Do all workers get paid sick leave?

UPDATE: Proposition A 2024 was overturned by Missouri state lawmakers in an eleventh-hour decision. However, workers can still accrue and use their earned paid sick days until August 28, 2025.

Under the original Proposition A passed by Missouri voters in November of 2024, nearly all private sector employees were guaranteed paid sick leave. There were minor exemptions. Government employees often have paid sick leave but were not impacted by Proposition A.

Current Status

While Proposition A has been overturned, workers who have already accrued paid sick time can continue to use it until August 28, 2025. Employers should continue to allow workers to use their earned sick time during this period.

Who was exempt from the paid sick leave law?

The following workers were exempt from Missouri’s paid sick leave requirements under Proposition A:

• Federal government employees (though they typically have their own sick leave benefits)
• State and local government employees (though many have sick leave through their employer)
• Independent contractors (those who are genuinely self-employed, not misclassified employees)
• Certain railroad workers covered by the federal Railroad Unemployment Insurance Act
• Certain seasonal employees who work less than 120 days in a year

What if I’m a part-time worker?

Part-time workers were covered by the paid sick leave law. You accrued sick time at the same rate as full-time employees (1 hour for every 30 hours worked), though you naturally accrued fewer hours if you worked fewer hours overall.

More on exceptions

RSMO 290.600 (5)

“Employee”, any individual employed in this state by an employer, but does not include:

(a) Any individual engaged in the activities of an educational, charitable, religious, or nonprofit organization where the employer-employee relationship does not, in fact, exist or where the services rendered to the organization are on a voluntary basis;

(b) Any individual standing in loco parentis to foster children in their care;

(c) Any individual employed for less than four months in any year in a resident or day camp for children or youth, or any individual employed by an educational conference center operated by an educational, charitable or not-for-profit organization;

(d) Any individual engaged in the activities of an educational organization where employment by the organization is in lieu of the requirement that the individual pay the cost of tuition, housing or other educational fees of the organization or where earnings of the individual employed by the organization are credited toward the payment of the cost of tuition, housing or other educational fees of the organization;

(e) Any individual employed on or about a private residence on an occasional basis for six hours or less on each occasion;

(f) Any individual employed on a casual basis to provide baby-sitting services;

(g) Any individual employed by an employer subject to the provisions of Part A of Subtitle IV of Title 49, United States Code, 49 U.S.C. §§ 10101 et seq.;

(h) Any individual employed on a casual or intermittent basis as a golf caddy, newsboy, or in a similar occupation;

(i) Any individual who is employed in any government position defined in 29 U.S.C. §§ 203(e)(2)(C)(i)-(ii);

(j) Any individual employed by a retail or service business whose annual gross volume sales made or business done is less than five hundred thousand dollars;

(k) Any individual who is an offender, as defined in section 217.010, who is incarcerated in any correctional facility operated by the department of corrections, including offenders