Posted on 02/25/2005 6:28:40 AM PST by T.Smith
Feb. 24 - Weyco may be one of the only large companies in the country that can boast not only a smoke-free workplace, but a smoke-free workforce. Achieving that status, however, didn’t come without a lot of effort—and controversy.
Howard Weyers, the founder and CEO of the Michigan-based health-benefits-management company, attracted a lot of media attention—and the ire of workers’ advocates—when he let go four employees recently after they refused to stop smoking. Civil-rights activists accused the company of discrimination, arguing that Weyers was punishing workers for engaging in a legal activity on their own time.
Weyers claimed that he gave his employees plenty of notice and opportunities and incentives to quit. “I gave them a little over 15 months to decide which is most important: my job or tobacco?” says Weyers.
That’s a question that more Americans may be asking themselves these days. Most companies already ban tobacco use in the workplace and more than a half dozen states and hundreds of cities have enacted laws to the same effect. Now, citing rising health-insurance costs and concerns about employees’ well-being, a growing number of companies are refusing to hire people who smoke, even if they do so on their own time and nowhere near their jobs. An estimated 6,000 employers no longer hire smokers, according to the National Workrights Institute, an affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
do they fire people for smoking pot after hours?
What's next? Not hiring someone because they drink, eat junk food, don't exercise, etc. The more these companies make stringent rules and regulations, more people will end up being unemployed.
What you do on your off time should not concern the employer as long as you perform your job!
I just quit cold turkey eight weeks ago, after smoking 2 to 3 packs per day. I've managed to stay away, without patches, gums, pills, or anything else. I just looked at my son whenever I wanted a cigarette. I just had to decide which meant more to me.
Only if the people agree to not do it as part of their employment contract.
Unrelated to the topic...
Your signature is incorrectly attributed. Before the battle of Chancellorsville, Joseph Hooker said, "May God have mercy on General Lee, for I shall have none."
He was promptly beaten like a rented mule.
Well, hold on now.
Menthol or regular?
Weyers' claim that he is doing this to save on health-insurance expenses is disingenuous. He's 70 years of age; he ought to fire himself first, if he's interested in firing people who statistically have high health care expenses.
But, what is next? Will sex be prohibited to Weyco employees, on the grounds that it could create a rather large healthcare expense (pregnancy and dependent child care)?
"Howard Weyers, the founder of Weyco Inc., said he wants to tell fat workers to lose weight or else, Reuters reported."
http://www.nbc10.com/health/4134754/detail.html?rss=phi&psp=health
Hmmmm ...I wonder what this old fool will die from? Choking on a McBurger, or a blast of second hand cigar smoke?
Nah ... It'll probably be a garden hose, attached to his running auto's exhaust pipe.
See post #10?
my understanding is that when one is ready to quit smoking, one will. unlike alcohol which is far more addictive and often requires help.
so these smokers accepted in their employment contract that they cannot smoke?
Let the four who were fired go start their own businesses which will only hire smokers, if they want to. They exercised their free will and can continue to do so.
That is a legitimate performance issue; inadvertently wrecking production due to one of those things certainly may be prevented by work rules.
Was your wearing of those things restricted in your off-duty hours, though?
Don't smoke myself, but don't have a problem with others doing so.
I wonder why the effort to banish smoking and legalize pot?
France's Jeanne Calment, world's oldest woman, dead at 121
ARLES, France (AP) - She took up fencing at 85, and still rode a bicycle at 100. She liked her port wine, her olive oil, her chocolate and her cigarettes, and she released a rap CD at 121.
No wonder Jeanne Calment, at 122 the world's oldest person until her death Monday, said she was ''never bored.''
She lived through France's Third and Fourth Republics, and into its Fifth. She was 14 when the Eiffel Tower was completed in 1889.
''She was a little bit the grandmother of all of us,'' President Jacques Chirac said.
Mrs. Calment died of natural causes at the Arles retirement home where she had lived for 12 years. Though blind, nearly deaf and in a wheelchair, she remained spirited and mentally sharp until the end.
That was clear to those who attended her 121st birthday - in February 1996 - when she released her CD, ''Time's Mistress.'' It featured her reminiscing to a score of rap and other tunes.
By then, she was already a media star. A steady stream of foreign reporters had traveled to Arles to interview her.
Born Feb. 21, 1875, Mrs. Calment eventually became the greatest attraction in the southern city of Arles since Vincent Van Gogh, who spent a year there in 1888. She met him that year when he came to her uncle's shop to buy paints, and later remembered him as ''dirty, badly dressed and disagreeable.''
''She was the living memory of our city,'' said Michel Vauzelle, the deputy mayor of Arles. ''Her birthdays were a sort of family holiday, where all the people of Arles gathered around their big sister.''
For Mrs. Calment, the keys to long life were olive oil and port wine.
She gave up cigarettes in 1995, and her doctor said her abstinence was due to pride rather than health - she was too blind to light up herself, and hated asking others to do it for her.
At 121, Mrs. Calment hinted about what it takes to stay interested in even the longest of lives.
''I dream, I think, I go over my life,'' she said. ''I never get bored.''
Mrs. Calment had no direct descendants, having survived her husband, her daughter and grandson.
In her later years, she lived mostly off the income from her apartment, which she sold cheaply more than 30 years ago to a lawyer, Andre-Francois Raffray.
He had agreed to make monthly payments on the apartment in exchange for taking possession when she died, but never got to do so. He died more than a year ago at 77; his family was required to keep making the payments.
Just the same, his widow, Huguette, said Monday she was saddened by Mrs. Calment's death.
''She was a personality,'' she told France Info radio. ''My husband had very good relations with Mrs. Calment.''
The Guinness Book of World Records had listed Mrs. Calment as the oldest living person whose birth date could be authenticated by reliable records.
Smoked until 118, gave up cigarettes and died!!!!
They accept it by continuing to work there. The terms can be changed at any time by either party since no violence is used to force anyone to work there.
Life is easy absent force, you don't like the arrangement, just haul your butt out of there.
He's going to have a little bit of a problem with Michigan's Elliot-Larsen Civil Rights Act...
The opportunity to obtain employment, housing and other real estate, and the full and equal utilization of public accommodations, public service, and educational facilities without discrimination because of religion, race, color, national origin, age, sex, height, weight, familial status, or marital status as prohibited by this act, is recognized and declared to be a civil right.
Sec. 202.(1) An employer shall not do any of the following:
(a) Fail or refuse to hire or recruit, discharge, or otherwise discriminate against an individual with respect to employment, compensation, or a term, condition, or privilege of employment, because of religion, race, color, national origin, age, sex, height, weight, or marital status.
You posted while I was typing :-)
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