# Coca-Cola worker fired for drinking a Pepsi **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 14, 2003, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882 "2003-06-14T19:16:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Blalron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/35a633/32.png) [@Blalron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blalron)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2003, 8:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/61 "2003-06-18T20:54:55Z")
> [@](#): > > To be frank, I am quite skeptical of antidiscrimination law, on precisely free market grounds: a company that willingly excludes talented people from its labor pool on an irrational basis such as skin color or gender is only hurting itself. I think such laws can be justified on the grounds of historic prejudices and on the grounds that, at least regarding race in the Deep South during the civil rights era, you had a situation where employers were more or less acting as a cartel to exclude blacks. But they are narrow exceptions to the general rule that market participants should be free to make their own decisions about who to hire and who to work for. I vigorously disagree. Pure capitalism is not always in the best interests of society. The harm that comes by allowing employers to disciminate against blacks far outweighs the good of freedom for employers to be bigots. I don’t think that market forces left to their own devices will always correct the injustice. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2003, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/62 "2003-06-18T23:38:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by gypsygirl31 \* > \*\*I once worked for an Anheuser-Busch distributor, and it was company policy that ALL employees should drink Budweiser (not even Bud Light) in public. The policy was overturned when a new Marketing Director took over, and she was a non-drinker, so she preferred O’Doul’s. A soft drink still violated company policy (the distributor, not A-B). I always felt sorry for those employees who didn’t like beer in the first place… \*\* Not to mention recovering alcoholics. I agree-he probably shouldn’t have done it. However, telling people what RESTAURANTS they can eat at? Kiss my ass! Just because I work for Coke, I can’t go to a fucking restaurant I enjoy, because they happen to serve Pepsi? That’s far too much control over my life. When one is on company time, it’s one thing. After that, my life is my life. And personally, if I don’t like what my company makes, I’ll drink plain water. If the delivery guy was on company time, then yes, they should have fired him. But in his own personal time, he should be allowed to drink whatever he wants. (Hehehe…I’d probably pour Pepsi into Coke bottles. But then, I really don’t care which one I drink-although I CAN taste the difference.) ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2003, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/63 "2003-06-18T23:43:56Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Dewey Cheatem Undhow \* > \*\*In this case, we’re talking about the labor market. Coca-Cola is a buyer of labor. Employees and job applicants are sellers of labor. > > If a person doesn’t like the conditions Coca-Cola puts on employment, that person is free to decline to sell his or her labor to Coca-Cola. > > If Coca-Cola’s rules cost them more in terms of employee morale and in terms of other employee compensation than it gains them in terms of marketing advantage (or, more accurately, marketing disadvantage vis-a-vis their competitors), then Coca-Cola will find itself at a disadvantage in the marketplace and will suffer accordingly. \*\* Yeah, because there are just TONS of jobs out there that he can pick and choose from. What-the-fuck-ever. :rolleyes: (Hey, it’s my first eye roll in over a week-I swear!) ---
**Author:** ![brad\_d](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@brad\_d](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brad_d)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2003, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/64 "2003-06-19T01:50:34Z")
This sort of thing (which I really don’t see a problem with) can extend to some interesting other areas. The Willliams Formula One team recently signed a sponsorship agreement with NiquitinCQ, a product to help the user give up smoking. The logo of the company now appears on the [cars](http://f1.racing-live.com/photos/2003/monaco/diapo_104.jpg) and the [uniforms](http://f1.racing-live.com/photos/2003/montreal/diapoa_187.jpg) that team personnel wear at races. I’ve heard via several sources that team members are no longer allowed to smoke while wearing team attire. (The drivers don’t smoke, but plenty of the mechanics and publicity wonks do.) [This article](http://www.grandprix.com/ft/ft11055.html) mentions that the team has gone so far as to make and issue unbranded jackets for team personnel to don while smoking at events. This, to me, sounds quite reasonable. Clearly the team isn’t trying to ban smoking anytime, anywhere - they’re even taking steps to allow their team members to smoke while on break at “work.” Just not while wearing (well-paid-for) advertising for a quit-smoking product. ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2003, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/65 "2003-06-19T02:56:05Z")
Interesting, **Dewey Cheatem Undhow** , how closely your views mimic the “official party line” I recall. > [@](#): > > I know you dig thinking about business executive sitting around, twisting their mustaches and bellowing “muhahahahaha!” while kicking puppies and castrating their employees, but the real world just doesn’t work that way. Kicking puppies would be far too much effort for the executives I knew - by and large their days were spent farting around, calling friends, surfing the web, sleeping (seriously), and going on business lunches to schmooze customers. Many of whom were of the same do-nothing calibre. Interesting thing is, I worked with a division that served a major fast-food chain, and while no one ate in a soda pop competitor’s restaurant, neither did they eat at the chain they were busy promoting. They considered the food gawd-awful & tacky, appropriate for “the public” but not the elite (who they considered themselves, owing to big paychecks). Even our customers were that way - group lunches with restaurant owners were always held at more upscale eating places, never their own. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/13edae/32.png) [@Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Cheatem_Undhow)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2003, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/66 "2003-06-19T15:00:08Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Guinastasia \* > \*\*Yeah, because there are just TONS of jobs out there that he can pick and choose from. \*\* We are living in a buyer’s market ([a fact I am tragically all too familiar with](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=145212)). This too shall pass. It’s called a business _cycle_ for a reason. In lean times, employers wield considerably more power. In fat times, employees hold the cards. There is nothing unusual or particularly terrible about that fact. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/13edae/32.png) [@Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Cheatem_Undhow)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2003, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/67 "2003-06-19T15:17:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by fessie \* > **Interesting, Dewey Cheatem Undhow, how closely your views mimic the “official party line” I recall.** Not sure what you mean by that – I certainly don’t work for Coca-Cola, if that’s what you mean. Care to elaborate? \*\* > [@](#): > > Kicking puppies would be far too much effort for the executives I knew - by and large their days were spent farting around, calling friends, surfing the web, sleeping (seriously), and going on business lunches to schmooze customers. Many of whom were of the same do-nothing calibre. \*\* While I hold no brief for lazy employees, regardless of the color of their collar, it’s my experience that this kind of blanket characterization is typically made by those who have no idea what the work of an executive actually entails. As a corporate lawyer, I’d sometimes overhear similar crap from secretaries and the like who clearly were under the impression that if you were on the phone with a colleague or at lunch, you must not be working. Which is utter crap. Senior partners at our firm were paid five or six hundred dollars an hour for the subtle negotiations they performed at those lunches. If their presence didn’t impart value, they wouldn’t be paid those astronomical rates – a call girl would probably be both cheaper and better looking, and would certainly be a hell of a lot more fun. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/13edae/32.png) [@Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Cheatem_Undhow)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2003, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/68 "2003-06-19T15:20:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Blalron \* > \*\*I vigorously disagree. Pure capitalism is not always in the best interests of society. The harm that comes by allowing employers to disciminate against blacks far outweighs the good of freedom for employers to be bigots. > > I don’t think that market forces left to their own devices will always correct the injustice. \*\* Did you not bother to read past the first sentence of the quotation you were responding to? ---
**Author:** ![Gary\_Kumquat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4491bb/32.png) [@Gary\_Kumquat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_Kumquat)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2003, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/69 "2003-06-19T16:08:25Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Dewey Cheatem Undhow \* > **The basic argument for the free market is that individual enterprises, left to their own devices, will yield the least unsatsifactory results via a Darwinian-like process of success and failure. Companies and individuals who come up with winning mixes of economic value succeed, and those who don’t fail.** Yes, that is the premise. But that premise is governed by a set of requirements for this to operate, and this clearly is in breach of those requirements. I will expand on this in answer to… > [@](#): > > **Coca-Cola’s policy does not control or hinder the soft drink market. No one is forced to drink Coca-Cola because no one is forced to work for the Coca-Cola company. That simple fact makes the policy perfectly consonant with the free market.** Blatantly false. This policy is clearly inconsistent with “free market” philisophy. Markets are, quite obviously, interdependant. Their policy here must create one of two influences - either it manipulates the purchasing habits of employees, or it manipulates the job market (as you keep saying, people don’t have to apply for this job, even if it would otherwise suit them) You keep arguing the latter, that people don’t have to apply for these jobs. Surely you must see this is a manipulation - you have created an artificial restriction on demand. You cannot pick and choose which markets you want Free Market rules to apply to. If they are ideals for one market, they are ideals for all markets. > [@](#): > > **Furthermore, the rule is not uncommon in the world of consumer goods manufacturing and retailing. Next time you’re in the mall, take a gander at the folks working in the Polo/Ralph Lauren store and see how many of them are wearing Gap clothes, and vice versa. Next time you visit a car dealership, note which manufacturer’s car the salesman drive home at night. You get the picture.** Yes indeed. Care to tell me what this shows in regards to your original claim about coke’s policy being in accord with a free market. > [@](#): > > **To be frank, I am quite skeptical of antidiscrimination law, on precisely free market grounds:** Thats your opinion. It has been argued by far better people than me that there is no such thing as a true free market. One of the reasons for this is the influence of external factors such as discrimination affecting the job market. As such, any law that prevents that is in accord with free market grounds. I’m starting to wonder just what it will take for you to accept that this policy, while in accord with many forms of capitalism, is not an example of free market behaviour. ---
**Author:** ![mama2nate\_anna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a9a28c/32.png) [@mama2nate\_anna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mama2nate_anna)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2003, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/70 "2003-06-19T17:39:39Z")
[ Think of it this way: What if GBP and the Raiders were playing, and Brett Favre showed up wearing a black Raiders jersey? ] Ummm, it would mean that Brett wanted to win!!? ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/13edae/32.png) [@Dewey\_Cheatem\_Undhow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Cheatem_Undhow)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2003, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/71 "2003-06-19T18:14:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Gary Kumquat \* > \*\*Blatantly false. This policy is clearly inconsistent with “free market” philisophy. Markets are, quite obviously, interdependant. Their policy here must create one of two influences - either it manipulates the purchasing habits of employees, or it manipulates the job market (as you keep saying, people don’t have to apply for this job, even if it would otherwise suit them) You keep arguing the latter, that people don’t have to apply for these jobs. Surely you must see this is a manipulation - you have created an artificial restriction on demand. > > You cannot pick and choose which markets you want Free Market rules to apply to. If they are ideals for one market, they are ideals for all markets. \*\* You seem to be suggesting that anything which influences the market is inconsistent with a free market philosophy. Which is plainly ridiculous – by that measure, every contract ever written is anti-free market because it in some measure alters the flow of goods to the marketplace. For example: Coca-Cola enters into a contract with Big Kahuna Burger in which Big Kahuna agrees to only carry Coca-Cola products in their fast-food establishment in exchange for favorable pricing and delivery terms. By your lights, this is “anti free market” because it influences market outcomes – customers who want to eat one of BKB’s tasty burgers cannot elect to have a Pepsi with their meal. But quite the opposite is true: this transaction is the epitome of the free market – it is two unimpeded economic actors reaching an agreement by which they both mutually benefit. Coke will make less per unit sold but will make it up on volume. Big Kahuna gets a cost savings that will presumably offset any lost customers who absolutely demand a Pepsi with their burger. Everybody wins. Same deal regarding the OP. Coke and its employees are economic actors. They each come to mutually-agreeable arrangements by which each benefits. Coke pays out salary and benefits, employees give up their time, labor, and a measure of individual choice for public soft drink consumption. Everyone wins. It is by definition a free market transaction. Just because the restriction on soft drink purchases may in some insubstantial way affect demand for Coke products does not change that fact. ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2003, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/72 "2003-06-22T14:28:29Z")
> [@](#): > > Everyone wins. Sure, and the beauty thing is _some win more than others_. The ones who’ve gone to the “right” school, earned the “right” degree, and have the “right” appearance have the opportunity to sit on their asses and reap the benefits generated by those less fortunate, who actually have to _work_ all day long. I’ve had a lot of jobs, in a lot of fields, and my experience is that people who own their own business or practice do often bust butt and work hard to produce (or else it bombs). But big corporations are generally self-perpetuating fantasy farms, where conformity, BS, theoretical business models and loyalty to “the brand” outweigh thinking. Cite you say? There’s this enormously popular cartoon called “Dilbert”. ---
**Author:** ![Alien](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/57b2e6/32.png) [@Alien](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alien)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2003, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882/73 "2003-06-22T21:57:33Z")
A question comes to mind: What if a person employed by Coca-Cola is really really ugly (but with valuable expertise), could the company _deny_ him drinking their products in public? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coca-cola-worker-fired-for-drinking-a-pepsi/181882.md?page=3)