People who smoke get to take a lot of breaks during the day, and non-smokers pretty much only get a lunch break. Shouldn’t smokers be penalized for wasting company time? If 5 times a day, I stopped working to play games on a PS Vita, I would be fired. But a heavy smoker can waste just as much time and take no penalty.
What % of the workday is spent on productive tasks? For many jobs it is not 100%.
Salaried employees aren’t paid by the hour, so the company assumes smokers stay longer, arrive earlier, or work harder.
Hourly employees can be required to clock out if the employer thinks it’s worth it.
Or maybe something different. I know of one (very large company) that told their employees they can’t smoke during their shift (including their lunch break).
They started doing this for a few reasons. One of the big reasons was to encourage the employees to quit smoking (and I know many of them did over the years) which brought down the group health insurance rates (moot now as we move into ACA plans). But one of the biggest reasons, probably the biggest reason was because the owner didn’t like giving tours of his factory to clients and having to walk through a cloud of smoke at every exit and entrance. He can now say that his entire campus is smoke free.
Where did you get the idea that smokers just “get to” take extra breaks? Plenty of employers don’t allow that.
At my company, they do.
At mine they don’t. They’re not even allowed to smoke anywhere on company property. I don’t believe smokers being permitted to take extra breaks is the norm these days.
Does your employer have a problem with that?
Our company went smoke free on all their sites 20 years ago. No smoking anywhere on the property. If you wish to smoke you have to leave the property, not just the building. The company also will pay for smoking cessation programs for employees.
The primary reason this was done, was not because of time wasted, but because our company is self-insured as it relates to health insurance to employees. Having fewer smokers on the payroll dramatically reduces this costs over time.
In the last few years, the company has instituted different employee paid premiums amounts for smokers and non-smokers.
It’s a common perception, though I don’t know if it’s necessarily strictly true. At my last job, there were several smokers and they’d typically take hourly breaks to smoke and they’d arrive and leave at the same time as non-smokers. Personally, I didn’t care because I would spend time on non-work websites, chatting, or whatever too. And, no one really cared that much unless the work wasn’t getting done. There were a few complaints I’d hear if there was a particularly egregious smoker who would take really long smoke breaks. For instance, there was one guy who would take 10-15 minute breaks every hour, and he was eventually fired, but mostly because he wasn’t getting things done.
Altogether, health concerns aside, I don’t see why smokers should get paid less, just make sure they get the same amount of work done as others. If they’re taking regular breaks to smoke and still spending as much time on random websites or chatting or whatever as others, then it might be an issue. Or maybe they work longer hours.
For what it’s worth, I was the most productive employee in the company (a retail chain with 300 stores) the last time I had a job when I could take smoke breaks. To the extent that any employer allows smoke breaks but not similar breaks for non-smokers, I agree that it’s unfair and illogical. However, a lower wage doesn’t make sense unless the employee’s smoke breaks affect productivity, which should already be reflected in wages.
Said every employee ever.
Sure, but I can objectively support it: I was the #1 seller out of approximately 6000 retail associates three years in a row. The figures were published each January and the top 10 were listed on the desktop of the Windows PCs we used as cash registers and inventory control.
I don’t think smokers should be paid less. Hell, I post the equivalent of two packs a day to this forum. I’m not comfortable having my time micromanaged, so I’ll avoid that slippery slope.
Starting two years ago, my company did start charging smoking employees higher health insurance premiums. (Not eye-watering amounts, we’re talking a 3% difference.) I feel less ambivalent about that.
Okay, let’s pay smokers less.
But since they die younger and collect far less in Social Security and Medicare benefits than non-smokers, they should pay less in Social Security and Medicare taxes.
Back when my employer allowed smoking on the premises, but no longer at our desks, I worked in a group of 12 where 3 were smokers. We non smokers realized that the three smokers would be gone for 15 minutes or so about every hour. We felt this was unfair so we hatched a plan.
The next day when the smokers left to go outside we all went with them. Supervisor looked around to see 12 empty desks.
By by the end of the second day the three smokers had cut back to only going out mid morning and mid afternoon.
In CA, you have to take a lunch break before your fifth hour starts. You also get two ten or fifteen minute breaks.
I’m a smoker and for me this works fine. Two cigarette/bathroom breaks and lunch. Works great for the non-smokers too.
They’re doing something that will prevent them from going through nicotine withdraws and their performance suffering as a result, you just want to stop working to play goof off for a while.
What if it’s time off for Light Therapy to alleviate the soul crushing depression brought on by the meaningless drudgery of the everyday office environment?
Don’t be silly. I’m a smoker myself, and never in a million years would I argue that smoking is anything other than voluntary (hard to quit as it may be).