In sickness and in health

In another time, when communism held some credibility, there was a case for the common good. The weak survive through the strong. But in today’s individualistic environment, the weak survive through the forced goodwill of the strong.

My father is a prime example of the baby boomer ethic. For this generation, turning up each day was a duty to their employer and themselves. In the 25 years he stayed with the one employer, he took a total of 16 sick days - 0.6 per year. It wasn’t as though he didn’t get the flu, have headaches and just generally feel like putting his feet up at home, he just didn’t believe that feeling poorly was a valid excuse to take a day off.

This is in contrast to the generations that followed who feel entitled to all forms of leave and fail to view it through the communist-inspired perspective that promotes a sharing of sickness and health. By not using at least half your allotted sick leave you are giving up holidays which are statistically yours.

To stem the strategic sickie tide, a number of companies have implemented a Monday/Friday sick day policy which requires employees to provide a doctors certificate to validate the fact it was spent in a doctor’s surgery for at least some part of the day to obtain the necessary documentation.

So foreign is this policy, which does little to promote trust within organisations that when a legitimate sick day was taken by my father, on a Friday, he was in a state of disbelief when a doctor’s certificate was demanded. “I don’t need a doctor to tell me I need to stay at home sipping hot tea!” was his complaint.

I contend that sick leave should be opened up to the forces of the free market. Across Australia, employees take an average of 5.2 sick days per leave out of the allotted 10. Why don’t companies simply build this average into their budgets and let the market determine its distribution.

Let those vital souls who make it in every day trade their allocation for either additional annual leave days or some other form of incentive. This would add a structure to the workplace survival of the fittest. Stay in the pink and trade your leave with those who become fully sick. Let the fully sick save their annual leave for holidays and not succumb to taking leave without pay, a mature version of being unemployed.

It would be nice to believe that as a collective we support each other through tough times but is the underlying guilt and disdain worth this perhaps outdated notion? A market for sick leave would allow those who make the financial and personal investment in their health to rightly benefit while offering those who through misfortune or mismanagement, fail to maintain their health, take guiltless sick leave.

As I took my spoon to breakfast in front of the computer last Monday morning and quickly flicked through the news headlines I was struck by the looming forecast - fine, sunny and averaging in the mid-30s. I rinsed out my bowl and sneaked a glance out the office window - skies of blue, a blue depressingly similar to the one currently set as my desktop background. Returning to my desk I scanned the calendar, Tuesday meeting, Wednesday deadline and Thursday - surprisingly clear. Was that a cough I felt at the back of my throat?