Opening The Door

Well, we certainly must congratulate our Supreme Court, it appears their latest ruling will open the door for all sorts of abuse by companies towards their employee’s, and of course it will all be legal. With the allowance of Hobby Lobby to refuse to provide payment for services concerning contraception, at least one college is proclaiming the same thing. No doubt, in this age of every higher health costs, there will be quite a few companies that do the same, believing it will lower their own healthcare costs as well. But for the moment let’s forget that the cost of childbirth is terrifically more expensive that contraceptives, let’s look a bit further down the road.

Ever heard of a church that had an objection to blood transfers, medications, or transplants? Stay tuned, they may soon be popping up everywhere. There are already several who’s religious beliefs state they should not even see doctors; I wonder if any of them own a “closely held private corporation”? It could soon end up like a lot of Indian Tribes who teamed with private investors to build casino’s. I mean, why can’t we appoint a chairman of the board that is LDS or one of the lesser known religions that object to any kind of medical care? Certainly would cut costs …. No doubt!

One can only hope that corporations are a bit smarter than that, after all, if you take away enough perks people simply won’t want to work for you, but remember, this is a lot like the practice of banks. I don’t know of any rebel bank out there that is paying 5-10% interest on a simple savings account … why should one or two corporations promote great medical plans when all their competitors have ended theirs?

OK, seriously it probably won’t get that bad but I still recall the sales pitches when “managed health care” came out, how it was going to make all of healthcare highly competitive and we would all save a bundle. You know, I don’t remember even a month going by before the first cost increases went into effect and of course the claim now is “oh, without managed healthcare it would be a LOT worse!”. One thing I have not been able to confirm is that Hobby Lobby has always voiced this objection or if they have had that coverage blocked in their prior insurance coverage’s for their employee’s. Anyone know?

None of this directly affects me. My children are grown and at my age I’m not going to have any more, but I must admit that I cannot help but notice how businesses keep eroding benefits, salaries and all those items that get and keep employee loyalty; the one thing that ALL companies constantly complain about. The current generation of kids out there will pick up and leave a job just because they don’t like the boss’s new tie and it drives these company’s nuts trying to figure out how to hang onto them. Do they think this new ruling is going to improve their odds of retention?

I’d love to be in charge of Hobby Lobby’s marketing department and see how much it affects their bottom line in the coming months & years. I wonder if there are any strip mall operators that will decline Hobby Lobby’s leases because they don’t agree with Hobby Lobby’s approach?

It’s the sort of thing that is bad for business, bad for employee’s, bad for public relations and simply put, no good can come out of any of it. Sadly, since the great majority of their employee’s are minimum wage jobs in locations where opportunities may be limited, once again the employee must suck it up and deal with it because they can’t afford to walk out the door and get a better job with a more considerate employer that cares more about their employee’s than they do about their petty personal ambitions.