[wefarrell]

At the very least we need Federally mandated sick days. My mother caught COVID at the beginning of March of 2020 from a coworker who knew her husband had it but continued to come into work out of fear of losing her job. It's crazy that it would happen again during the next pandemic.

Meanwhile 20 years after 9/11 we're still taking off our shoes to get on airplanes.

[commandlinefan]

> out of fear of losing her job

Wait, are you saying she was actually threatened with being fired if she didn't come in sick or that she just thought that she might be? If the latter, no federal mandate would change that - I get sick days, but I feel weird taking them, like I'm getting a black mark on my employment record that will come back to haunt me later. No law can change that, that's just how our society (currently) is.

[dragontamer]

> No law can change that, that's just how our society (currently) is.

Laws can change society, through propaganda. See "Click it or Ticket" campaigns, and the like.

A simple PSA / Propaganda effort of "If you're sick with COVID19, stay at home. Federally mandated leave demands it", would probably go a long way. Maybe something like 'Use your sick days, they're a promised benefit of US Law', or "True Americans stay home when they're sick". (Etc. etc. I'm not good with PSA videos, but give it to some Hollywood artist and have them figure out the details, lol)

The WW2 propaganda levied upon the population was incredibly epic in size and scope, and was key to building US national unity and drumming up support for the war.

--------

There was that Bangladesh mask study, showing that something like 30+% of people would listen to masking advice/propaganda from religious leaders, in that 400+ village study. (200 villages as the control, 200 villages as the experiment. Found a bunch of religious leaders who would push pro-Mask statements and then ran the experiment). 10% of people wore masks before the study, 40% of the experiment-group wore masks after the study (so 30% of people were "affected").

No, that's not 100%. But changing even a fraction of the population would have huge effects.

[wefarrell]

A law would dissuade corporate cultures that punish workers for taking sick days. It would pave the way for class action lawsuits against companies where this type of thing is a pattern.