MSN: Hide the Doritos! Here comes HR

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com...DoritosHereCom
esHR.aspx?page=1

Hide the Doritos! Here comes HR
With an eye on soaring health care costs, companies are becoming more
proactive about what their employees eat.

By BusinessWeek
The lawyers at boutique law firm Littler Mendelson have always liked their
carbs. For years the firm's sumptuous San Francisco headquarters overflowed
with endless trays of Krispy Kremes, gooey sweet rolls and gigantic
muffins.

Then one day the attorneys showed up for a firm breakfast and found
hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, mini-quiches, cottage cheese and fresh fruit.
"Where's the doughnuts?" ranted the associates.

Littler Mendelson's human-resources chief, Suzanne Perez, feared mass sugar
withdrawal, but she yanked the junk anyway. And though she's not too
popular at the office right now, she's in good company. Google, Yamaha of
America, Caterpillar and others are putting health food in corporate break
rooms, cafeterias and vending machines, dumping doughnuts in favor of
organic fresh fruit and slapping "calorie taxes" on fatty foods.

For several years the company wellness police -- the folks obsessed with
bringing down exploding health insurance costs -- have confined themselves
to targeting chunky cube dwellers with subsidized cholesterol drugs, free
gym memberships and New Age-spouting health coaches. But what good is all
that if the office vending machine is filled with candy, cola and chips, or
if cookies and cake are served at every meeting?

"I didn't think we were being aggressive enough," says Carol Baker, the HR
boss at Yamaha.

But getting junkies to detox isn't easy. "People aren't ready to give up
everything," Baker says.

Don't let them eat cake
Google, the company famously committed to doing no evil, is a case in
point. Yes, the Googleplex swarms with svelte 20-somethings in snug tops
and low-slung denim. But even these workers aren't immune to the so-called
Google 15 -- the number of pounds Googlers say they typically gain after
joining the company and partaking of its famous gratis grub.

As one blogger put it, "I fully expect a Google Infarct Room to be opened
within two years."

Google's "micro-kitchens" -- the snack stations within 200 feet of every
worker's desk -- were like small 7-Elevens.

"We kept adding things and adding things and adding things," says Google's
former food-services chief, John Dickman. Like 20 kinds of sugared cereal.
Or, in the cafeteria, the Luther Burger, a bacon-cheese number with Krispy
Kreme doughnuts as the bun.

It wasn't long before some Googlers were pondering the philosophical
implications on the company's in-house message boards. Wretched excess with
stock options was one thing. But wasn't free junk food kind of, ahem, evil?

Yet when Dickman ditched the M&M's, employees argued that the measure was
about costs, not calories. (That was a hard case to make given Google's
valet parking, free massages and bidet-equipped restrooms.)

"There were certain things they couldn't live without," Dickman says. So
the M&M's returned. But the junk-healthful ratio is now 50-50, with
agave-sweetened beverages, roasted nuts, sulfate-free dried fruit and
platters of organic crudités.

At Yamaha, Baker has done away with the "zillions" of pies in favor of
regular shipments of organic fruit from San Francisco's Fruit Guys, whose
business in providing workplaces across the U.S. with pesticide-free,
locally grown fruit is exploding. (It turns out that fruit is cheaper than
the pies.)

Lunchtime is another battle. Yamaha's Buena Park, Calif., headquarters is
situated near a thoroughfare chockablock with fast-food joints. So Baker
brought in a catering company offering healthful salads and sandwiches.

"We're trying to change people's behaviors," she says.

The 'calorie tax'
Baker soon found out that employees were not the only resisters.

"The vending machine people were not very supportive," she says. At first,
she says, they grudgingly tossed in some trail mix and stuck a little heart
sticker next to those fluorescent orange crackers with peanut butter.

But within weeks, the potato chips and candy bars were back. Junk moves.

That's why some companies are getting to employees' stomachs through their
wallets. After Caterpillar offered garden burgers in its cafeteria for a
buck last year, sales soared fivefold, to 2,500 a month. At mortgage giant
Freddie Mac, workers who order six healthful meals in the cafeteria get the
seventh free.

Florida Power & Light, Dow Corning and Sprint Nextel all charge more for
unhealthful food (the so-called calorie tax) and less for more healthful
fare. At Pitney Bowes, they moved the desserts away from the cash register
to curb impulse buys

Some companies feel like a re-education camp. Microsoft's food honcho, Mark
Freeman, created a color-coded system of icons to help make the healthful
stuff as recognizable as a Snickers bar. (Microsoft is the publisher of MSN
Money).

In each of Microsoft's 31 cafeterias, there are icons for vegan,
gluten-free, organic, sustainable, sugar-free, carb control and nondairy.
Freeman has also made the company's metropolislike headquarters a
trans-fat-free zone.

At first, "everybody was yelling and screaming about the healthy food,"
Freeman says. But the Microserfs are coming around.

For those who don't, there is always tough love. HR types swarmed the New
York Marriott Marquis hotel in February to learn how to implement
lean-worker campaigns, biggest-loser contests and strategic-eating
seminars. During breaks over yogurt and fruit, the attendees swapped war
stories about how overweight workers eat up health-care dollars.

As one executive from a major software company quipped: "We're waging a war
on fat people."

Junk food lovers, beware. These people are serious.

This article was reported and written by Michelle Conlin for BusinessWeek.

Shelly wrote:

> As one executive from a major software company quipped: "We're waging
> a war on fat people."

That sums up their master plan right there.

--

"Shelly" <shelly@nowhere.com> wrote in message
news:20080522020906.537EB4E4DA@outpost.zedz.net...
> http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com...DoritosHereCom
> esHR.aspx?page=1
>
> Hide the Doritos! Here comes HR
> With an eye on soaring health care costs, companies are becoming more
> proactive about what their employees eat.
>
> By BusinessWeek
> The lawyers at boutique law firm Littler Mendelson have always liked their
> carbs. For years the firm's sumptuous San Francisco headquarters
> overflowed
> with endless trays of Krispy Kremes, gooey sweet rolls and gigantic
> muffins.
>
> Then one day the attorneys showed up for a firm breakfast and found
> hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, mini-quiches, cottage cheese and fresh fruit.
> "Where's the doughnuts?" ranted the associates.
>
> Littler Mendelson's human-resources chief, Suzanne Perez, feared mass
> sugar
> withdrawal, but she yanked the junk anyway. And though she's not too
> popular at the office right now, she's in good company. Google, Yamaha of
> America, Caterpillar and others are putting health food in corporate break
> rooms, cafeterias and vending machines, dumping doughnuts in favor of
> organic fresh fruit and slapping "calorie taxes" on fatty foods.
>
> For several years the company wellness police -- the folks obsessed with
> bringing down exploding health insurance costs -- have confined themselves
> to targeting chunky cube dwellers with subsidized cholesterol drugs, free
> gym memberships and New Age-spouting health coaches. But what good is all
> that if the office vending machine is filled with candy, cola and chips,
> or
> if cookies and cake are served at every meeting?
>
> "I didn't think we were being aggressive enough," says Carol Baker, the HR
> boss at Yamaha.
>
> But getting junkies to detox isn't easy. "People aren't ready to give up
> everything," Baker says.
>
> Don't let them eat cake
> Google, the company famously committed to doing no evil, is a case in
> point. Yes, the Googleplex swarms with svelte 20-somethings in snug tops
> and low-slung denim. But even these workers aren't immune to the so-called
> Google 15 -- the number of pounds Googlers say they typically gain after
> joining the company and partaking of its famous gratis grub.
>
> As one blogger put it, "I fully expect a Google Infarct Room to be opened
> within two years."
>
> Google's "micro-kitchens" -- the snack stations within 200 feet of every
> worker's desk -- were like small 7-Elevens.
>
> "We kept adding things and adding things and adding things," says Google's
> former food-services chief, John Dickman. Like 20 kinds of sugared cereal.
> Or, in the cafeteria, the Luther Burger, a bacon-cheese number with Krispy
> Kreme doughnuts as the bun.
>
> It wasn't long before some Googlers were pondering the philosophical
> implications on the company's in-house message boards. Wretched excess
> with
> stock options was one thing. But wasn't free junk food kind of, ahem,
> evil?
>
> Yet when Dickman ditched the M&M's, employees argued that the measure was
> about costs, not calories. (That was a hard case to make given Google's
> valet parking, free massages and bidet-equipped restrooms.)
>
> "There were certain things they couldn't live without," Dickman says. So
> the M&M's returned. But the junk-healthful ratio is now 50-50, with
> agave-sweetened beverages, roasted nuts, sulfate-free dried fruit and
> platters of organic crudités.
>
> At Yamaha, Baker has done away with the "zillions" of pies in favor of
> regular shipments of organic fruit from San Francisco's Fruit Guys, whose
> business in providing workplaces across the U.S. with pesticide-free,
> locally grown fruit is exploding. (It turns out that fruit is cheaper than
> the pies.)
>
> Lunchtime is another battle. Yamaha's Buena Park, Calif., headquarters is
> situated near a thoroughfare chockablock with fast-food joints. So Baker
> brought in a catering company offering healthful salads and sandwiches.
>
> "We're trying to change people's behaviors," she says.
>
> The 'calorie tax'
> Baker soon found out that employees were not the only resisters.
>
> "The vending machine people were not very supportive," she says. At first,
> she says, they grudgingly tossed in some trail mix and stuck a little
> heart
> sticker next to those fluorescent orange crackers with peanut butter.
>
> But within weeks, the potato chips and candy bars were back. Junk moves.
>
> That's why some companies are getting to employees' stomachs through their
> wallets. After Caterpillar offered garden burgers in its cafeteria for a
> buck last year, sales soared fivefold, to 2,500 a month. At mortgage giant
> Freddie Mac, workers who order six healthful meals in the cafeteria get
> the
> seventh free.
>
> Florida Power & Light, Dow Corning and Sprint Nextel all charge more for
> unhealthful food (the so-called calorie tax) and less for more healthful
> fare. At Pitney Bowes, they moved the desserts away from the cash register
> to curb impulse buys
>
> Some companies feel like a re-education camp. Microsoft's food honcho,
> Mark
> Freeman, created a color-coded system of icons to help make the healthful
> stuff as recognizable as a Snickers bar. (Microsoft is the publisher of
> MSN
> Money).
>
> In each of Microsoft's 31 cafeterias, there are icons for vegan,
> gluten-free, organic, sustainable, sugar-free, carb control and nondairy.
> Freeman has also made the company's metropolislike headquarters a
> trans-fat-free zone.
>
> At first, "everybody was yelling and screaming about the healthy food,"
> Freeman says. But the Microserfs are coming around.
>
> For those who don't, there is always tough love. HR types swarmed the New
> York Marriott Marquis hotel in February to learn how to implement
> lean-worker campaigns, biggest-loser contests and strategic-eating
> seminars. During breaks over yogurt and fruit, the attendees swapped war
> stories about how overweight workers eat up health-care dollars.
>
> As one executive from a major software company quipped: "We're waging a
> war
> on fat people."
>
> Junk food lovers, beware. These people are serious.
>
> This article was reported and written by Michelle Conlin for BusinessWeek.
>

Hey why not require dna testing, and full body scans as part of the
interview process in the first place. If you can tell if someone will be
sick 5, 10, 20 years down the road, well that's grounds for passing over
that job candidate right there! Also, implant microchips in employees like
owners do to their dogs. Just replacing junk food in offices with healthy
stuff will not be enough. Employees can just buy and consume their own junk
food. A microchip that monitors vital signs of employees will enable
employers to make sure their employees are eating healthy-all the time!

On Thu, 22 May 2008, Shelly wrote:

> Hide the Doritos! Here comes HR
> With an eye on soaring health care costs, companies are becoming more
> proactive about what their employees eat.

There is a difference between being "proactive" and being "intrusive".

> The lawyers at boutique law firm Littler Mendelson have always liked their
> carbs. For years the firm's sumptuous San Francisco headquarters overflowed
> with endless trays of Krispy Kremes, gooey sweet rolls and gigantic
> muffins.
>
> Then one day the attorneys showed up for a firm breakfast and found
> hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, mini-quiches, cottage cheese and fresh fruit.
> "Where's the doughnuts?" ranted the associates.

That actually is being "proactive". "Intrusive" would be things like
telling people they can't have lunch at McDonalds, or making them get on a
scale once a week, something like that. The company offering healthy FREE
goodies rather then the high calorie choices is perfectly fine. If lawyer
dude doesn't like it, get his own damn Krispy Kremes.

> Google, Yamaha of
> America, Caterpillar and others are putting health food in corporate break
> rooms, cafeterias and vending machines, dumping doughnuts in favor of
> organic fresh fruit and slapping "calorie taxes" on fatty foods.

While offering healthy foods in the break rooms, cafeterias, and vending
machines, is perfectly fine and proactive, I find it fundamentally
intrusive to issue a "calorie tax" on fatty food choices.

> For several years the company wellness police -- the folks obsessed with
> bringing down exploding health insurance costs

AKA size nazi fat bashing bigots, but continue...

> -- have confined themselves
> to targeting chunky cube dwellers with subsidized cholesterol drugs, free
> gym memberships and New Age-spouting health coaches. But what good is all
> that if the office vending machine is filled with candy, cola and chips, or
> if cookies and cake are served at every meeting?

Then take the snacks out of the vending machine. If I want a snickers
bar, and my break room doesn't have it, I will go to walmart to buy a
snickers bar and bring it to work.

Back to the above mentioned calorie tax, however. When a company has a
vending machine in a business, they "rent out" the rights to have a
machine there. The host company gets the rent, the vending machine
company gets the snickers bar money.

And by all means, the company should be able to tell the vender what
goodies are allowed in the machines.

However, the moment the host company gets a "kick-back" on high calorie
snacks, that is when it crosses the line. The vending machine company
might charge 75 cents for a high calorie snack, but if the host demands
payment of a 25 cent calorie tax, that snack is bumped up to a buck. That
is why I find it fundamentally wrong.

> "I didn't think we were being aggressive enough," says Carol Baker, the HR
> boss at Yamaha.

Ofcourse not... Bigots rarely think they are being bigots.

> But getting junkies to detox isn't easy. "People aren't ready to give up
> everything," Baker says.

Junkies? So now people who like snickers bars are no better then those
addicted to drugs? What a cunt...

> Google's "micro-kitchens" -- the snack stations within 200 feet of every
> worker's desk -- were like small 7-Elevens.

God bless Google.

> It wasn't long before some Googlers were pondering the philosophical
> implications on the company's in-house message boards. Wretched excess with
> stock options was one thing. But wasn't free junk food kind of, ahem, evil?

Oh come off it! Now they are just being ridiculous.

> Yet when Dickman ditched the M&M's, employees argued that the measure was
> about costs, not calories. (That was a hard case to make given Google's
> valet parking, free massages and bidet-equipped restrooms.)

The "Dick" part of Dickman's name is there for a reason. The lying sack
of shit... It was obviously NOT about the cost... Get rid of candy, keep
the valets?

> "There were certain things they couldn't live without," Dickman says. So
> the M&M's returned. But the junk-healthful ratio is now 50-50, with
> agave-sweetened beverages, roasted nuts, sulfate-free dried fruit and
> platters of organic crudités.

Go figure, they offer CHOICES now, and the workers get to PICK.

> Lunchtime is another battle. Yamaha's Buena Park, Calif., headquarters is
> situated near a thoroughfare chockablock with fast-food joints. So Baker
> brought in a catering company offering healthful salads and sandwiches.

And that's fine. But don't force people to eat there... You offer a
choice, and that's great. But if Sally Sue wants Burger King, she better
be able to drive to a Burger King.

> "We're trying to change people's behaviors," she says.

Mind control and brain washing you mean...

> "The vending machine people were not very supportive," she says. At first,
> she says, they grudgingly tossed in some trail mix and stuck a little heart
> sticker next to those fluorescent orange crackers with peanut butter.
>
> But within weeks, the potato chips and candy bars were back. Junk moves.

Then tell them to pull the machines, and pick a different company that
will listen to management. It's called Capitalism, you aren't stuck with
just one vending company choice.

> That's why some companies are getting to employees' stomachs through their
> wallets. After Caterpillar offered garden burgers in its cafeteria for a
> buck last year, sales soared fivefold, to 2,500 a month. At mortgage giant
> Freddie Mac, workers who order six healthful meals in the cafeteria get the
> seventh free.

Ah, so they are offering lowered costs of healthy choices? If the
employer wants to pay for half the price, they have that right. As long
as they aren't increasing the costs of unhealthy foods and channeling the
increase to company health insurance, I'm fine with it.

> For those who don't, there is always tough love. HR types swarmed the New
> York Marriott Marquis hotel in February to learn how to implement
> lean-worker campaigns, biggest-loser contests and strategic-eating
> seminars. During breaks over yogurt and fruit, the attendees swapped war
> stories about how overweight workers eat up health-care dollars.

That is scarry... It will be interesting if they make weight loss
mandatory.

> As one executive from a major software company quipped: "We're waging a war
> on fat people."

Well fuck you, asshole!

> Junk food lovers, beware. These people are serious.

That's what scares me...

On Thu, 22 May 2008, Real BBW wrote:

>> As one executive from a major software company quipped: "We're waging
>> a war on fat people."
>
> That sums up their master plan right there.

It seems so...

On Thu, 22 May 2008, ricok987 wrote:

> Also, implant microchips in employees like
> owners do to their dogs. Just replacing junk food in offices with healthy
> stuff will not be enough. Employees can just buy and consume their own junk
> food. A microchip that monitors vital signs of employees will enable
> employers to make sure their employees are eating healthy-all the time!

The problem with the Usenet is you can't tell when someone is being a
smart ass or not. Your above concept is a drastic limitation on personal
rights and freedoms, giving employers way too much power over their
workers.

The problem is, after reading the MSN story, I'd be inclined to believe
that companies would do it if they could work out the legal issues.

On May 21, 7:09*pm, she...@nowhere.com (Shelly) wrote:
> http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com...ideTheDoritosH...
> esHR.aspx?page=1
>
> Hide the Doritos! Here comes HR
> With an eye on soaring health care costs, companies are becoming more
> proactive about what their employees eat.
>
> By BusinessWeek
> The lawyers at boutique law firm Littler Mendelson have always liked their
> carbs. For years the firm's sumptuous San Francisco headquarters overflowed
> with endless trays of Krispy Kremes, gooey sweet rolls and gigantic
> muffins.
>
> Then one day the attorneys showed up for a firm breakfast and found
> hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, mini-quiches, cottage cheese and fresh fruit.
> "Where's the doughnuts?" ranted the associates.
>
> Littler Mendelson's human-resources chief, Suzanne Perez, feared mass sugar
> withdrawal, but she yanked the junk anyway. And though she's not too
> popular at the office right now, she's in good company. Google, Yamaha of
> America, Caterpillar and others are putting health food in corporate break
> rooms, cafeterias and vending machines, dumping doughnuts in favor of
> organic fresh fruit and slapping "calorie taxes" on fatty foods.
>
> For several years the company wellness police -- the folks obsessed with
> bringing down exploding health insurance costs -- have confined themselves
> to targeting chunky cube dwellers with subsidized cholesterol drugs, free
> gym memberships and New Age-spouting health coaches. But what good is all
> that if the office vending machine is filled with candy, cola and chips, or
> if cookies and cake are served at every meeting?
>
> "I didn't think we were being aggressive enough," says Carol Baker, the HR
> boss at Yamaha.
>
> But getting junkies to detox isn't easy. "People aren't ready to give up
> everything," Baker says.
>
> Don't let them eat cake
> Google, the company famously committed to doing no evil, is a case in
> point. Yes, the Googleplex swarms with svelte 20-somethings in snug tops
> and low-slung denim. But even these workers aren't immune to the so-called
> Google 15 -- the number of pounds Googlers say they typically gain after
> joining the company and partaking of its famous gratis grub.
>
> As one blogger put it, "I fully expect a Google Infarct Room to be opened
> within two years."
>
> Google's "micro-kitchens" -- the snack stations within 200 feet of every
> worker's desk -- were like small 7-Elevens.
>
> "We kept adding things and adding things and adding things," says Google's
> former food-services chief, John Dickman. Like 20 kinds of sugared cereal.
> Or, in the cafeteria, the Luther Burger, a bacon-cheese number with Krispy
> Kreme doughnuts as the bun.
>
> It wasn't long before some Googlers were pondering the philosophical
> implications on the company's in-house message boards. Wretched excess with
> stock options was one thing. But wasn't free junk food kind of, ahem, evil?
>
> Yet when Dickman ditched the M&M's, employees argued that the measure was
> about costs, not calories. (That was a hard case to make given Google's
> valet parking, free massages and bidet-equipped restrooms.)
>
> "There were certain things they couldn't live without," Dickman says. So
> the M&M's returned. But the junk-healthful ratio is now 50-50, with
> agave-sweetened beverages, roasted nuts, sulfate-free dried fruit and
> platters of organic crudités.
>
> At Yamaha, Baker has done away with the "zillions" of pies in favor of
> regular shipments of organic fruit from San Francisco's Fruit Guys, whose
> business in providing workplaces across the U.S. with pesticide-free,
> locally grown fruit is exploding. (It turns out that fruit is cheaper than
> the pies.)
>
> Lunchtime is another battle. Yamaha's Buena Park, Calif., headquarters is
> situated near a thoroughfare chockablock with fast-food joints. So Baker
> brought in a catering company offering healthful salads and sandwiches.
>
> "We're trying to change people's behaviors," she says.
>
> The 'calorie tax'
> Baker soon found out that employees were not the only resisters.
>
> "The vending machine people were not very supportive," she says. At first,
> she says, they grudgingly tossed in some trail mix and stuck a little heart
> sticker next to those fluorescent orange crackers with peanut butter.
>
> But within weeks, the potato chips and candy bars were back. Junk moves.
>
> That's why some companies are getting to employees' stomachs through their
> wallets. After Caterpillar offered garden burgers in its cafeteria for a
> buck last year, sales soared fivefold, to 2,500 a month. At mortgage giant
> Freddie Mac, workers who order six healthful meals in the cafeteria get the
> seventh free.
>
> Florida Power & Light, Dow Corning and Sprint Nextel all charge more for
> unhealthful food (the so-called calorie tax) and less for more healthful
> fare. At Pitney Bowes, they moved the desserts away from the cash register
> to curb impulse buys
>
> Some companies feel like a re-education camp. Microsoft's food honcho, Mark
> Freeman, created a color-coded system of icons to help make the healthful
> stuff as recognizable as a Snickers bar. (Microsoft is the publisher of MSN
> Money).
>
> In each of Microsoft's 31 cafeterias, there are icons for vegan,
> gluten-free, organic, sustainable, sugar-free, carb control and nondairy.
> Freeman has also made the company's metropolislike headquarters a
> trans-fat-free zone.
>
> At first, "everybody was yelling and screaming about the healthy food,"
> Freeman says. But the Microserfs are coming around.
>
> For those who don't, there is always tough love. HR types swarmed the New
> York Marriott Marquis hotel in February to learn how to implement
> lean-worker campaigns, biggest-loser contests and strategic-eating
> seminars. During breaks over yogurt and fruit, the attendees swapped war
> stories about how overweight workers eat up health-care dollars.
>
> As one executive from a major software company quipped: "We're waging a war
> on fat people."
>
> Junk food lovers, beware. These people are serious.
>
> This article was reported and written by Michelle Conlin for BusinessWeek.

"Then one day the attorneys showed up for a firm breakfast and found
hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, mini-quiches, cottage cheese and fresh
fruit.
"Where's the doughnuts?" ranted the associates. "

Big problem. The replacement food is no better than donuts...high
cholesterol. Also, you can get plenty fat eating this food and stay
thin eating KRispy Kreme. This is a paternalistic concept and way too
specific. I wouldn't work for such a short-sighted company. dkw

And this comment points up exactly what is wrong with the company's
approach. Not everyone believes the same rules apply as to what is healthy
food. I'd say everything in the replacements is healthy except for the
mini-quiches which still might be okay for thin non-diabetics. Some fruit
might be too carby for some people. But cholesterol is irrelevant.

dkw12002@yahoo.com wrote:
|
| "Then one day the attorneys showed up for a firm breakfast and found
| hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, mini-quiches, cottage cheese and fresh
| fruit.
| "Where's the doughnuts?" ranted the associates. "
|
| Big problem. The replacement food is no better than donuts...high
| cholesterol. Also, you can get plenty fat eating this food and stay
| thin eating KRispy Kreme. This is a paternalistic concept and way too
| specific. I wouldn't work for such a short-sighted company. dkw

"The Master" <tardis@nospam.sdf.lonestar.org.nospam> wrote in message
news:Pine.NEB.4.64.0805221344000.13122@sdf.lonesta r.org...
> On Thu, 22 May 2008, ricok987 wrote:
>
>> Also, implant microchips in employees like
>> owners do to their dogs. Just replacing junk food in offices with
>> healthy
>> stuff will not be enough. Employees can just buy and consume their own
>> junk
>> food. A microchip that monitors vital signs of employees will enable
>> employers to make sure their employees are eating healthy-all the time!
>
> The problem with the Usenet is you can't tell when someone is being a
> smart ass or not. Your above concept is a drastic limitation on personal
> rights and freedoms, giving employers way too much power over their
> workers.
I was being sarcastic but think of this: if I told you 5 years ago oil
would be $135 a barrel, and gas $4.00+ per gallon you would think I was
nuts. Maybe 5, 10 years from now after we have to pay a $1.00 tax to eat a
McDonalds Hamburger-microchips in people will start to be a reality. I
think the police have the right to get dna samples of people for minor
crimes now, who knows, in 10 years they might get samples of every American
in order to maintain citizenship.

ricok987 <ricok987@optonline.net> wrote:
> "The Master" <tardis@nospam.sdf.lonestar.org.nospam> wrote in message
> news:Pine.NEB.4.64.0805221344000.13122@sdf.lonesta r.org...
>> On Thu, 22 May 2008, ricok987 wrote:
>>
>>> Also, implant microchips in employees like
>>> owners do to their dogs. Just replacing junk food in offices with
>>> healthy
>>> stuff will not be enough. Employees can just buy and consume their
>>> own junk
>>> food. A microchip that monitors vital signs of employees will
>>> enable employers to make sure their employees are eating
>>> healthy-all the time!
>>
>> The problem with the Usenet is you can't tell when someone is being a
>> smart ass or not. Your above concept is a drastic limitation on
>> personal rights and freedoms, giving employers way too much power
>> over their workers.

> I was being sarcastic but think of this: if I told you 5 years ago oil would be $135 a barrel, and gas $4.00+ per
> gallon you would think I was nuts.

Nope, not when anyone with a clue knows what it got to in the 70s previously.

> Maybe 5, 10 years from now after we have to pay a $1.00 tax to eat a McDonalds Hamburger-microchips in people will
> start to be a reality.

Using that mindlessly silly line, they might go for summary
execution if you are outside the acceptible BMI too.

> I think the police have the right to get dna samples of people for minor crimes now,

Nope.

> who knows, in 10 years they might get samples of every American in order to maintain citizenship.

Nope, essentially because the voters would never buy that. You watch.

"FOB" <fob@removethisameritech.net> wrote in message
news:uklZj.48$uE5.40@flpi144.ffdc.sbc.com...
> And this comment points up exactly what is wrong with the company's
> approach. Not everyone believes the same rules apply as to what is
> healthy
> food.

The only opinion that counts is that of the one paying for the health
insurance.

If you don't want to see this kind of nannyism grow, workers need to let go
of the idea that health benefits are the responsibility of an employer.
Purchase your own policy just as you purchase your own car insurance - then
you can decide the tradeoff between paying higher premiums (or forgoing
insurance altogether) and eating cow food.

On 22 May 2008 02:09:09 -0000, shelly@nowhere.com (Shelly) wrote:

The idiots are truly running the asylum.

More shit from idiots.

Stick it up your ass. SSFA is not interested.

LV-posted from SSFA

"I rode a tank and held a general's rank
When the blitzkrieg raged and the bodies stank."

---Sympathy for the Devil-The Rolling Stones
--------------------------------------------
"A fanatic cannot change his mind and will not
change the subject."

---Winston Churchill
----------------------------------------------

Posted Via Usenet.com Premium Usenet Newsgroup Services
----------------------------------------------------------
http://www.usenet.com

On Thu, 22 May 2008 13:41:17 +0000, The Master
<tardis@nospam.sdf.lonestar.org.nospam> wrote:

>On Thu, 22 May 2008, Shelly wrote:
>
>> Hide the Doritos! Here comes HR
>> With an eye on soaring health care costs, companies are becoming more
>> proactive about what their employees eat.
>
>There is a difference between being "proactive" and being "intrusive".
>
>> The lawyers at boutique law firm Littler Mendelson have always liked their
>> carbs. For years the firm's sumptuous San Francisco headquarters overflowed
>> with endless trays of Krispy Kremes, gooey sweet rolls and gigantic
>> muffins.
>>
>> Then one day the attorneys showed up for a firm breakfast and found
>> hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, mini-quiches, cottage cheese and fresh fruit.
>> "Where's the doughnuts?" ranted the associates.
>
>That actually is being "proactive". "Intrusive" would be things like
>telling people they can't have lunch at McDonalds, or making them get on a
>scale once a week, something like that. The company offering healthy FREE
>goodies rather then the high calorie choices is perfectly fine. If lawyer
>dude doesn't like it, get his own damn Krispy Kremes.
>
>> Google, Yamaha of
>> America, Caterpillar and others are putting health food in corporate break
>> rooms, cafeterias and vending machines, dumping doughnuts in favor of
>> organic fresh fruit and slapping "calorie taxes" on fatty foods.
>
>While offering healthy foods in the break rooms, cafeterias, and vending
>machines, is perfectly fine and proactive, I find it fundamentally
>intrusive to issue a "calorie tax" on fatty food choices.
>
>> For several years the company wellness police -- the folks obsessed with
>> bringing down exploding health insurance costs
>
>AKA size nazi fat bashing bigots, but continue...
>
>> -- have confined themselves
>> to targeting chunky cube dwellers with subsidized cholesterol drugs, free
>> gym memberships and New Age-spouting health coaches. But what good is all
>> that if the office vending machine is filled with candy, cola and chips, or
>> if cookies and cake are served at every meeting?
>
>Then take the snacks out of the vending machine. If I want a snickers
>bar, and my break room doesn't have it, I will go to walmart to buy a
>snickers bar and bring it to work.
>
>Back to the above mentioned calorie tax, however. When a company has a
>vending machine in a business, they "rent out" the rights to have a
>machine there. The host company gets the rent, the vending machine
>company gets the snickers bar money.
>
>And by all means, the company should be able to tell the vender what
>goodies are allowed in the machines.
>
>However, the moment the host company gets a "kick-back" on high calorie
>snacks, that is when it crosses the line. The vending machine company
>might charge 75 cents for a high calorie snack, but if the host demands
>payment of a 25 cent calorie tax, that snack is bumped up to a buck. That
>is why I find it fundamentally wrong.
>
>> "I didn't think we were being aggressive enough," says Carol Baker, the HR
>> boss at Yamaha.
>
>Ofcourse not... Bigots rarely think they are being bigots.
>
>> But getting junkies to detox isn't easy. "People aren't ready to give up
>> everything," Baker says.
>
>Junkies? So now people who like snickers bars are no better then those
>addicted to drugs? What a cunt...
>
>> Google's "micro-kitchens" -- the snack stations within 200 feet of every
>> worker's desk -- were like small 7-Elevens.
>
>God bless Google.
>
>> It wasn't long before some Googlers were pondering the philosophical
>> implications on the company's in-house message boards. Wretched excess with
>> stock options was one thing. But wasn't free junk food kind of, ahem, evil?
>
>Oh come off it! Now they are just being ridiculous.
>
>> Yet when Dickman ditched the M&M's, employees argued that the measure was
>> about costs, not calories. (That was a hard case to make given Google's
>> valet parking, free massages and bidet-equipped restrooms.)
>
>The "Dick" part of Dickman's name is there for a reason. The lying sack
>of shit... It was obviously NOT about the cost... Get rid of candy, keep
>the valets?
>
>> "There were certain things they couldn't live without," Dickman says. So
>> the M&M's returned. But the junk-healthful ratio is now 50-50, with
>> agave-sweetened beverages, roasted nuts, sulfate-free dried fruit and
>> platters of organic crudités.
>
>Go figure, they offer CHOICES now, and the workers get to PICK.
>
>> Lunchtime is another battle. Yamaha's Buena Park, Calif., headquarters is
>> situated near a thoroughfare chockablock with fast-food joints. So Baker
>> brought in a catering company offering healthful salads and sandwiches.
>
>And that's fine. But don't force people to eat there... You offer a
>choice, and that's great. But if Sally Sue wants Burger King, she better
>be able to drive to a Burger King.
>
>> "We're trying to change people's behaviors," she says.
>
>Mind control and brain washing you mean...
>
>> "The vending machine people were not very supportive," she says. At first,
>> she says, they grudgingly tossed in some trail mix and stuck a little heart
>> sticker next to those fluorescent orange crackers with peanut butter.
>>
>> But within weeks, the potato chips and candy bars were back. Junk moves.
>
>Then tell them to pull the machines, and pick a different company that
>will listen to management. It's called Capitalism, you aren't stuck with
>just one vending company choice.
>
>> That's why some companies are getting to employees' stomachs through their
>> wallets. After Caterpillar offered garden burgers in its cafeteria for a
>> buck last year, sales soared fivefold, to 2,500 a month. At mortgage giant
>> Freddie Mac, workers who order six healthful meals in the cafeteria get the
>> seventh free.
>
>Ah, so they are offering lowered costs of healthy choices? If the
>employer wants to pay for half the price, they have that right. As long
>as they aren't increasing the costs of unhealthy foods and channeling the
>increase to company health insurance, I'm fine with it.
>
>> For those who don't, there is always tough love. HR types swarmed the New
>> York Marriott Marquis hotel in February to learn how to implement
>> lean-worker campaigns, biggest-loser contests and strategic-eating
>> seminars. During breaks over yogurt and fruit, the attendees swapped war
>> stories about how overweight workers eat up health-care dollars.
>
>That is scarry... It will be interesting if they make weight loss
>mandatory.
>
>> As one executive from a major software company quipped: "We're waging a war
>> on fat people."
>
>Well fuck you, asshole!
>
>> Junk food lovers, beware. These people are serious.
>
>That's what scares me...

So are the idiots who infest SSFA.

They are just like a bunch of bugs.

LV-posted from SSFA

"I rode a tank and held a general's rank
When the blitzkrieg raged and the bodies stank."

---Sympathy for the Devil-The Rolling Stones
--------------------------------------------
"A fanatic cannot change his mind and will not
change the subject."

---Winston Churchill
----------------------------------------------

Posted Via Usenet.com Premium Usenet Newsgroup Services
----------------------------------------------------------
http://www.usenet.com

On Thu, 22 May 2008, ricok987 wrote:

> I was being sarcastic but think of this:

Ok... Good. The scarry part is, however, that some people would agree
with your sarcastic comment, and see nothing wrong with it... Anyhow,
your new point...

> if I told you 5 years ago oil
> would be $135 a barrel, and gas $4.00+ per gallon you would think I was
> nuts. Maybe 5, 10 years from now after we have to pay a $1.00 tax to eat a
> McDonalds Hamburger-microchips in people will start to be a reality. I
> think the police have the right to get dna samples of people for minor
> crimes now, who knows, in 10 years they might get samples of every American
> in order to maintain citizenship.

It may very well be a "reality" in 10 years... Just look at what rights
have been limited since 9/11, in the name of "national security"?
Presidential orders are a violation of the constitution, but they are
followed anyhow without question. National security was even used as an
excuse for the FBI to obtain information on US citizens without search
warrents. When the story broke on Yahoo news, I wrote my US rep, asking
him how the FBI's powers will be limited to prevent such a violation of
constitutional rights from happening again. My snail mail reply was
"support our troops".

Who's to say the "mark of the beast" won't be a manditory implant within
the USA, to store identifying data. Drivers license, social security
number, credit cards, can all be carried in "virtual vaults" stored in an
EPROM based IC under the skin. And when that occures, the ability to
store biometric data would be trivial. All in the name of "national
security".

One of my favorite saying is "I love this nation, it's the government that
scares me..."

On May 22, 2:11*pm, "FOB" <f...@removethisameritech.net> wrote:
> And this comment points up exactly what is wrong with the company's
> approach. *Not everyone believes the same rules apply as to what is healthy
> food. *I'd say everything in the replacements is healthy except for the
> mini-quiches which still might be okay for thin non-diabetics. *Some fruit
> might be too carby for some people. *But cholesterol is irrelevant.
>
> dkw12...@yahoo.com wrote:
>
> |
> | "Then one day the attorneys showed up for a firm breakfast and found
> | hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, mini-quiches, cottage cheese and fresh
> | fruit.
> | "Where's the doughnuts?" ranted the associates. "
> |
> | Big problem. The replacement food is no better than donuts...high
> | cholesterol. Also, you can get plenty fat eating this food and stay
> | thin eating KRispy Kreme. This is a paternalistic concept and way too
> | specific. I wouldn't work for such a short-sighted company. dkw

Right. It is mostly opinions and management would be imposing their
opinions on employees. The condition is overweight so they need to
address that problem and leave the how-to to the employees. OFFERING
lower calorie foods would be one way. I worked for an employer once
who had this opinion that everyone needed 2 weeks off all at once
rather than a couple of days here and there, so he tried to see that
everyone took their vacations in 2-week periods. We got 4 weeks. His
stated reason was that it takes 2 weeks to reguvenate yourself. I told
him that might apply to him, but it wasn't a valid reason to apply it
to everyone else. He did lighten up a bit after that. It may have also
been that what he really wanted was less paperwork and fewer
replacement temp. employees coming and going, but he denied that.
Paternalism has always irked me. I don't need someone else to tell me
how I should conduct my life. Oh, they can suggest all they want and
present their OPINIONS, but they don't seem to understand the
difference between fact and opinion to begin with. dkw

>>On Thu, 22 May 2008, Shelly wrote:
>>
>>> Hide the Doritos! Here comes HR
>>> With an eye on soaring health care costs, companies are becoming more
>>> proactive about what their employees eat.
>>
>>There is a difference between being "proactive" and being "intrusive".
>>
>>> The lawyers at boutique law firm Littler Mendelson have always liked
>>> their
>>> carbs. For years the firm's sumptuous San Francisco headquarters
>>> overflowed
>>> with endless trays of Krispy Kremes, gooey sweet rolls and gigantic
>>> muffins.

This doesn't mean you have to eat them all lol



>>>
>>> Then one day the attorneys showed up for a firm breakfast and found
>>> hard-boiled eggs, yogurt, mini-quiches, cottage cheese and fresh fruit.
>>> "Where's the doughnuts?" ranted the associates.

What makes you think that stuff is good for you? In the countries where
people are slim and have long life expectancies they eat a Continental
breakfast which is basically a doughnut and a cup of coffee or a croissant
smeared with butter.




>>
>>That actually is being "proactive". "Intrusive" would be things like
>>telling people they can't have lunch at McDonalds, or making them get on a
>>scale once a week, something like that. The company offering healthy FREE
>>goodies

Give me an example of a "healthy" goodie



rather then the high calorie choices is perfectly fine. If lawyer
>>dude doesn't like it, get his own damn Krispy Kremes.
>>
>>> Google, Yamaha of
>>> America, Caterpillar and others are putting health food in corporate
>>> break
>>> rooms, cafeterias and vending machines, dumping doughnuts in favor of
>>> organic fresh fruit and slapping "calorie taxes" on fatty foods.
>>
>>While offering healthy foods in the break rooms, cafeterias, and vending
>>machines, is perfectly fine and proactive, I find it fundamentally
>>intrusive to issue a "calorie tax" on fatty food choices.
>>
>>> For several years the company wellness police -- the folks obsessed with
>>> bringing down exploding health insurance costs
>>
>>AKA size nazi fat bashing bigots, but continue...

It doesn't just apply to the fatties since even the normal and thin people
would have to eat this crap.



>>
>>> -- have confined themselves
>>> to targeting chunky cube dwellers with subsidized cholesterol drugs,

Which are a fraud aside from the fact that the "ideal" level has gone down
over the years to the point where very few people would be ideal even if
they are thin.


free
>>> gym memberships and New Age-spouting health coaches. But what good is
>>> all
>>> that if the office vending machine is filled with candy, cola and chips,
>>> or
>>> if cookies and cake are served at every meeting?

None of those things are bad for you. Just don't eat everything in the
machine lol


>>
>>Then take the snacks out of the vending machine. If I want a snickers
>>bar, and my break room doesn't have it, I will go to walmart to buy a
>>snickers bar and bring it to work.
>>
>>Back to the above mentioned calorie tax, however. When a company has a
>>vending machine in a business, they "rent out" the rights to have a
>>machine there. The host company gets the rent, the vending machine
>>company gets the snickers bar money.
>>
>>And by all means, the company should be able to tell the vender what
>>goodies are allowed in the machines.

The people who use the machine should determine what they like.
>>
>>However, the moment the host company gets a "kick-back" on high calorie
>>snacks, that is when it crosses the line. The vending machine company
>>might charge 75 cents for a high calorie snack, but if the host demands
>>payment of a 25 cent calorie tax, that snack is bumped up to a buck. That
>>is why I find it fundamentally wrong.

A company has no right to "tax" things they don't like, either has the
government.



>>
>>> "I didn't think we were being aggressive enough," says Carol Baker, the
>>> HR
>>> boss at Yamaha.
>>
>>Ofcourse not... Bigots rarely think they are being bigots.
>>
>>> But getting junkies to detox isn't easy. "People aren't ready to give up
>>> everything," Baker says.


This is stupid. There is no such thing as a true addiction to food.


>>
>>Junkies? So now people who like snickers bars are no better then those
>>addicted to drugs? What a cunt...
>>
>>> Google's "micro-kitchens" -- the snack stations within 200 feet of every
>>> worker's desk -- were like small 7-Elevens.
>>
>>God bless Google.
>>
>>> It wasn't long before some Googlers were pondering the philosophical
>>> implications on the company's in-house message boards. Wretched excess
>>> with
>>> stock options was one thing. But wasn't free junk food kind of, ahem,
>>> evil?
>>
>>Oh come off it! Now they are just being ridiculous.
>>
>>> Yet when Dickman ditched the M&M's, employees argued that the measure
>>> was
>>> about costs, not calories. (That was a hard case to make given Google's
>>> valet parking, free massages and bidet-equipped restrooms.)
>>
>>The "Dick" part of Dickman's name is there for a reason. The lying sack
>>of shit... It was obviously NOT about the cost... Get rid of candy, keep
>>the valets?

Read it. It was the employees who claimed this.



>>
>>> "There were certain things they couldn't live without," Dickman says. So
>>> the M&M's returned. But the junk-healthful ratio is now 50-50, with
>>> agave-sweetened beverages, roasted nuts, sulfate-free dried fruit and
>>> platters of organic crudités.
>>
>>Go figure, they offer CHOICES now, and the workers get to PICK.
>>
>>> Lunchtime is another battle. Yamaha's Buena Park, Calif., headquarters
>>> is
>>> situated near a thoroughfare chockablock with fast-food joints. So Baker
>>> brought in a catering company offering healthful salads and sandwiches.

Salads are not healthy. We're not rabbits and did not evolve to eat this
stuff. Not to mention the fact that there is a lot of bacteria in lettuce
and you don't even know if it's been washed properly. A salad bar is one of
the dirtiest places you can eat at.



>>
>>And that's fine. But don't force people to eat there... You offer a
>>choice, and that's great. But if Sally Sue wants Burger King, she better
>>be able to drive to a Burger King.
>>
>>> "We're trying to change people's behaviors," she says.
>>
>>Mind control and brain washing you mean...
>>
>>> "The vending machine people were not very supportive," she says. At
>>> first,
>>> she says, they grudgingly tossed in some trail mix

What makes you think trail mix is not fattening?


and stuck a little heart
>>> sticker next to those fluorescent orange crackers with peanut butter.
>>>
>>> But within weeks, the potato chips and candy bars were back. Junk moves.
>>
>>Then tell them to pull the machines, and pick a different company that
>>will listen to management. It's called Capitalism, you aren't stuck with
>>just one vending company choice.
>>
>>> That's why some companies are getting to employees' stomachs through
>>> their
>>> wallets. After Caterpillar offered garden burgers in its cafeteria for a
>>> buck last year, sales soared fivefold, to 2,500 a month. At mortgage
>>> giant
>>> Freddie Mac, workers who order six healthful meals in the cafeteria get
>>> the
>>> seventh free.

This is all absurd since there is no such thing as a "healthy meal"



>>
>>Ah, so they are offering lowered costs of healthy choices? If the
>>employer wants to pay for half the price, they have that right. As long
>>as they aren't increasing the costs of unhealthy foods and channeling the
>>increase to company health insurance, I'm fine with it.

There's no such thing as unhealthy food. Humans evolved to eat almost
anything which is why they are the most sucessful animal on earth.



>>
>>> For those who don't, there is always tough love. HR types swarmed the
>>> New
>>> York Marriott Marquis hotel in February to learn how to implement
>>> lean-worker campaigns, biggest-loser contests and strategic-eating
>>> seminars. During breaks over yogurt and fruit, the attendees swapped war
>>> stories about how overweight workers eat up health-care dollars.

The is no difference between slim and fat workers unless they are extremely
thin or fat. A man can be 50% over his ideal weight and not suffer any
health problems. How do I know? The best statistics in the world;those from
life insurance companies who make their money predicting life expenctancy.


>>
>>That is scarry... It will be interesting if they make weight loss
>>mandatory.
>>
>>> As one executive from a major software company quipped: "We're waging a
>>> war
>>> on fat people."
>>
>>Well fuck you, asshole!
>>
>>> Junk food lovers, beware. These people are serious.

There's no such thing as junk food. Potato chips are just potatos and if you
look on the package that's all that's in them. The sugar in a snickers bar
is no different than the fructose in grapes in the way your body handles it.
>>
>>That's what scares me...
>
> So are the idiots who infest SSFA.
>
> They are just like a bunch of bugs.
>
> LV-posted from SSFA
>
> "I rode a tank and held a general's rank
> When the blitzkrieg raged and the bodies stank."
>
> ---Sympathy for the Devil-The Rolling Stones
> --------------------------------------------
> "A fanatic cannot change his mind and will not
> change the subject."
>
> ---Winston Churchill
> ----------------------------------------------
>
> Posted Via Usenet.com Premium Usenet Newsgroup Services
> ----------------------------------------------------------
> http://www.usenet.com