Does Pennsylvania require paid family or sick leave in 2026?
No statewide law requires either. But Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Allegheny County each mandate accrued paid sick leave by work location, and federal FMLA gives 12 weeks unpaid at employers with 50 or more employees. The rest is the policy you write.
· Pennsylvania, United States guide
Illustration · Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania mandates no statewide paid family leave and no statewide paid sick leave. There is no state programme, no payroll withholding line, and no claim portal. The only job-protected leave floor that reaches the whole state is federal FMLA, and it applies only to employers with 50 or more employees.
What makes Pennsylvania different from a true nothing state is local law. Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Allegheny County each require accrued paid sick leave for employees who work inside their borders, so a single national policy can be compliant statewide yet fall short in those three jurisdictions. Below the FMLA line the federal floor is PWFA accommodation at 15 employees, USERRA reemployment, and jury-duty protection.
Does Pennsylvania require paid family leave?
No. Pennsylvania has no statewide paid family leave law. Around a dozen states plus Washington DC run mandatory paid-family-leave programmes funded by payroll contributions; Pennsylvania is not one of them. Compare that to New Jersey, where you withhold a payroll contribution from day one to fund a state benefit.
There is no state PFL line on a Pennsylvania payslip, no contribution rate, and no benefit claim to file. A bill to create one, the Family Care Act, passed the state House in 2026 but is still in committee in the Senate, so it is proposed law, not current law.
Until that bill is enacted, the cost that adds a fraction of a percent of wages in California, New York or Washington simply does not exist in Pennsylvania. A Pennsylvania hire carries no state paid-family-leave deduction, and there is no statewide wage replacement for a new baby, a serious illness, or a family emergency.
For a hire below the FMLA threshold there is no statutory job hold for those events either. Whatever paid parental, paid family or paid bereavement leave a Pennsylvania employee receives is the leave you chose to write into the offer. That is a competitive decision, not a statewide compliance one, and it is worth tracking the Family Care Act in case the rules change. See how Pennsylvania termination law treats employees on voluntary leave for the related at-will picture.
Does Pennsylvania require paid sick leave?
Not at the state level, but the answer is local, not blank. Pennsylvania has no statewide paid sick leave statute, yet three jurisdictions mandate accrued paid sick leave for anyone working within their borders.
Philadelphia runs the Promoting Healthy Families and Workplaces Act. Pittsburgh runs the Paid Sick Days Act, upheld by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in 2019 and expanded again for 2026. Allegheny County runs its own Paid Sick Leave Act for employees working in the county outside Pittsburgh.
This is the distinctive Pennsylvania trap. Each of the three ordinances works the same way in principle: an employee accrues paid sick time as they work, the bank carries over within limits, and it covers their own illness and care for a family member. The hour caps and accrual rates differ by city and by employer size, and Pittsburgh raised its requirement on 1 January 2026, so the detail is genuinely local.
The consequence for a remote-first employer is concrete. A single national sick-leave policy can be fully compliant in rural Pennsylvania and still fall short for a worker based in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh or Allegheny County, because those ordinances set a floor your national policy has to clear. The fix is not a statewide rule to track; it is a work-location overlay that tops the policy up where a local ordinance bites. Review Pennsylvania wage and overtime law alongside sick-leave accrual, since both follow the work-location principle. Outside those three jurisdictions, paid sick days are whatever the offer letter says.
What does federal FMLA give Pennsylvania employees?
Federal FMLA gives eligible Pennsylvania employees up to 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave per 12-month period, with group health coverage continued at your normal contribution.
It applies only to employers with 50 or more employees within a 75-mile radius. The employee qualifies after 12 months of tenure and 1,250 hours worked in the prior year.
FMLA is the federal floor for unpaid, job-protected leave. Pennsylvania has no statewide mini-FMLA on top of it, so the federal rules stand alone for leave, while the local sick-leave ordinances run separately. The 50-employee threshold counts your entire US workforce, not just Pennsylvania staff, which catches multi-state employers off guard. That same headcount logic shapes your obligations under Pennsylvania termination law.
Source: US Department of Labor, Family and Medical Leave Act
Hire 30 people in Pennsylvania and 25 in another state and you cross the 50-employee line even though neither state alone reaches it. Once tripped, the obligation runs for the rest of the current calendar year and the full following year, even if headcount later falls back. Use the Employer Cost Calculator to model the benefit-continuation cost once FMLA kicks in.
| FMLA element | Federal rule |
|---|---|
| Employer threshold | 50+ employees within 75 miles, 20+ weeks in the current or prior year |
| Employee eligibility | 12 months employed and 1,250 hours worked in the prior 12 months |
| Standard leave | 12 weeks unpaid, job protected, per 12-month period |
| Military caregiver leave | 26 weeks in a single 12-month period |
| Pay during leave | None; FMLA is unpaid by statute |
FMLA gives no wage replacement of its own. Below 50 employees, or for a worker in their first 12 months, there is no FMLA right at all and no Pennsylvania mini-FMLA to fall back on, though a local sick-leave ordinance may still apply.
What pregnancy and disability protections apply in Pennsylvania?
Federal law applies and Pennsylvania adds no separate statewide pregnancy-leave statute. The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act requires reasonable accommodation for pregnancy, childbirth and related conditions at any employer with 15 or more employees.
The Pregnancy Discrimination Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act apply at the same 15-employee threshold, and the PUMP Act gives nursing employees break time and a private space at almost every employer.
Between 15 and 50 employees there is a real gap. PWFA covers accommodation, such as modified duties, schedule changes, time off for appointments and lactation breaks, but FMLA does not yet apply, so no statute gives a Pennsylvania worker a 12-week job hold for the birth itself.
That gap is the decision your offer letter has to make explicit. The most retention-critical voluntary line for a Pennsylvania hire is paid parental leave, because federal unpaid FMLA at 50 and PWFA accommodation at 15 leave a wide space that only a written policy fills. A local sick-leave ordinance can cover short recovery time, but none of the three substitutes for parental leave. Check Pennsylvania state tax and unemployment insurance to see how payroll obligations sit alongside these leave thresholds.
Pennsylvania employers under 50, military leave and jury duty
Below 50 employees Pennsylvania imposes no statewide mandatory leave law, with three narrow exceptions that apply at any size: PWFA accommodation at 15 employees, USERRA reemployment for service members, and jury-duty protection. A Philadelphia, Pittsburgh or Allegheny County sick-leave ordinance can add a fourth, by work location.
USERRA protects a service member's civilian job for up to five years of cumulative service and reinstates them on the escalator principle. Pennsylvania law bars firing or threatening an employee for answering a jury summons.
USERRA reinstates a returning service member to the position they would have reached had they not been called up, not simply the job they left. Health-plan continuation runs alongside, and the protection applies regardless of company size.
For a small Pennsylvania employer outside the three local jurisdictions this is the entire mandatory picture: accommodate pregnancy at 15 employees, reinstate service members, and protect jury service. Everything beyond that, including the 26-week military caregiver entitlement that arrives with FMLA at 50 employees, is either a federal trigger you grow into, a local sick-leave duty by work location, or a voluntary benefit you choose. The Teamed employer of record service tracks these thresholds across your whole US payroll as you add headcount.
How Teamed runs Pennsylvania leave end to end
Teamed becomes your legal employer of record in Pennsylvania for $599 per employee per month flat, with zero FX mark-up. You design the leave package; we administer it and track every federal trigger and local ordinance for you.
FMLA eligibility, the 50-employee threshold measured across your whole US payroll, PWFA accommodation logging, USERRA reinstatement and jury-duty pay continuation all run on one platform, and we apply the Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Allegheny County sick-leave overlay by each employee's work location.
Real HR and legal experts handle your Pennsylvania hires and know the FMLA, PWFA and local sick-leave stack by heart. An actual person, not a chatbot or a pooled queue. There is no setup fee and no exit fee, and statutory employer cost (FICA, FUTA, SUTA, workers' compensation) passes through at cost, itemised on every invoice so you see every figure.
Contractor onboarding, EOR payroll and entity graduation all live on one platform. A Pennsylvania contractor who converts to W-2 keeps their record, and that same employee can graduate to your own US entity without switching systems. Use the Crossover Calculator to see the month the model flips. The US hiring guide covers the full federal picture across all states. EOR is the right model for a first Pennsylvania hire, until it isn't.
Pennsylvania looks like a clean leave question and is not quite one. There is no statewide paid family leave, no statewide paid sick leave, and federal FMLA only once you cross 50 employees. But Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Allegheny County each require accrued paid sick leave, so a national policy that reads fine on paper can still fall short for a worker in one of those three places. The work is policy design plus a work-location overlay, and getting both right is what a Pennsylvania candidate actually feels.
Pennsylvania writes no statewide leave law. The federal FMLA floor starts at 50 employees and stops at unpaid.
But Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Allegheny County each mandate accrued paid sick leave by work location.
So a national policy can be compliant statewide and still short in those three places. Here the offer letter plus a local overlay is the leave policy.
