MGMT Ex. 2

Chapter Exercise #2.html

Several hospitals and other businesses have adopted bans on hiring smokers. Companies that ban smokers state that rising healthcare costs justify the decision. Please either read the supplemental articles below or find your own articles discussing the arguments for and against bans on hiring smokers.  Then, respond to the exercise questions and upload your responses in the D2L dropbox.  

Supplemental Articles:

H. Schmidt, K. Voight, E. Emanuel, “The Ethics of Not Hiring Smokers” New England Journal of Medicine, 11 April 2013.  https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmp1301951 B. Farmer, “Smokers Need Not Apply: Fairness of No-Nicotine Hiring Policies Questioned”, Kaiser Health News, 13 January 2020.  https://khn.org/news/smokers-need-not-apply-fairness-of-no-nicotine-hiring-policies-questioned/

Exercise Questions

1.  Based on the text, define ethics and social responsibility. Do you see the decision on whether or not  to hire smokers as an ethical decision, a social responsibility decision or both? Briefly, explain your reasoning.   

2. If a company bans the hiring of smokers, discuss at least two stakeholder groups that might be impacted.  Explain how these groups might be impacted.

3.  Assume a CEO wants to consider the utilitarian view of ethics in deciding whether or not to ban the hiring of smokers.  What do you think the CEO should decide based on the utilitarian view of ethics?  Explain the utilitarian view of ethics in your response. 

4. Assume a company has offices in multiple states.  The company adopts a ban on hiring smokers in states that allow such bans.  In states that do not allow bans, the company adopts an alternative program to reward healthy habits.  The CEO asks you to evaluate the different policies under the theory of justice view of ethics.  How would you apply the theory of justice view of ethics in evaluating the different policies?  Explain the theory of justice view in your response.