Tribune Company Will Charge Smokers $100 a Month

Hey, feel free to smoke away (as long as I'm not around).

Just don't expect me to help pay for your smoking-related illnesses.

 

Nope. Not at all. That's the biggest reason I oppose the Uncle Sam Insurance Company.

 

Had another thought.

I've known of a few papers chopping off a chunk of the insurance premium when you sign up for a variety of health-related stuff. Seems logical for this to be SOP at most places, but I know logic is far from SOP at most places.

At my current paper, I have been offered free skin cancer screenings, flu shots, weight-loss clinics/contests, etc., etc. They have a 'wellness bureau' in the bottom floor of the building with free weights, treadmills, elipticals, a yoga floor, showers, locker rooms, etc. It's in a business' best interest to have healthy employees. Offering incentives to be healthy only makes sense from a productivity standpoint as well as a financial one.

 

I think this is a bottom-line move, that like other moves and trends in the industry, will only speed up the death spiral the industry in. The industry is treating the symptom and not the illness. Read the American Journalism Review article about how continued cost cutting has done more damage to news orgs than anything else blamed on the industry's decline.

 

Can't argue with you. The real problem often lies with stockholders worried about the next dividend check and nothing else. They can sell stock if they want to (i.e. Wall Street Journal) rather than worry about true long-term viability.

 

2 a day for men, 1 a day for women = good for you.

Now, getting behind a wheel of a car after drinking... = mandatory jail time in some states... meaning... it's legal to do it when it doesn't harm others, when it does affect others, the hammer comes down.

Perhaps if they could cage smokers in their own filtering environment to eliminate second hand smoke....

Kidding, smokers, kidding. ;D

Sort of.

 

Man, I wish my place offered all that. The 'wellness bureau' benefits both sides -- healthy employees and a free gym for those interested instead of paying $50 a month at the local YMCA.

 

Well, isn't there a middle ground? How 'bout having three or four drinks and taking a cab home?

Anyway, if drinking isn't a sufficiently indefensible lifestyle choice, how 'bout speeding?

My fellow insured are "subsidizing" me every time I push it to 79 or so on the Interstate, increasing my chances of bodily harm. So should the company I work for hire Pinkertons to follow me with a radar gun so they can jack up my health insurance?

Edited to add "health" to the last sentence, just so we're clear on what I'm talking about.

 

No. The point of group insurance was to make it cheaper for everyone because of the economy of scale. If you go to Sam's Club, you get a better price because you buy in bulk. Same with insurance. But people have grown tired of paying for this particular lifestyle choice made by others.

 

Get busted for speeding a few times and see how that goes for you.

 

Believe me, I wish I'd only been busted "a couple times." Your point?

 

How about when people tire of paying for your family's genetic predisposition to cancer or heart disease?