000–$49,999), 90.3% ($50,000–$74,999), 89.6%
($75,000–$99,999), and 87.4% (≥$100,000) missed school in the past year.
Similarly, 83.7% of children living below the poverty level with
gastrointestinal illness missed school, compared with 88.3% of those living at
or above the poverty level.

------
Gpetrium
It seems that a lot of people fail to realize some key aspects that lead to
the pressure and outcomes you see on this paper:

* As customers, (1) when the washroom of a diner is dirty, the first reaction is not "Hey, maybe the cleaner was sick", it is an instant negative view. (2) when your favorite coffee shop is closed, most people don't think "I hope everything is alright, I'll come back tomorrow."

* As employees, (1) When someone doesn't show up for a meeting, most people will go for the lowest denominator "Person A is disrespecting my time", etc.

* As employer, (1) When someone doesn't show up to complete a project/deadline/task, the company can go bankrupt, be less profitable or lead to disruptions.

* As fellow humans, we mostly assume that the experience we have had or seen (e.g. having a child and nurturing them or working in tech vs laborer) follow the same mold as everyone else until we read and understand more about that.

Therefore, society creates an environment where unexpected absenteeism is
frowned upon. Whether that is the correct modus operandi is for each and
everyone of us to dig in and ask ourselves.

------
mises
I've seen other comments mention this, but it's really hard to make the case
for paying a wage laborer to not show up. Even if he's sick. Can't do
janitorial work from home. And such labor is highly fungible: very high
turnover, easy replacement, little training, lots of firing/hiring. If you
don't show up, you get replaced, mostly because your company now has to hire
someone else to do the job and has no reason to keep paying you.

Let's not forget that every time we pass stronger "labor laws" (e.g. higher
minimum wage), we do see job loss, decreased hours, second jobs. A paper by
the National Bureau of Economic Research showed that the costs to low-income
workers outweighed the benefits by about three to one. Telling McDonalds it
must pay people to stay home will almost certainly just accelerate the pace of
automation.

~~~
davidgay
> I've seen other comments mention this, but it's really hard to make the case
> for paying a wage laborer to not show up. Even if he's sick.

The concept you're looking for is "insurance". It solves the problem here (for
the employer, for the employee, for the other employees, for society as a
whole).

~~~
mises
Insurance in this case is silly. The premise of insurance is to protect
against financial catastrophe, which is why it is carried for things like a
possible half-million dollar medical bill, house burning down, etc.

Another core tenet of insurance is that the event against which it protects is
not certain (or even likely, typically) to occur. Though this has been
somewhat perverted with medical these days ("I want coverage for my $200/mo
prescription"), it's still the basic idea. American workers take about 5 sick
days per year ([https://www.statista.com/statistics/682924/sick-leave-
days-a...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/682924/sick-leave-days-among-
adults-us-by-age/\);) that's not an uncertainty. And because sick days are
limited, insurance doesn't make sense: businesses offer as many sick days as
they are able and willing to fund; any more they just don't cover.

In summary, there's no "catastrophic situation" here, it's just a serious
expense many can't or wont cover.

------
eecc
What sort of failed state does not mobilize to support and ease the pain of
fellow humans living through such hardship.

By the way, “poor life choices” is not a valid argument.

Edit: ok, in view of the objections regarding the technical definiton of
“failed state” let me reword it to “failed society”. It is closer to my own
objection anyway

~~~
StreamBright
Thanks but I do not need any support from any state. I can manage my and my
children's life just fine without them.

~~~
DanBC
How were your children born? Fed? Clothed? Educated? Transported? Protected
from crime?

~~~
StreamBright
Private healthcare, paid by my salary, private schools, cars, 2nd amendment.

~~~
crankylinuxuser
And see? This is the kind of idiotic one-liners we have to deal with in this
country about taxes and citizenship.

>>How were your children born?

> Private healthcare

So those that can't get jobs with it don't deserve it. And even those who make
little can't really afford it either. Sure the ACA copper plan leaves the
policy holder with 30%, but in actuality its insurance they can't actually
use.

>>Fed? Clothed?

> paid by my salary

Again, if someone else can't get a job, they and their children shouldn't eat
or afford clothing. That sounds like a 3rd world shithole...

>>Educated?

> private schools

Oh. You're one of _those_ types. I'd imagine you've never had a day of
adversity in your life. Never been homeless, never hungered. And I'd bet that
familial money has ensconced your vision that people just must be lazy.

>>Transported?

> cars

Again, you're one of "Them". Adversity is being annoyed, or having "first
world problems". Ever been without a car? Ever been stuck in a city with
nobody really to call on for help?

>>Protected from crime?

> 2nd amendment

Oh yes, because the best crime prevention is Somalia-style arm everything and
shoot first. Seriously, how much of an idiot do you have to be to think this
is anywhere a good policy?

To my counterparts in Europe: this is what we have to deal with in this
country. We pay taxes, and some of us want to pay none and go this anarchic
"every man for themselves" style governance, complete with private police
forces, private firefighters, and little to no government structure. What
little "healthcare" we have with ObamaCare / PPACA is hated and derided with
the utmost bile. And even the state (Indiana) I live in passed a law 'Banning
cities or counties from banning plastic bags, straws or other one-time plastic
things' \- it even includes banning taxing those products. (0)

(0)
[https://www.indystar.com/story/news/politics/2016/03/23/bill...](https://www.indystar.com/story/news/politics/2016/03/23/bill-
banning-local-plastic-bag-restrictions-signed-law/82183114/)

------
markdown
Fiji just introduced 5 days/yr of "Family Care Leave" on the 1st of Jan, 2019.
The Act doesn't require there to be sickness involved, so while you can take
leave to care for your sick family member, theoretically you can also do so to
support them at a school rugby match:
[https://i.imgur.com/Ct0wv5D.png](https://i.imgur.com/Ct0wv5D.png)

Fiji is just barely above "third world" status. What's your excuse, USA?

~~~
umanwizard
> What's your excuse, USA?

Well, what's Fiji's excuse for being "barely above 'third world' status" ?

What makes you think it's normal for Fiji to have low standards of
development, but it's an aberration for the USA?

It turns out there are many different dimensions of development, and just like
many countries, the US ranks poorly on some of those dimensions, due to
extremely complicated and maybe intractable political and cultural issues.

~~~
markdown
> Well, what's Fiji's excuse for being "barely above 'third world' status" ?

Well there's a very long list of reasons starting from geographic isolation to
brain drain (incl. to the USA) all the way up to military coups, but I doubt
that was a serious question so there's no point me answering your question in
any great detail.

> What makes you think it's normal for Fiji to have low standards of
> development, but it's an aberration for the USA?

See above for why Fiji has low standards of development. In comparison, USA is
the most prosperous and powerful nation on earth and has been for over a
century. You've enjoyed democracy for almost 250 years. You've been to the
moon.

> the US ranks poorly on some of those dimensions, due to extremely
> complicated and maybe intractable political and cultural issues.

And at last after the defensive stuff is out of the way, we see an attempt at
an answer, abstract and hand-wavy though it is.

~~~
umanwizard
> See above for why Fiji has low standards of development. In comparison, USA
> is the most prosperous and powerful nation on earth and has been for over a
> century. You've enjoyed democracy for almost 250 years. You've been to the
> moon.

Democracy and space programs are two dimensions of development, but certainly
not the whole story. India is a democracy, and Russia has an advanced space
program. Both countries have loads of problems. So I'm not sure what your
point is with democracy and the space program.

As for "powerful", I also don't see how that's relevant. China is extremely
powerful, and Switzerland is not powerful at all. However I would bet my life
that a greater fraction of Swiss than Chinese people have access to sick
leave.

Yes, the US is prosperous in _some_ ways, and not in others.

> And at last after the defensive stuff is out of the way, we see an attempt
> at an answer, abstract and hand-wavy though it is.

Actually that was the point of my entire post. Everything else in the post was
an illustration of that point.

Let me make another point. The US isn't a person; it doesn't have willpower,
feelings, or emotions. So it doesn't make sense to reason as though "the US"
made some sort of irrational bad decision to be a shitty country where people
can't take the day off of work. It doesn't make decisions at all in the way a
human being does. It's an emergent _system_ with no mind of its own and must
be understood as such.

~~~
benj111
"Let me make another point. The US isn't a person; it doesn't have willpower,
feelings, or emotions"

You made a similar point in your reply to me, but you've made it better here,
so I'll reply here.

The US is a human construct, just like any other nation. And part of 'The US'
is its people, its citizens. You can't divorce the country from the people
that make it.

It does have willpower, it does have feelings, it does have emotions. As an
example take a look at _the countries_ reaction to 9/11\. There was a
reaction, which seems to disprove your theory, I would go further and say it
was quite a _human_ reaction.

------
dfilppi
So high income parents with no sick leave don't send their kids?

~~~
cimmanom
High income parents without sick leave may be able to hire a babysitter. And
are far more likely have a job that can be done from home (most "knowledge
work") than requiring physical presence (food service, retail, labor). And are
more likely to simply have more leverage with their employers / more rainy day
resources to be able to insist on taking a day off anyway and swallow whatever
the consequences are.

------
michaco33
People who work hourly are in the same boat and come to work sick.

------
sabujp
the disconnect in this thread is a mild shock

------
black-tea
Of course they do. When I was a kid I stayed off and my mum looked after me. I
really don't understand how people can think they can have a normal career
_and_ have children. Let's just stop. We're not better off with all this extra
working.

