by Chris Bodenner
A reader writes:
I am an ex-smoker (I quite a three-pack-a-day habit almost 40 years ago), so I have great sympathy for nicotine addicts. I have worked for a major corporation that had a no-smokers policy (the boss had quit and thought it was a good idea; it was his company). But I have no space for UPenn’s irrational policy with respect to smokers.
If health and its associated costs are the criteria for hiring, then are they hiring people with high BMIs, high LDL-low HDL, high blood pressure, diabetes, alcoholism or any other health issue? Likely yes, because the ADA won’t let them discriminate. Well, I believe there is enough evidence available now to include nicotine addiction under the illness rubric. I won’t go into serotonin and dopamine reactions, but a quick Google search will yield a lot of information that you would expect PennMed to already possess. It would seem that just because they can discriminate against smokers (and not any of the other health issues), PennMed is discriminating. That may be good for the bottom line. It will not do anything for smokers. And it stinks worse than cigarette haze.
Another also goes after “nanny-state paternalism”:
So are they going to stop hiring obese people as well?
You know, I get that there is an externality on the health care system now that we are all buying in, but they could just pass the premium increase on to the employees. ObamaCare specifically allows insurance companies to charge smokers more, and even though we pay ridiculously huge taxes on our smoking already, I’d be OK with paying double the Pigovian tax rate. It’s not economically efficient, but it’s ok – a bit of tax-incentive nudging by the government in health policy isn’t the worst thing in the world. We encourage home-ownership and retirement savings as well, and I think we should tax the hell out of pot too, so fine.
But this is just stupid. It is not about health. It is about image and heavy-handed, nanny-state paternalism which is different not just in degree but in kind from small price incentives or public health campaigns (even if these are incentives are larger than the economically “optimal” level). Somehow it has become OK for people to find pleasure in excessive food or alcohol or risky sexual behavior (all of which induce the same kinds of public health externalities), but not in tobacco.
So here’s my deal: don’t hire smokers, but don’t hire overweight people, drinkers, or anyone who enjoys recreational sex either (or for that matter, anyone who risks their body in expensive ways playing soccer or mountain climbing or doing anything vaguely dangerous and fun).
Update from another:
It seems to me that readers complaining about “nanny-state paternalism” in private companies are trying to have their ideological cake and eat it too. Last I heard, no one was talking about making it illegal to hire smokers – and in fact I imagine that in the end, the nanny-state paternalism of the ADA will strike down no-smoker policies. But for libertarians, why does their right to smoke trump my right to run a company with just the “image” I want?
