By allowing health insurance carriers to charge higher premiums to smokers, the ACA has in effect acknowledged that smoking is statistically proven to be "hazardous to your health." Given the added costs of providing more health-insurance choices to employees under the ACA, many organizations are choosing to hire the non-smoker over the smoker for an open position – all other factors being equal and the U.S. economy still nowhere near full-employment.
However, is that leaving employers open to charges of discrimination? By some accounts, it's a slippery slope from there to penalizing workers for other ailments or addictions.
Read the full article from HR Morning.