Posted on 12/10/2005 1:40:02 PM PST by Crackingham
Scotts Miracle-Gro Co., looking for ways to hold down health insurance costs, will require workers who smoke to quit by October or lose their jobs. The lawn and garden company wants workers to live healthy lifestyles, said James Hagedorn, the company's chairman and chief executive. Scotts recently opened a $5 million fitness and medical facility. Scotts is joining other companies focusing on smokers to cut health insurance costs. Some companies make employees who smoke pay higher health insurance premiums, or don't hire them.
"Why would we admit someone into this environment when they're passing risk along to everyone else? Our view is we shouldn't and we won't," Hagedorn said.
Scotts, which made $100 million on sales of $2.3 billion in its last fiscal year, has 6,000 employees in the United States and overseas. It said it can fire smokers legally in 21 states.
"We're being as aggressive as the law will allow us, to keep our costs under control," Hagedorn said.
Scotts pays for 75 percent of employees' health insurance but won't say how much that runs. The company also will require higher premiums for workers who refuse to take a health survey in 2006. In 2007, premiums will rise for workers who don't follow doctor recommendations to improve their health.
In a 2004 survey of 270 professionals, the Society for Human Resource Management found 4.4 percent preferred to not hire smokers. Fewer than 1 percent said their companies have a formal policy against hiring smokers.
This year, Okemos, Mich.-based Weyco Inc. began firing workers who smoke.
Scotts, based in this town 30 miles northwest of Columbus, is offering free counseling, nicotine patches and classes on quitting to workers who smoke. The company hasn't figure out how it will determine whether employees are in compliance, spokesman Jim King said.
The can of worms was opened when companies starting paying for health insurance. That is what has created all this.
If your employer paid your auto insurance, they would dictate what type of car you would drive.
The problem is not that the company is over-reaching, but that the employees want benefits without any strings.
So, there we have commies and fascists going at it. Unions are scum. I'd rather hang out with a fascist employer who didn't want smokers than a union worker- any day of the week. Bunch of thugs- unions. Nothing more un-American than a union.
What is wrong with this whole thing is having your employer provide health care insurance. That is the problem, not the strings attached to that policy.
This is not gov't controlling behavior, but a private company protecting is costs. If they would not provide health insurance, they would not care if you smoke.
Feel free, but everyone on this thread has missed the real point here-----if Scott's was not providing health insurance, this would not be an issue.
If Scott's supplied homeowner's insurance for its employees, they would be allowed to dictate the size and type of home you lived in.
This is not a problem of a company discriminating, but employees wanting a benefit without any strings.
This is only happening because Scott's is providing health insurance for its employees. The same thing would happen if they provided car insurance for employees.
This is why your employer should not provide health insurance.
It's amazing that you are the only one on this thread to actually "get it".
All the whining over an employer trying to control costs has lost the real problem --- employer supplied health insurance.
If your employer supplied auto insurance, they would eventually dictate what type of car you would drive.
And they could go further, how about firing people for being a conservative and voting in that idealogical manner.
I can understand a company having rules that control their workers actions WHILE THEY ARE WORKING... But it crosses the line into tyranny for a company to try to control someone actions during the time they are NOT WORKING for said company.
You nailed it. If they're willing to pay me 24 hours a day, I'll do whatever they want. But if I'm not on the clock, it's MY time.
This just reeks. And I hope they lose business for it.
(I wonder how many of their products are used by the tobacco industry and home tobacco growers...)
It may be that the company doesn't have to prove your use or non-use of tobacco. There must be tests that could be done immediately upon admission to the hospital. You get caught as a smoker paying non-smoking rates and your policy is void.
No. Just pay employees and let them find their own health insurance just like we find our own car insurance, homeowner's insurance, etc.
Then companies will not care what you do as long as you do not show up for work incapable of performing the job.
Wouldn't the employees lose the benefits of the "group" plans/rates offered to employers (lower premiums for the best insurance)?
Yes. But the same argument could apply to car insurance---why don't we do group buys through our employers?
The advantage to group buying is a fallacy. The insurance companies pool everyone together into one large group for their own purposes, but charge you based on the size and risk of the smaller pool made up by your company.
Because employer-provided coverage is the norm, there has been few innovations and less competition that we see in car and homeowner's insurance.
Did you give in? Probably not, because the company had no leg to stand on.
When the company invests in your health, they have a financial interest in how you maintain it.
Hence my statement that employer supplied anything (other than pay) is dangerous.
This presents the same argument that is raised against gov't healthcare. If you are going to look to someone else to provide your healthcare (or 75% of it in this case), you are ceding authority to them on lifestyle decisions.
Granted the companies seem to go after the non-pc aspects first, like smoking, but pass on the other obvious heatlh risks like homosexuality. It's their quarter and they get to call the shots. An oversimplification would be that of a hitch-hiker getting picked up for a ride and trying to tell the driver how to drive. If you don't like the driving, walk. If you don't like the consequences of letting somebody else pay for your healthcare, then you are free to pay for it yourself. There's your freedom and individualism.
For the record, my last cigarette was 31Oct02. Skittles sales saw an immediate uptick in the days and years following...
Do you have any luck with black plastic? My dad used it once, and 30 yrs later, it was a horrible mess to get rid of. The great thing about living up here is that there are no fleas. I don't know if it's the altitude or lack of humidity, but it's great. Fleas are the worst. We're moving to a larger home the first, and it's natural landscape. I'm not sure what I'm going to do regarding a vegetable garden, but I think the climate would allow me to plant berry brambles. The property is on 2.5 acres of peace and quiet : )
Oh yes, the bug bombs. I remember one place we lived in. It was ancient, but functional. We bombed it, and the chemicals melted the pretty shelf paper I put on the kitchen shelves. This place doesn't have cockroaches, but there is a huge black bug that's prevalent in the area. They get in through the pipes, under the doors, and they're gross. Every place I've ever lived in up here, including the house my ex and I used to own, had them. I used rocks and old saucers over all the drains every night. Thank God for winter. They go away when it gets cold.
That's where the lizard comes in. He's a Dumaralis Monitor, and pretty fiesty. The lizard is fat from eating the pests, and he knows where the bathroom is. He's toilet trained! He comes out of hiding, strolls through the living room, and jumps into the bathtub. We run a lukewarm bath for him, he drinks, swims, does his business, hops out, and we feed him a mouse. In a year or two, the lizard goes to my bf's oldest daughter when she gets her own place. I'm buying another one!
Not to worry, the ACLU will soon file a lawsuit that will stop this discrimination!!! As soon as they (the ACLU) get Christmas banned.........
In my experience, it is pregnant women that access employment related health care the most.
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