Self-Employed Workers’ Access to State Paid Leave Programs in 2026

To date, 14 states and Washington, D.C., have passed paid family and medical leave laws.¹ These laws provide covered workers with wage replacement benefits when they need time away from work to address their own serious health needs, care for a seriously ill or injured loved one, or bond with a new child.

Most of these state laws, though not all, include the opportunity for self-employed workers—including freelancers, independent contractors, and sole proprietors—to access paid family and sick leave coverage. Access to these benefits is critical for the self-employed, who experience the same health and family needs as all workers but almost always lack any form of paid leave unless they have access to an insurance system.

Prior Center for American Progress work in this series (see below) has explored in greater detail why these workers need paid leave and the essential benefits leave provides.² This issue brief explains the status of coverage for self-employed workers under state paid leave programs.

For employees, coverage under state paid leave laws is generally automatic. Employees have a legal right to coverage, and they—and/or their employers—are legally required to contribute to the program. In contrast, no existing state paid leave program automatically covers self-employed workers.³ While counts of the number of self-employed workers vary substantially, there are at least 16.8 million self-employed workers in the United States, making up more than 10 percent of all employed people in the country.⁴ States that have extended the opportunity for paid leave coverage to self-employed workers have done so on a voluntary, opt-in basis.⁵

Twelve of the 15 existing state paid leave programs generally⁶ allow—or will allow, when the programs are fully operational—self-employed workers to voluntarily opt in to coverage: California,⁷ New York,⁸ Washington,⁹ Massachusetts,¹⁰ Connecticut,¹¹ Oregon,¹² Colorado,¹³ Maryland,¹⁴ Minnesota,¹⁵ Maine,¹⁶ Virginia,¹⁷ and Washington, D.C.¹⁸ Nationwide, 30 percent of self-employed people live in states that currently provide paid leave benefits and allow self-employed people to opt in; when all currently passed paid leave programs are up and running, that number will rise to about 34 percent.¹⁹

Opting in to a state paid leave program typically involves submitting an application or notice to a state agency or enrolling through an online portal, providing required documentation, and then complying with the state’s rules.²⁰ Self-employed people must pay contributions into that program’s insurance system. In exchange, subject to state-specific eligibility rules, self-employed people become eligible for cash benefits, set as a percentage of their self-employment income, when they are unable to work because of covered medical, parental, or caregiving needs. The following subsections provide further information on how these programs work.

Benefits

State paid leave programs provide cash benefits from an insurance fund to those who cannot work due to serious health or family needs.²¹ Typically, covered needs include addressing one’s serious health needs, caring for those of a loved one, or bonding with a new child. In addition, some programs cover needs in relation to military deployment or sexual or domestic violence.²² If self-employed people opt in and meet the eligibility requirements, they can apply for and receive cash benefits to cover lost income when they cannot work for a covered reason.

Benefits are set as a percentage of self-employment income, up to a weekly cap. This can be either a flat rate, where all workers receive the same percentage of their income, or a progressive rate based on income.²³ Typically, progressive-rate programs replace a higher percentage of income than flat-rate programs. Most commonly, progressive-rate programs replace 90 percent of a worker’s pay below a certain amount and replace income above that amount at a lower percentage, usually 50 percent.²⁴ This creates a sliding scale where lower-income workers—including lower-income self-employed workers who opt for coverage—receive a higher percentage of their income.

Benefits are available for a period of weeks, with 12 weeks being the most common maximum time limit per need.²⁵ The exact available duration varies by state and may vary by purpose.²⁶ If appropriate, self-employed workers may be able to take benefits on an intermittent basis, rather than as a single unit, to cover recurring absences such as medical appointments.²⁷

Costs

The costs to opt in vary widely by state. Contributions are typically set as a percentage of a self-employed person’s income, adjusted annually. Among the states with opt-in options, Colorado is at the low end with an opt-in contribution of 0.44 percent of income,²⁸ while California is at the high end with a typical opt-in cost of an astronomical 8.84 percent of income.²⁹ All other programs are below 1 percent. (see Figure 1) Every program, with the exception of Washington, D.C.,³⁰ and California,³¹ caps contributions, usually applying them only to income up to a certain amount, most commonly at the maximum amount subject to taxation for Social Security,³² which is currently $184,500.³³

In six state programs, self-employed people pay the same amount as employees at the same income level. This can mean either that costs are split between employees and employers, but self-employed people pay only the employee share—as in Colorado, Oregon, Washington state, Maine, and Virginia³⁴—or that only employees contribute, and self-employed people pay the same amount as employees, as in Connecticut.³⁵

In six other state programs, self-employed workers must pay a higher share of income than employees. In four states, employers and employees both contribute,³⁶ but self-employed workers must pay both the employer and employee shares, potentially resulting in much higher rates than employees pay.³⁷ In Washington, D.C., employees do not contribute to the cost of the program, but self-employed workers who opt in pay the full employer contribution.³⁸ 

Eligibility and waiting periods

For employees, eligibility typically depends on meeting a minimum amount of covered earnings or time worked over a fixed period prior to the use of leave.³⁹ For the self-employed, benefit eligibility is tied to requirements workers must meet following their decision to opt in to the program. These requirements could include a minimum passage of time after opting in, making paid contributions for a minimum period of time or minimum amount of covered income, or both.⁴⁰ In Washington, D.C., and New York, workers who fail to opt in within a set timeframe following becoming self-employed face a longer waiting period—one year in Washington, D.C., and two years in New York.⁴¹ To be eligible to opt in, most programs require self-employed people to commit to remaining in the program for a specific period of time, typically three years.⁴²

The number of self-employed people who opt in has remained shockingly low across all state programs that offer the option. The 10 fully operational programs that allow individuals to opt in report that for the most recent available time period, an approximate 133,500 total self-employed people opted in out of 5.1 million self-employed people in those states, a rate of about 2.64 percent. (see Figure 2) Opt-in rates vary but remain low in all states, from just 0.06 percent in California up to 11.37 percent in New York (for disability only). (see Figure 2)

Exactly why program usage remains low merits further research and examination. One likely driver of low usage is low awareness: Workers cannot use a program they do not know exists. Lack of awareness is an ongoing challenge for paid leave programs—both for employees and self-employed workers—requiring continual outreach and educational investments. Because of the opt-in system, the stakes are even higher for self-employed workers, as they must proactively enroll in the program, typically for some period of time prior to using it. However, many self-employed workers do not seek out information about paid leave until they have an urgent need for it, at which point it may be too late. More research is needed to identify best practices in education and outreach to engage self-employed workers as well as implement these practices in all states.

Even when workers are aware of programs, other barriers may exist. In California, for example, the exceptional cost of opting in puts coverage out of reach for many self-employed people, which likely contributes to California’s particularly low opt-in rate. In 2026, covered employees must pay in at a rate of 1.3 percent of their income.⁴³ California’s program is fully employee funded, with no employer contribution, so this contribution represents the full amount being paid into the fund on behalf of employees. However, self-employed workers who opt in to the program must typically pay 8.84 percent of their net profit—nearly seven times the rate of an employee making the same amount.⁴⁴ Making matters worse, self-employed people are eligible for fewer weeks of benefits—a maximum of 39 weeks of disability benefits, compared with 52 weeks for employees.⁴⁵ As a result, self-employed people must pay much more for less.

In New York, self-employed workers face a different challenge. Those wishing to opt in to the state’s paid family leave program must do so within 26 weeks of becoming self-employed. If they do not, they face a mandatory two-year waiting period after electing paid family leave coverage before they can access the benefits. In other words, they must pay premiums for a full two years before becoming eligible for these benefits.⁴⁶ This deadline is not widely known, and many self-employed people inadvertently miss their window to opt in without triggering the waiting period.⁴⁷ As noted above, other programs have waiting periods after workers opt in before they can qualify for benefits, but none are nearly as long as New York’s two-year waiting period.

More work remains to ensure that opportunities to opt in to state paid leave programs are well understood and designed to meet the needs of the self-employed workforce. In addition, the three state paid leave programs that do not currently broadly allow self-employed workers to opt in should be amended to include this crucial option.

The self-employed need paid leave, allowing them to heal, to bond, and to care without jeopardizing their economic security. State paid leave programs giving these workers the opportunity to choose coverage are crucial first steps that should be studied and expanded. These policies should pave the way for true national paid leave for all—including paid leave for the self-employed.