When All Else Fails: Forcing Workers Into Healthy Habits

Not good enough.

"Last year, AmeriGas Propane Inc. gave its employees an ultimatum: get their medical checkups, or lose their health insurance.

The nationwide propane distributor took the unusual step after facing years of steep increases in the cost of health coverage for its roughly 6,000 workers. The company’s work force was aging, and many employees had unhealthy habits—the average worker is 46, and around 44% are smokers. And people weren’t getting tests or preventive care that could help them avoid heart attacks, diabetes or cancer.

AmeriGas had tried a number of voluntary wellness programs to encourage healthy habits in its employees. But the company concluded that 'optional programs just don’t work,' says Bill Katz, vice president for human resources."

And neither will this unless employees make changes.

But the changes that need to be made cannot be the ones advocated by the experts.

Those will never work.

Just as they have not worked.

See Einstein and insanity.