Now that employers are required to insure you, they are going to make sure that they control you. Fish Medical center is now refusing to hire anyone that is a user of tobacco, citing the increased costs smokers present to insurers.
How long before the "studies" that have been ordered by the Obama administration show that gun ownership increases costs? We can control people in every way: Overweight? SCUBA diver?
One thing you won't see: Women present greater costs because of maternity coverage. Can we refuse to hire women? Of course not.
Gay men are at higher risk of contracting AIDS, and present higher costs. Can I refuse to hire them?
In a world where the government considers it to be discrimination for an employer to refuse to hire a high school dropout, or a person with a criminal record, this smells like another lair of control to me.
The place I work for has charged smokers extra for insurance as long as I've been there (17 years), and as of a few years ago, adopted a wellness program that went from "we screen you for cholesterol and send you to your doctor" to "BMI under 25 required" to get a discount. I've never been under any delusion it was about anything other than control.
ReplyDeleteNo matter how hard I try, I can't trust BMI. It's simply a height/weight table in different form. Any system that says an emaciated heroin addict with BMI of 18 is healthier than a well-trained, 5% body fat athlete with a BMI over 30 has something wrong with it. Yeah, first time I was in a discussion about BMI, one guy was a recently ex-Air Force academy running back. They told him his BMI was too high.