Weyco fires 4 employees for refusing smoking test

AP ^ | 1-24-05

[Dan from Michigan]

Weyco fires 4 employees for refusing smoking test
1/24/2005, 2:50 p.m. ET
The Associated Press

LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Four employees of Okemos-based health benefits administrator Weyco Inc. have been fired for refusing to take a test that would determine whether they smoke cigarettes.

The company instituted a policy on Jan. 1 that makes it a firing offense to smoke — even if done after business hours or at home, the Lansing State Journal reported Monday.

Weyco founder Howard Weyers said previously that he instituted the tough anti-smoking rule to shield his company from high health care costs.

"I don't want to pay for the results of smoking," he said.

The anti-smoking rule led one employee to quit work before the policy went into place. Since Jan. 1, four more people were shown the door when they balked at the anti-smoking test.

"They were terminated at that point," said Chief Financial Officer Gary Climes.

Even so, Weyco said, the policy has been successful. Climes estimated that about 18 to 20 of the company's 200 employers were smokers when the policy was announced in 2003.

Of those, as many as 14 quit smoking before the policy went into place. Weyco offered them smoking cessation help, Climes said.

"That is absolutely a victory," Climes said.

[hunter112]

Correct, but the real outrage will come when you can't get health coverage through your employment (or anywhere else) if you have the wrong DNA. They might not detect every Twinkie I sneak, but I can't get away from my genetics.

[Sender]

They do as a private company have the right to decide who works for them and who doesn't. They can show statistically that smokers will have more health care costs and risk missing work and lowering productivity.

OTOH, what about people who ride motorcycles? Or water skiiers? Or climbers, bicyclists? Hunters? All could be considered as taking some measure of risk that could become a liability for the company.

Do we really want companies specifying Stepford employees?

BTW, I lost my job after 15 years on Friday, due to be replaced by two people at lower cost. Or by Indian call centers. Who knows.

[RobRoy]

>>Do they prohibit risky sexual behavior?<<

nope. Just smoking. BTW, my wife works there and loves it. Employee morale is high and the company still has a strong "family values" atmosphere.

The rabbid pro-smoking crowd can support their own circle of companies for as long as this habit holds on (not much longer, probably).

I'm all for smokers rights, but it's health effects are clear. I am a republican and support a companies right to choose who they hire based on their own rules.

[glorgau]

A company saying that it doesn't want smokers is the equivalent to saying it doesn't want gay men. The health costs are so much higher for all the various stuff they seem to pick up. The same argument could be made for obese (fat) people.

[thoughtomator]

The health care costs of homosexuality make smokers look cheap. One AIDS patient can equal hundreds of smokers' worth of health care costs. Shouldn't a company also be able to fire on that basis?

[Niteranger68]

Just wait a minute. They can't have it both ways. If second-hand smoke is just as dangerous as actual smoking, shouldn't this test show positive for non-smokers who are exposed to second-hand smoke? Then, wouldn't they be wrongly fired for something they didn't do? So, either second-hand smoke is harmless, or this test is faulty.

[azhenfud]

The one I work for? No. It's a privately owned business. Why do you ask?

[Riddick]

I think you are wrong. This is a clear case of infringing on the rights of employees to pursue legal activities in their time away from work. The employer can control what happens in the work place and could probably make a case for setting this as a condition of employment but to institute the practice with existing employees and then terminate their livelyhood is despicable.

For whatever reason what if an employer decided everyone had to run a marathon, excercise ten hours a week and become a vegetarian in order to continue employment?

If I was in their shoes the phone line to my lawyer would be BURNING up!

[thoughtomator]

Smokers are not the group that costs the most in health care costs. Fat people cost more to take care of as do homosexuals. And of course there are people with inborn disabilities who cost an immense amount to care for as well. Continuing along that line of thought, women cost more in health care than men because women require more specialized services and live longer. People with children will cost more than single people, as their kids are covered by their policy.

On the other hand, black people cost less because they die earlier, requiring far less of the mega-expensive care given to many elderly.

For a more dramatic example... could a company fire a woman because she doesn't want to abort her child? Pregnancy costs companies a LOT of money, and having a child adds to the company's cost because the child is covered.

While your prejudice against smokers isn't the worst thing in the world, the case you are supporting now will be used against you in the future. Maybe Democrats cost less than Republicans to take care of. If so, you can count on this boomerang returning with great speed in one form or another.

Employers must respect the freedoms of their employees. Otherwise they are not employees, they are slaves.

[thoughtomator]

With luck, the lawsuit will bankrupt the company and send all the folks who betrayed their smoking co-workers to the unemployment lines.

[HamiltonJay]

Trust me, I am not wrong. Personal actions that are legal outside of business hours are and have been grounds for termination for years. Posing in Playboy is a legal activity... but it gets folks fired... as does acting in Porn films... having affairs.... etc etc etc....

Provided the policies exist, documented and enforced uniformly they are generally enforceable.

And even if say these 20 folks sue and get some judgement, the fact remains in the longer term view of the company, its still cheaper. From now on not a single smoker will be hired, which will keep their health care costs considerably, and over the lifetime of their policy will easily be an ROI that will beat out any pain these folks might cause them fiscally.

The risk of some short term pain, for long term benefit is ALWAYS a better move. More and more companies are going to do this, and smokers will either have to go start their own companies, a better thing to do anyway.. or they will be left on the sidelines whining.

[zeugma]

I figure a maximum of 30 years before companies will be routinely acting on genetics testing.

[Sloth]

I think the policy sucks(and I almost never smoke cigarettes), but it is a private company and they have right to dictate their own so I defend it on that basis.

You have exactly the correct take on this.

[investigateworld]

I too support a company's right to hire who they want, but that is not a absolute right, as illustrated by the various civil rights laws.
Plus the anti-smoking crowd has too many of the same players the anti-gun crowd has. JMHO That ATZ cocktail that the AIDS folks take runs about $30,000 PA. As I stated previously, it's a slippery slope, what's next...communion wine?

[Sloth]

Actually, whether public or private, no company has any legitimate power to control the lawful activities of any employee off-site and off company time.

Where would the government get the "legitimate" right to FORCE you, as an employer, to employ people you don't want?

[RobRoy]

>>Smokers are not the group that costs the most in health care costs. Fat people cost more to take care of as do homosexuals.<<

With that I agree 100%. But smoking is sort of a binary thing, that is, you smoke or you don't - and it has no benefit to the human body, it only causes harm. Homosexuality is a legally protected thing, as much as I think people should have the right to refuse to hire homosexuals as well.

The food thing is trickier, since people NEED food to survive. It is not a binary thing. Just eating is not bad, but some sort of line must be crossed. Now who is to establish that line? I think employers should. I think a prospective employer should have the right to weigh in their employees every month or so and terminate those that are over OR UNDER an arbitrary limit.

>>
Employers must respect the freedoms of their employees. Otherwise they are not employees, they are slaves.<<

For the last decade I have gone on record as saying the modern word for "slave" is "employee."

If you don't like your employers rules, go start your own business. Companies were never meant to be democracies.

[Bogeygolfer]

First, AIDS patients are not nearly as expensive as they once were and the cost pales next to smoking related illnesses. Many threads mentioned offering medical plans without coverage for smoking related illnesses or two sets of plans.........no can do. Too many federal and state laws to deal with here requiring equality of benefits (ERISA). I also believe this is clearly their right in part due to the fact that smokers are hardly a protected class. There was a thread a few months ago about a Florida firm with Muslim owners who fired an employee for eating something (pizza I think) with pork in it. If it was a clear company policy at the outset and they are not discriminating per se, they have the right. I of course disagree with that right but I also believe they have to have some recourse to controlling their expenses.

[snapperjk]

The same argument could be made for obese (fat) people.

Not so. Obesity is considered a 'disability' and in most cases protected by Federal law against discrimination.

[ShadowDancer]

but it is a private company and they have right to dictate their own so I defend it on that basis

They can make it firing material to smoke on the job. They cannot make it firing material to smoke at home. It is a legal substance. The health care 'issue' is garbage. If this is taken to court it will be shot down in a minute.

[azhenfud]

The concentrations of nicotine in the urine, blood, skin, and hair are significantly different between smokers and second-hand smoke. I don't know the particulars, but at least that's what "they" say...

Some insurers routinely ask for blood/urine samples to assure the underwriter their policyholder is smoke-free. I've read that, amazingly, the tests are accurate enough they can calculate the last time (within a bracketed length of time - I think it was 6 mo's) a person has fired one up. Again, that's what "they" say...