Recent articles about abuse of sick pay benefits have raised some questions. Is sick pay an employee benefit that pays for limited days when a worker is unable to work, or is it an opportunity for extra paid days off or a big check at retirement?

Sick pay misuse has been a problem in many states and major cities for years. This week, a Pittsburgh newspaper noted that Pennsylvania will pay out $49 million to retiring workers for unused sick days.

The misuse of sick leave has been mostly a below-the-radar problem for years. But in 2009, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie made national news when he focused attention on Parsippany, where the city paid $900,000 to four retiring police officers for their accumulated unused sick pay. Again, in 2010, Christie highlighted the fiscal harm of sick-pay bankrolling when the city of Hackensack had to borrow $4.6 million to pay the accumulated sick pay obligations for a wave of city retirements.

Republican Christie’s position is simple: Sick pay is for when a worker is sick.

Sick pay is abused by workers taking paid days off when they are not sick. Sick-pay benefits are also abused, though legally, when workers rack up years of unused sick pay to collect a large payment upon retirement.

In both cases, it’s a waste of taxpayer dollars and it’s wrong. Around the country, there are efforts to end both practices.

In Harrisburg, state Rep. Daryl Metcalfe, R-Butler County, wants Gov. Tom Corbett to target the expected $49.6 million payout to state workers for unused sick pay as a step toward closing the state’s budget gap.

In some of the New Jersey cases of big bonus checks, the problems are limited to employees hired decades ago because more recent hires no longer can bankroll unused sick days. The practice is rare in the private sector.

Most municipal workers probably only take sick days when they are ill. But some employees view sick days as vacation extenders. Seeing that, some municipalities have cracked down after noticing sick leave often spiked on days before or after an official vacation day.

Christie wants to end the practice of bankrolling unused sick pay. New Jersey Democrats sent him a bill capping accumulated unused sick pay benefits at $15,000. Christie vetoed it. They came back with a $7,500 cap, but Christie says that the cap should be $0.

Using sick days for extra vacation or bankrolling it for a big check on retirement is wrong and should be stopped.

Commenting on sick pay abusers, Christie said, “They should not be allowed to play me or you for chumps.”

But Leah Wright, spokeswoman for the Service Employees International Union Local 668 in Pittsburgh, has a different view. Wright has no problem with the lump-sum payments, telling a Pittsburgh newspaper, “It’s fair that they get paid for it at the end. It’s part of their compensation package.”

While it might be part of some workers’ benefits package, it never should have been allowed. It’s encouraging to learn it’s being curtailed or removed from most contracts these days.

Sick pay is intended to provide help when people are sick. If they are not sick, they should not be paid for not working.

Corbett should follow Christie’s lead and work for taxpayers by ending the big payments for unused sick pay.