For most workers, shifts last 8 hours, 5 days a week, for a 40 hour work week. However, many workers, especially those who work in healthcare, are required to work for all 24 hours in a day, in which a healthcare worker must be available to provide care for at least 13 hours, and is given 3 hours for meals, and 8 hours for sleep during their working period. While 8 hours of sleep and 3 hours for meals seems to be reasonable, these breaks from work are applied throughout the day rather than at once. If a patient requires support while a worker is sleeping, their sleep may be interrupted. Similarly, if an emergency occurs while a worker is taking a lunch break, they’re required to act, regardless of if they’ve already worked their 13 hours or not. For many shifts, this results in less than 11 hours of breaks being given, with many workers getting little to no sleep or meals during their shifts.

Not having consistent sleep and meals is known to cause both mental and physical health issues, and healthcare workers are at the forefronts of these effects. For many, these effects, such as the increase in likelihood of dementia, cardiovascular strains, poorer metabolism, and so much more, negatively impacting life in ways that can’t be undone. Forcing workers to stay for all 24 hours in a day inherently disallows them from being able to handle or address health issues caused by working for such long periods of time, and – for those who work for several 24 hour shifts in a row – causes prevention of harm to be nearly impossible. Even despite these downsides, what many consider to be an even worse failure of workers’ rights is the lack of pay following 13 hours of work. 

New York State laws regarding Medicare only allow for workers to be paid for the hours they’re meant to be working; the 11 hours that are meant to be spent for meals and sleep aren’t included in pay calculations. Despite that, laws also exist to pay workers for any interrupted time during what’s meant to be their breaks, but these laws are often left unenforced, with most workers, largely consisting of immigrant Asian women, being consistently left with less pay than what they’ve worked for, while still working for an excessive amount of time.

What is the “No More 24” Act?

“Int 0615-2024 – Maximum working hours for home care aides,” more commonly known as the “No More 24” Act introduced by New York City Council member Christopher Marte, reads as follows:

“This bill would set the maximum working hours that an employer may assign to a home care aide. Assigned hours would be limited to 12 hours for any shift, or within any 24-hours period. A home care aide could be assigned additional hours in the event of an emergency, but no more than 2 per day or 10 per week. Additionally, a home care aide could be assigned more than 56 hours in a week provided that the employer provides 2 weeks advanced notice and obtains written consent from the home care aide. This bill would also impose a notice requirement, under which employers would be required to provide home care aides with a copy of a form notice of rights.” 

This bill would, overall, prevent many of the abuses mentioned previously from occurring. Only allowing for shifts up to 12 hours would prevent the negative effects of one being interrupted from rest or meals, receive full payment for the hours they’ve spent working, and only allowing for 2 hours of emergency assigned work per day prevents extreme damages caused by the constant need to be active in case of an emergency from the 24 hour workday. 

Why hasn’t the act passed?

Facing court trials as far back as 2015, the Chinese-American Planning Council (CPC) has opposed state-wide bills that would prevent the 24-hour workday from being made illegal. Along with that, the firm had spent almost each year in court since 2015 arguing that, instead of a class-action lawsuit involving workers who’ve been mistreated by the organization, each worker should be forced to independently arbitrate with the CPC, only allowing individuals to attempt to obtain reparations for their mistreat, and allowing the workday length to continue. This ensures that one person successfully winning a legal battle against the CPC doesn’t also apply to any other worker who’s faced mistreatment.

Similar bills introduced to City Council have failed before. “Assembly Bill A3145A”, which would have also split the 24 hour workday into two, separate 12 hours shifts by different people, had been struck down by former City Council speaker Adrienne Adams, claiming, along with similar oppositions to the current bill, that such a decision should require a change on the state level rather than just to the City of New York, for the state controls Medicare spending, claiming that only the state would be able to control how funds would need to be shifted to account for two 12-hour shifts rather than one 24-hour shift.

The main hurdles preventing the bill from passing is a suggested adjustment to the bill from Mayor Zohran Mamdani, as well as opposition from Governor Kathy Hochul.

The extent of Zohran’s direct involvement in preventing the bill from being passed is unclear. Although ending the 24-hour workday was a campaign promise preceding his election, he prevented the bill from being voted upon by its original planned passage in March due to a request in wording adjustment to allow for the option of a 24-hour workday, rather than outlawing the practice entirely. Similarly, although Hochul hasn’t made any official comments regarding the bill, when City Council speaker Julie Menin was asked if the governor was pressuring him into pulling the bill, he refused to comment upon if he or the governor had consulted each other. The governor’s office also hadn’t commented on the bill when requested to.

Despite setbacks, Marte has still spoken up about the bill, urging the governor to support it. A hunger strike has been implemented by protestors since April of this year in hopes of forcing support for the bill from both Mamdani Hochul. While it’s unclear if the bill will pass due to the setbacks it still faces, protestors and supportive council members remain committed to seeing it declared law.

Sources:
Amir Khafagy. “Gov. Hochul Moves to Block City Bill Banning 24-Hour Home Care Shifts: Sources Say.” Documented, 15 Apr. 2026, documentedny.com/2026/04/15/governor-hochul-home-care-24-hour-bill/.

Granicus, Inc. “The New York City Council – File #: Int 0615-2024.” Nyc.gov, 2024, legistar.council.nyc.gov/LegislationDetail.aspx?ID=6566011&GUID=CAD8F84C-35B8-434C-9923-DA1147B3BEBA.

“Dropbox.” Dropbox.com, 2026, www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/6dhqfhfb5przn16thh72u/The-Nonprofit-War-on-Workers-Part-I.-FINAL.pdf?rlkey=qice3nfoumaozijgiuw5y2vbe&e=1.