If your employer observes Martin Luther King Jr. Day, you’re in a minority, albeit a growing one.
No group appears to track how many Charlotte businesses observe the day by giving its employees the day off. But nationwide, 31 percent of U.S. employers surveyed by a publisher of business newsletters say they honored the holiday in 2007.
BNA, a trade publisher, found big distinctions among the types of employers who observe the holiday. Governments and nonprofit groups were most likely to give the day off (55 percent) and manufacturers least likely (6 percent).
In Charlotte, large employers such as Bank of America and Wachovia shut down for the national holiday. So do local governments, including Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools.
Two other large employers, Carolinas HealthCare System and Duke Energy do not, though company representatives pointed out employees can use paid time off or, in Duke’s case, an “employee choice” day if their supervisors approve.
Among media companies, The Charlotte Observer honors the holiday as “Diversity Day” — workers who must get the paper out may take another day off. MLK Day is a paid holiday at The Charlotte Post, though some staffers must work to cover MLK events. It isn’t at Creative Loafing, though some staffers take the day off anyway.
Business participation in 2008 was down two percentage points from 2007, when the day was observed by one-third of employers surveyed — the highest rate recorded since 1986, when King’s birthday became a national holiday.
That year, just 14 percent of those surveyed made the day paid holiday, according to a BNA press release. Survey figures stayed in the teens until a spike to 24 percent in 1993.
Larger employers — those with 1,000 or more employees — are only slightly more likely than smaller firms to give workers paid time off on the holiday.
This article appears in Jan 16-22, 2008.
