A low unemployment rate and shortages of skilled professionals have led to a tight labor market and challenges for Geisinger and other employers to fill jobs.
Yet, there is one demographic that Geisinger has refused to hire for more than seven years: smokers.
Geisinger has a policy that it will not hire people who use tobacco products, including cigarettes, cigars and chewing or smokeless tobacco.
Job applicants are tested for tobacco use just as they are for illegal drugs. Testing for nicotine is part of a urine drug screening.
Applicants who test positive for nicotine will not be offered employment, but may reapply for jobs at Geisinger within six months, according to the health system’s policy on its website.
In an emailed statement, Geisinger spokesman Matt Mattei said the policy of hiring non-tobacco users was implemented in 2012 “to create better employee health and a more healthful patient environment and improving health remains our focus.”
“Improving employee health is a primary focus at Geisinger,” he said. “Geisinger has a robust employee wellness program.”
When the policy of not hiring smokers was implemented, it did not affect existing Geisinger employees who smoke or use other tobacco products.
As of 2018, 97.4 percent of employees reported no tobacco use and 59 percent of tobacco users enrolled in a tobacco cessation program. Of those, 30 percent reported quitting, according to statistics Mattei provided.
The statistics also showed as of 2018, more than 38,000 free, on-site health screenings have been provided for Geisinger employees.
Denise Balas, talent acquisition specialist for Geisinger, recently participated in a discussion with Eileen Cipriani, deputy secretary of the state Department of Labor and Industry, at CareerLink in Wilkes-Barre about the challenges of trying to hire local employees amid a tight labor market.
She said the health system is looking to fill a number of nursing jobs and offers increased wages and sign-on bonuses of up to $20,000 for registered nurses because of a nursing shortage. Geisinger also encounters challenges trying to fill entry-level positions, she said.
Mattei said Geisinger’s policy of hiring non-tobacco users “has not made hiring more difficult.”
Geisinger hired 3,700 employees in fiscal year 2018, which spans July 1, 2017, to June 30, 2018; 3,800 employees in fiscal year 2019 and 1,200 employees through Sept. 30, 2019, he said.
Geisinger Wyoming Valley Medical Center in Plains Twp. was the third-largest employer in Luzerne County for the first quarter of 2019 after the federal and state governments, and Geisinger Community Medical Center in Scranton was the third-largest employer in Lackawanna County after the state government and Allied Services Foundation, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry Center for Workforce Information & Analysis.
Geisinger employs about 32,000 people, according to its website, which also advertises a number of career opportunities in the health system.
ACLU opposition
The American Civil Liberties Union has expressed opposition on its website to employers discriminating against off-duty smokers.
“Private employers are using the power of the paycheck to tell their employees what they can and cannot do in the privacy of their own homes,” the ACLU stated on its website. “The American Civil Liberties Union believes that what a person does during non-working hours away from the workplace should not be the basis for discrimination.”
According to the ACLU, the driving force behind the trend of not hiring smokers is economics, in particular the rising cost of health care benefits that employers provide.
Several factors contribute to the high cost of health insurance, but the only factor employers have substantial control over is their employees. Under the pressure of economic considerations, employers try to regulate “every health-related aspect of their employees’ lives, including diet, hobbies, sleep habits and even childbearing,” the ACLU stated.
According to the ACLU, the groups most frequently “discriminated against” are smokers and people who are overweight.
“Employers’ desire to keep their health care insurance costs down is understandable, but it is unclear that employers can save much by engaging in lifestyle discrimination,” the ACLU stated. “Permitting employers to act as ‘health police’ will not solve our nation’s health care crisis. It will only destroy the private lives of working Americans.”
The ACLU also pointed out that virtually every lifestyle choice people make has some health-related consequence and asked “where do we draw the line as to what an employer can regulate?”
“The real issue here is the right of individuals to lead the lives they choose,” the ACLU stated. “It is very important that we preserve the distinction between company time and the sanctity of an employee’s private life. Employers should not be permitted to regulate our lives 24 hours a day, seven days a week.”
While the ACLU opposes what it calls “lifestyle discrimination in the workplace,” it is not illegal to refuse to hire smokers. Federal laws prohibit discriminating against people for a variety of reasons such as race or sex but existing anti-discrimination laws do not offer the same protection for those who smoke.
Twenty-nine states prohibit discrimination based on legal activities outside the workplace but Pennsylvania is not one of them.
Mattei refrained from commenting on other health care systems that also refuse to hire people who use tobacco products, but he said “this type of policy is not an uncommon practice.”
The University of Pennsylvania Health System announced in 2013 it would join dozens of hospitals across the country in implementing a policy refusing to hire smokers.
Commonwealth Health, which includes Wilkes-Barre General Hospital, First Hospital in Kingston, Moses Taylor Hospital in Scranton, Regional Hospital of Scranton, Berwick Hospital Center and Tyler Memorial Hospital in Tunkhannock, does not have a similar policy.
“Commonwealth Health hires individuals to fill vacancies based on their expertise and knowledge. Whether or not an individual uses tobacco does not play a part in hiring decisions,” Commonwealth Health spokeswoman Annmarie Poslock said in a statement. “We do maintain a tobacco-free campus policy at all of our hospitals to provide a safe environment for our patients, visitors and employees.”
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