Fairness of no-nicotine hiring policies questioned
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"Should an employer be able to forbid an employee from going skiing? or riding a bicycle? or sunbathing on a Saturday afternoon?" an ACLU legislative briefing asks. "All of these activities entail a health risk."
On the one hand, I wanna shout: "THIS!"
On the other hand, as a business owner, I want to be able to decide who I want to hire, using whatever criteria I decide.
On the one hand, I wanna shout: "THIS!"
On the other hand, as a business owner, I want to be able to decide who I want to hire, using whatever criteria I decide.
And what gets me, so yes smoking increases company's health care costs. However, there is no such evidence for nicotine. I've only seen one-off flawed or inconclusive studies from vape ban zealots. Additionally such bans block hiring of those using FDA products like a nicorette gun, nicotrol inhalers, etc. What's next, not hiring anyone who takes aspirin, blood pressure medication, drinks wine on the weekend, etc. These companies are on a slippery slope with little to no supporting evidence.
Perhaps the real issue is this country largely forces responsibility for healthcare onto employers.
Perhaps the real issue is this country largely forces responsibility for healthcare onto employers.
Yep, they are. But we let them start down that slope decades ago, by letting them test for various other substances without any regard to whether it has a bearing on an employee's performance or safety.
Please don't parrot the Big Lie. Those smoking cost claims are lies based on pretending others paid costs paid by smokers, and that non-smokers' costs don't exist at all (e.g. SAMMEC). The bottom line: Smokers' lifetime health costs are lower than non-smokers'
Lifetime Medical Costs of Obesity: Prevention No Cure for Increasing Health Expenditure
I have little doubt this is true over peoples' total lives, but from an employer's point of view, it matters when those costs occur. If they come when people are still under 65 and in the workforce, then they increase employers' costs. If they don't come until after they've retired and are on medicare, then it's someone else's problem.
Correct. But this means that society as a whole has an interest in not allowing the health insurance companies to get away with foisting costs on everybody. The annoying thing is that the smoking cost liars have gotten away with pretending that the health insurance companies' selfish interests are those of society as a whole.
As for employers, much of the working class doesn't even have employer-paid health insurance. And smokers are more likely to be in the working class. Also, the biggest tax subsidy in the entire tax code is for employer-paid health insurance. It costs society around $250 billion per year in lost revenue due to exclusion of its cost from the federal income tax.
I vehemently disagree with the way you state that. It may cost the government $250 billion per year, but the government is not the same as society.
The health insurance companie$ are even less representative of society.
So where's the balance?
I understand the need to have discretion in your hiring process, but you're basically trying to control your employees legal off duty behavior. This is one of the biggest disagreements I have with conservative/Libertarian "Smaller government" policy.
When government won't regulate, employers usurp that power over their employees.
I can write letters, and tie up my Congress-critter's phone lines, and at least pretend that they're listening.
How much of a voice do I have in your company policy decisions?
In my company? None, because I own it outright. But of course you're under no obligation to continue to work for me if I make decisions you don't like.
FWIW, I've never discriminated against smokers, or vapers. Heck, I don't even charge tobacco users the additional premium that my health insurance carrier charges me for them. I also firmly believe that what you do on your own time is none of my business, so I don't do any drug screening either. Just don't come to work impaired, 'cause if you do, well, you won't be coming back.
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