By Susan Lakebrink-Nemish, MotoTireUSA
My husband and I own and operate a small motorcycle dealership and service department, MotoTireUSA. After years of hard work and careful budgeting, we recently reached the point where we could offer our employees paid vacation time—a benefit we were incredibly proud to provide. Unfortunately, the newly mandated sick time under Prop A puts that hard-earned progress at risk.
As a small business, we operate on thin margins. While we absolutely value our employees and want to support them in times of genuine illness, we’re deeply concerned that this mandate will force us to reduce or even eliminate other hard-earned benefits like vacation time. We simply cannot afford to provide both under our current operating budget.
Sick time, as many business owners can attest, is among the most frequently abused benefits. Without the resources for oversight or management that large corporations have, we fear this policy will become a substitute for vacation time, placing further strain on our already limited staff and resources.
In addition, we are not yet in a position to offer health care, and the compounding costs of employer taxes (including the 941 match), paid vacation, and now mandatory sick leave, are making it nearly impossible to grow. We entered this business with the American spirit of growth and opportunity in mind—but with policies like this, it feels more like punishment than support.
Between federal, state, and local taxes, we’re already paying around 41% in taxes. Adding yet another mandate without exemptions or scaling for small businesses like ours only pushes us further away from sustainability.
We urge you to reconsider how mandates like Prop A are applied, and to explore options that offer flexibility, exemptions, or phase-ins for small businesses. We’re not asking to do less for our employees—we’re asking for the chance to grow into the kind of business that can do more, without being buried before we get there.
