Google says unvaccinated employees will lose pay, eventually be fired | Hacker News Reader

Google says unvaccinated employees will lose pay, eventually be fired

thehill.com

22 pointsVicterius12 comments

If your employees are remote, what legitimate reason is there for this? Do they just like being able to wield power over other people's lives?

> what legitimate reason is there for this?

Unvaccinated employees are more likely to be hospitalized or die.

There is some precedent for this. In many states, it's legal to fire someone because they smoke cigarettes, even if they never smoke on company time or on company property[1].

That would mean you could fire a remote employee for smoking cigarettes at home in the evenings, after work ends.

1. https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/can-employer-threate...

But Google doesn't fire people for smoking, being obese, or anything else that makes them more likely to be hospitalized or die, so that can't be their real reason.

It's much, much easier to get vaccinated than to stop smoking or lose weight.

Covid is also much more likely to kill or hospitalize an employee in the short term than smoking or obesity.

Google may also just not want to associate with people who subscribe to conspiracy theories, which is their right as a private company.

The real conspiracy theory is believing that a company demanding that you will indefinitely have experimental medication injected into your veins as a scheme to ward off people who might be thinking the wrong thoughts privately in their own heads.

Just a few years ago, uttering such a view would be grounds for institutionalization, but it is the situation we are finding ourselves in today, and that is a far more terrifying reality to reckon with than the virus.

Pretty melodramatic.

Companies, schools, and military requiring vaccines isn't new. I don't really know why Google doesn't want unvaccinated (remote) workers, but it's their choice. Don't work for them if it bothers you. People should have freedom of association, even Google.

Whatever you're saying is worse than the virus isn't worse than the virus. The virus has killed millions of people.

Also, the vaccines aren't experimental. The more traditional vaccines, such as J&J, use a model that has safely protected billions of people and has been around for hundreds of years.

No one cares about your private thoughts. They just want you not to drain society of resources by catching or spreading a preventable disease.

But you won't get fired for publicly expressing a belief that the Earth is flat or the Moon landing was faked, so that can't be the reason either.

Those views don't make you more likely to catch and spread a deadly disease. They are fairly harmless.

There's a bunch of contagious diseases more deadly than COVID that we also have vaccines for, but Google won't fire you for not having those vaccines, so that can't be it either.

What is another ongoing pandemic that Google could require vaccines for? Please list the diseases you're referring to.

Covid is killing more than 1,000 Americans every day. No other contagious disease is doing that.

No.

They know they can. Getting rid of the rebels when you can is always a straightforward decision.

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