[SheLion]

This is just WRONG! Tobacco and cigarettes are LEGAL! What will they do next? Not hire or fire anyone who enjoys an alcohol beverage off hours??????

The BIG LIE That Smoking is an Economic Burden To Society

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[SheLion]

[Terridan]

What about homosexuals participating in unhealthy and risky behaviors??? I do believe this is costing the insurance companies a helluva lot more for aids related illness that lung cancer ever would... where is the damned ACLU???

[templar]

This is just WRONG!

Can't agree. If someone is paying your way (health care) they have the right to look out for their own interests by controlling your health habits. Same would go for obesity or ohter risky habits.

OTOH, if smokers are willing to pay their own way they shouldn't be cut out. Maybe they could just charge the smokers for the additional costs they cause as a compromise?

[waterstraat]

insurance costs have grown too steep to risk hiring smokers.

If the goal is to lower medical insurance costs, the county needs to require genetic testing and family medical history of any and ALL!! potential employees. Anyone with a family history of breast cancer, alcoholism, heart attacks, obesity, arthritis, MS, diabeties, etc, should be excluded.

NOt hiring smokers to become deputies, is a very very small piece of the pie, and relatively inconsequential in the larger scheme of what maladies we can now screen for when interviewing any potential employee candidate.

To really improve medical costs, current employees should also be screened, and if any current employee is found to have a family medical problem history, if he smokes, if he is over weight, then fire them.

Why should healthy people with no defective genes be made to pay higher medical costs by keeping fattees or diabetics on the payroll?

By eliminating all government employees who are more likely to have medical problems, the taxpayers would save a bunch on health care costs.

[metesky]

Nearly 60 percent of the $34.9 million per year Riverside County spends in workers’ compensation claims is spent on the county’s public safety employees, said Ron Komers, the county’s director of human resources.

With the county’s workers’ comp costs expected to rise to $39.9 million in 2007-08, Komers said the time has come to act and makes no apologies for the hiring ban. He asserts research shows smokers have higher accident rates and take more sick leave than nonsmokers. Both, he said, come out of county coffers.

I don't see any thing that specifically says that Riverside County's smoking employees take more sick leave, which, if true, should be easy enought to prove. The part about smokers having more accidents is just plain nonsense, IMO.

[LisaMalia]

Yes, it is wrong, and I don't see how they can get away with it.

[BriarBey]

UNREAL!!! Talk about discrimination and profiling!!

[Madame Dufarge]

They blame a workers’ compensation system that takes into account lifestyle factors like smoking or alcohol consumption when determining job-related claims.

The article doesn't say that lifestyle factors are taken into account when determining premiums.

They're taken into account when determining claims. Are they asserting that smokers and drinkers take longer to recover from a back injury, etc. than non-smokers?

Be interesting to know where they get their statistics from.

[DefCon]

"...He asserts research shows smokers have higher accident rates
and take more sick leave than nonsmokers...."
- - -
I want to see this research.

[Leisler]

Hey, most of these dolts voted for bigger gooberment/budgets, so now they get a taste of their own rules. Which reminds me, how come, what's his name, the mayor of New York, the geek necked twirp? How come he hasn't done this to NYcity employees? You know, really make friends?

[CSM]

Ah, another collective society's health policy! And I was foolish enought to think we were allowed individual liberty.

[FreedomPoster]

We didn't hire smokers 20 years ago. Didn't want the breaks outside (we didn't want the smell, so had a non-smoking office environment), considered it might have a long-term impact on our health insurance costs.

Nasty habit, legal or not.

[Publius6961]

Not hire or fire anyone who enjoys an alcohol beverage off hours??????

Why not?
Lost in the rhetorical cloud is the question: what is the impact on government finances of AIDS? Skiiers? Rock climbers? Scuba divers? Motorcycle riders? Surfers? Skateboarders? Sky divers?

Inquiring minds, etc.

[TankerKC]

Nearly 60 percent of the $34.9 million per year Riverside County spends in workers’ compensation claims is spent on the county’s public safety employees, said Ron Komers, the county’s director of human resources.

Well, duh! That's because the only risk the weenies in the welfare department have is tripping over an opened file cabinet or choking on a bagel.

Cops and Firefighters are another story. Is Ronnie really surprised that they used workers’ comp more that office workers?

[Wolfie]

What will they do next?

Start urine testing for nicotine, I suppose.

[lewislynn]

Riverside County will no longer hire prospective sheriff’s deputies who smoke, saying insurance costs have grown too steep to risk hiring smokers.

This is what happens when you expect someone else to pay your bills (health ins.). I would expect private companies to follow suit real soon.

If you've ever applied for insurance you'd know one of the first questions is if you smoke or how long it's been since you quit....it's not a survey to determine if it's legal or if it's your right to smoke in public places...it's to determine YOUR rate and it DOES increase the cost of the insured...period.

[Great Dane]

He asserts research shows smokers have higher accident rates and take more sick leave than nonsmokers. Both, he said, come out of county coffers.

This too gets dragged out everytime they need a new excuse, I have said it before, my husband retired with nearly a year worth of UNUSED sick-leave, I am hardly ever sick, and my non-smoking daughter admits that it is not the smokers taking days off, it's the people who thinks they owe to themselves to use every benefit they are accorded.

[Xenalyte]

He asserts research shows smokers have higher accident rates and take more sick leave than nonsmokers.

I could swear I've read right here on FR that smokers are more productive and take fewer sick days than non-smokers.

[CurlyDave]

Smoking-related diseases are (considered) job-related, so you have to pay workers’ comp

This is the big problem right here. Repeal this law and everything will be almost normal.