Obama Seeks Federal Mandate on Paid Family Sick Leave

He's always mandating something, usually by unconstitutional executive action. So it'll be interesting to see if the GOP stands up against another federal mandate boondoggle.

At the cover of today's business section, at the Los Angeles Times, "Obama pushes paid sick/family leave for workers":

President Obama embarked on an effort Thursday to make paid family leave the new norm in America, using a strategy that garnered him some success last year in increasing the minimum wage for certain workers.

Obama signed an order to give up to six weeks of paid leave to all federal employees when a new child arrives and publicly called on Congress to pass a federal law guaranteeing seven days of paid sick leave for all Americans.

He also announced that Department of Labor money would be made available for states and cities that want to study implementing their own such policies.

Then, after a lunchtime meeting with coffee shop owners and working parents in Baltimore, Obama unveiled a pitch to corporate America: Paid family leave is good for companies' bottom lines.

"When they make that investment in their employees, there's a dividend," Obama told reporters at Charmington's cafe. "They end up being more profitable over the long term."

The president's approach to paid leave draws heavily on his experience over the last year with the minimum wage, a proposal he rolled out in the State of the Union address last January by asking Congress to raise workers' base pay to $10.10 an hour from $7.25. His first steps were to sign an executive order raising the wage for people working on federal contracts and to set off on a speaking tour to plug the idea.

Today, Obama has yet to persuade the Republican-led Congress to hike the wage. But the idea has picked up currency: 17 states and the District of Columbia have raised the requirement to increase the pay of an estimated 7 million workers.

One Obama aide called the momentum "heartening," and the president's team is embracing the strategy as one of the best tools at his disposal as advisors prepare to reuse it for paid leave.

Still, the newest sales pitch faces the same challenges as the one for minimum wage. Republicans scoff at the idea of imposing more costly requirements, especially on small businesses.

Americans already have "great freedom" when it comes to work, said Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), noting that workers have latitude to choose a career and negotiate for the benefits that matter most to them. American businesses operate with far fewer restrictions than the rest of the world, he said.

"One more government mandate, however well-intentioned, will only reduce those freedoms, making it harder for employees to find jobs, negotiate for the things they need and open and run businesses," he said.

Sounds good. But time will tell if these congressional RINOS hold the line against Obama's latest bid to cement is bankrupt socialist legacy.