Fat Tax and Banning Obese Employees

The New York Times Magazine this Sunday (8/16) had an article about a surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic who, as part of a 'wellness initiative' plan, wanted to refuse to hire obese people.

They already refuse to hire smokers. And this anti-smokers policy has been given high praise, even if it is admitted to be a bit extreme.

Other plans that the doctor endorses: having a 'fat tax' on all fattening, high-sugar, low-nutritional food such as sodas, fast food, etc. It would be a sin-tax, like what we already have on alcohol and cigarettes.

Or: making people over a certain BMI pay higher insurance premiums, much like smokers do today. The idea being that those who are incurring costs on health care (because of diabetes, heart problems, etc.), should be the ones to pay for it

This doctor thinks we should treat obesity as the epidemic that it is, which means putting in place external restrictions to help the community at large. Like bans on smoking and helmet laws, he thinks that we need outside measures to keep us all from killing ourselves.

What do you all think? Is this too much? Is it fair? Does fairness even have anything to do with it, if obesity really is an epidemic? Should it be treated like alcoholism and smoking, where institutions are erected to help people not be alcoholics or smokers? Should there be funded programs to help people not be obese, and significant incentives to not be fat, like a 'fat tax', or higher insurance premiums, or the threat of not getting that job you want? Or is being obese somehow different from smoking, alcoholism, or wearing a helmet?

Any thoughts?

Personally I'm always outraged when I see a doughnut for $1.50 and a side salad for $3.  I know that salad didn't cost more than the doughnut to make although there is probably a higher percentage of spoilage so perhaps that accounts for the difference.

I think that currently many healthier foods do have a higher price tag simply because many people will pay more for foods that are perceived to be healthy.  Either expanding the sin taxes to include pastries or subsidizing fruits and vegetables would work fine for me.  Although really it's a matter that the more calories you eat the more you weigh no matter if they're strawberries or doughnuts.

A smoker can pretend they're not a smoker and still get hired. A fat person cannot hide it.

Fat people need jobs too, everyone has bills regardless of their weight. Why not target underweight people too? They're just as unhealthy (if not more in some cases) than obese people.

Oops, I forgot to mention that I think discriminating on hiring is just lamer than lame, not to mention potentially illegal.

Original Post by cptbunny:

Fat people need jobs too, everyone has bills regardless of their weight. Why not target underweight people too? They're just as unhealthy (if not more in some cases) than obese people.

 Given the sugeon's attitude, cptbunny, I think he would be fine with banning severly underweight people as well. It just so happens that in his profession, that's not much of a problem as people being overweight. But so if he did that, would it then be OK?

Keeping people from having a job because they're fat is outright discrimination based on looks. Not all fat people are unhealthy. My cousin is around 280-300 pounds and her blood work is better than many thin peoples'.

Personally I'd prefer to see a fart tax and a banning of flatulent employees.

jackattack07: that may be. And it may be that my uncle who is 98, and has been smoking a pack a day since he was 12, has healthier lungs than me, a runner. I think the point is not to say that all people who are obese are unhealthy--just like not all people who smoke will get lung cancer (there are outliers of any group who defy the statistics).

The point, I think, was that because there is a general correlation between being obese and health problems, that this guys hospital needs to set an example, just as they do by not hiring smokers.

And so it isn't discrimination based on looks or aesthetics. The guy didn't say he wanted to ban obese people because he hated looking at them. Rather, it was policy to make people be healthier, by trimming down or else...

Now, I don't mean to endorse his suggestions. I don't know what I think about all of this--it all seems pretty drastic to me, and that's why I was asking. But I do think that if his views are wrong, we should at least be careful to state his view correctly.

So, in the interest of being careful, he was not (i) discriminating people based on looks, nor (ii) was he saying that every obese person has corresponding health problems--just that most of them do or will, (as backed up by plenty of studies).

Original Post by ignayshus:

Personally I'd prefer to see a fart tax and a banning of flatulent employees.

Hahaha! Then we'd either all get fired or else explode!

The health insurance thing seems fair to me. About the job plan though such measures are not needed, there are plenty of jobs that sedentary obese people cannot do, why keep them out of the jobs they can do? It makes no sense.

"And so it isn't discrimination based on looks or aesthetics."

Yes, it is. How can you tell when someone is fat?

You look at them. Is he really going to put every employee or interviewee on a scale regularly? Doubt it.

So, in the interest of being careful, he was not (i) discriminating people based on looks, nor (ii) was he saying that every obese person has corresponding health problems--just that most of them do or will, (as backed up by plenty of studies).

 You can absolutely argue whether or not this issue is morally right/wrong in your own opinion, but it absolutely IS discrimination. It may not be discrimination as our current law defines it (i.e. based on age, sex, race, creed etc.), but it is most definitely discrimination.

Original Post by jackattack07:

"And so it isn't discrimination based on looks or aesthetics."

Yes, it is. How can you tell when someone is fat?

You look at them. Is he really going to put every employee or interviewee on a scale regularly? Doubt it.

Oh, sorry. I thought I included it in the description. He wants to do it based on BMI, which is something he thinks (and others do, too) that is objectively measurable, and not based on appearances.

And yeah, I think he intends to get that checked on regularly. I don't know.

But surely the 'difficulty' of getting people's BMI wouldn't be the only reason to object to his policy, right?

BMI is frequently incorrect, particularly at the higher end of the scale.  My doctor tells me that I'm healthy, my BMI says that I'm slightly overweight.

Original Post by trikki:

 You can absolutely argue whether or not this issue is morally right/wrong in your own opinion, but it absolutely IS discrimination. It may not be discrimination as our current law defines it (i.e. based on age, sex, race, creed etc.), but it is most definitely discrimination.

Fair enough, trikki. But I didn't say it wasn't discrimination. I just said it wasn't discrimination based on looks. There's a difference.

And to be clear: I'm not on this guys side. I just was curious as to what was wrong with his suggestion, since it struck me as so extreme. But then how is it any different than bans on smoking and helmet laws? The answer doesn't seem obvious to me...

My sister worked for the Cleveland Clinic about a year ago, for about a year.  They do regularly test for smoking, you have to take one when you are being considered for a position and then I think they do random testing, so it would be hard to get around that.  Even then (two years ago) they were considering this "wellness initiative."  But they are working on it with their current employees, they do not have ANY junk food in the building (at least where my sister worked).  Mcdonalds was out when their contract ran out, and there are no vending machines that will aid in the eating of "junk food."  So basically there are vending machines that only have water in them!  They are trying to make an impact on their employees, and make them think about their food choices. That doesn't stop them from bringing anything from home for lunch or snacks, but if they are planning on eating at work it will be healthy, to some degree. 
I'm not sure how I feel about it, and I'm not sure how their laws are written that would support or oppose this movement.  I don't even know how they would enforce that?  But they do with the smokers so I'm sure they already have that figured out.  (I realize that I didn't shed any important info on the situation, I'm just sharing the little info that I have.)

Original Post by smwhipple:

BMI is frequently incorrect, particularly at the higher end of the scale.  My doctor tells me that I'm healthy, my BMI says that I'm slightly overweight.

My guess--and this is just a guess, since the doctor doesn't address the practicle difficulties of implementing his program on hiring bans--is that it is not the borderline cases he is worried about. It is the clearly obese, and not some vague middling ground, or even being just slightly overweight, but clear obesity.

And this is as clear as the difference bewteen being a smoker and non-smkoker, right? I mean, if I smoke one cigarette a week am I a smoker? I don't know. Probably not. What about two cigarettes a week? Again, I don't know. There are certainly borderline cases, and it may not even be clear when the borderline cases end and the non-borderline cases begin. But when you get to like a pack or two a day, now you're a clear case of being a smoker. I think the surgeon might say (agains, speculating) that having a certain BMI is like that--there are clear cases when it matters to your health--over 35, for example.

It's just that, Phimegaphi. BMI is a severely outdated system. If a male is a muscly bodybuilder and desires to be hired by the clinic, will he be turned away? Because when they weigh him and figure out his BMI, he will be considered obese.

It is obvious that the clinic will resort to physical discrimination due to the inaccuracy of BMI systems. The only accurate ways to determine a person's body fat index is to do skin fold tests and take body measurements. NO ONE is going to want to go through that, especially periodically.

Like I said, it'll obviously end up being discrimination based on someone's looks.

Original Post by phimegaphi:

Original Post by cptbunny:

Fat people need jobs too, everyone has bills regardless of their weight. Why not target underweight people too? They're just as unhealthy (if not more in some cases) than obese people.

 Given the sugeon's attitude, cptbunny, I think he would be fine with banning severly underweight people as well. It just so happens that in his profession, that's not much of a problem as people being overweight. But so if he did that, would it then be OK?

Of course not! I was just trying to make a point, that if you block 2 "unhealthy" people, you gotta block them all. You'll end up blocking 80% of people. I think it's stupid, a person's weight (or being a smoker) has nothing to do with their job performance (ie desk job, a waiter/ess, not something where you need to be in shape for, like the police force, though I've seen plenty of overweight cops >.<).

Original Post by phimegaphi:

The New York Times Magazine this Sunday (8/16) had an article about a surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic who, as part of a 'wellness initiative' plan, wanted to refuse to hire obese people.

They already refuse to hire smokers. And this anti-smokers policy has been given high praise, even if it is admitted to be a bit extreme.

Other plans that the doctor endorses: having a 'fat tax' on all fattening, high-sugar, low-nutritional food such as sodas, fast food, etc. It would be a sin-tax, like what we already have on alcohol and cigarettes.

Or: making people over a certain BMI pay higher insurance premiums, much like smokers do today. The idea being that those who are incurring costs on health care (because of diabetes, heart problems, etc.), should be the ones to pay for it

This doctor thinks we should treat obesity as the epidemic that it is, which means putting in place external restrictions to help the community at large. Like bans on smoking and helmet laws, he thinks that we need outside measures to keep us all from killing ourselves.

What do you all think? Is this too much? Is it fair? Does fairness even have anything to do with it, if obesity really is an epidemic? Should it be treated like alcoholism and smoking, where institutions are erected to help people not be alcoholics or smokers? Should there be funded programs to help people not be obese, and significant incentives to not be fat, like a 'fat tax', or higher insurance premiums, or the threat of not getting that job you want? Or is being obese somehow different from smoking, alcoholism, or wearing a helmet?

Any thoughts?

woah...you asked A LOT of questions.  I am just going to respond to a few.

I think the company should be able use these factors(obesity and smoking) in their hiring process. If these factors really do affect their end profit, then it matters to them.  It's different from discriminating against gender or race because it WOULD affect productivity. 

I think there should be a fixed tax for everything.  Income tax, property tax, sales tax, should all be a certain % and we should leave it at that...so no, I do not support a fat tax.  If people want to be fat, let them be fat.  We should certainly educate people appropriately but beyond that, we shouldn't force them into anything with taxes.  Support groups could be useful though.

Original Post by cptbunny:

Original Post by phimegaphi:

Original Post by cptbunny:

Fat people need jobs too, everyone has bills regardless of their weight. Why not target underweight people too? They're just as unhealthy (if not more in some cases) than obese people.

 Given the sugeon's attitude, cptbunny, I think he would be fine with banning severly underweight people as well. It just so happens that in his profession, that's not much of a problem as people being overweight. But so if he did that, would it then be OK?

Of course not! I was just trying to make a point, that if you block 2 "unhealthy" people, you gotta block them all. You'll end up blocking 80% of people. I think it's stupid, a person's weight (or being a smoker) has nothing to do with their job performance (ie desk job, a waiter/ess, not something where you need to be in shape for, like the police force, though I've seen plenty of overweight cops >.<).

It could affect the amount of money the company has to spend on insurance.

But if they start implementing something like this...the job market will become much less competitive for exceptionally healthy people.  Companies would have to pay them higher salaries. So in the end, they would probably lose.

I honestly don't think it would make that big of a difference if we allowed this because only a few companies would try to do it anyway....and it probably wouldn't be beneficial to them in the long run, so they would stop.