Workers Fired for Being Obese May Sue Bosses, Court Says

Today's post is shared from businessweek.com/

Obese workers may claim discrimination in the workplace, the European Union’s highest court said in a case that will pave the way for severely fat people to be protected as disabled.

“That condition falls within the concept of disability where, under particular conditions, it hinders the full and effective participation of the person concerned in professional life on an equal basis with other workers,” the EU Court of Justice in Luxembourg ruled today.

Obesity has reached epidemic proportions globally, according to the World Health Organization, which says at least 2.8 million people die each year as a result of being overweight or obese. People with a BMI of more than 25 are classified as overweight and a BMI of more than 30 is obese. As many as 30 percent of adults in Europe are obese, the WHO says.

Today’s case was triggered by Karsten Kaltoft, who sued the town of Billund, Denmark, after he was dismissed from his post in 2010. Kaltoft, whose weight was never less than 160 kilograms (353 pounds) at the time, had a high body mass index of 54, which classified him as obese. His public-sector employer denies that this was why he lost his job.

Kaltoft first took his case to a Danish court, which asked the EU tribunal to rule on whether obesity could be included as a reason for unlawful discrimination by employers. The Danish court will have decide on his firing in line with today’s ruling.

The case is: C-354/13, FOA, acting on behalf...
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Seniors' Obesity-Counseling Benefit Goes Largely Unused

Nov 21, 2014

Officials estimated that about 30 percent of seniors are obese and therefore eligible for counseling services, which studies have shown improve the odds of significant weight loss. But less than 1 percent of Medicare's 50 ...

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Obesity Prevalence by Occupation in Washington State

Jun 30, 2014

Those are the results of a first-of-its-type study the Washington State Department of Labor & Industries sponsored connecting what you do for work with obesity. The study also examined the percentage of workers in specific ...

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Workers' Compensation: New obesity treatment guideline ...

Nov 20, 2013

Obesity is now been classified as disease. With such a designation of Worker's Compensation systems will be impacted by request for benefits in order to diminish obesity is a pre-existing and coexisting diagnosis. Treatment ...

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Workers' Compensation: Obesity Is Weighing Down The ...

Dec 04, 2012

With over two-thirds of the nations' workforce overweight, the US workers' compensation system appears to weighed down with issue of obesity and its complications and costs. The delivery of medical treatment, and resulting ...

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Obesity 'could be a disability' - EU courts rule

Levels of obesity are rising across Europe Today's post is shared from bbc.com/ Obesity can constitute a disability in certain circumstances, the EU's highest court has ruled. The European Court of Justice was asked to consider the case of a male childminder in Denmark who says he was sacked for being too fat. The court said that if obesity could hinder "full and effective participation" at work then it could count as a disability. The ruling is binding across the EU. “If employers suddenly have to start ensuring that they've got wider seats, larger tables, more parking spaces for people who are obese, I think then we're just making the situation worse.”Jane Deville Almond British Obesity Society Judges said that obesity in itself was not a disability - but if a person had a long term impairment because of their obesity, then they would be protected by disability legislation. The case centres around childminder Karsten Kaltoft who weighs about 160kg (25 stone). He brought a discrimination case against his employers of 15 years, Billund local authority, after he was sacked four years ago. The authority said a fall in the number of children meant Mr Kaltoft was no longer required. But Mr Kaltoft said he was dismissed because he was overweight. 'No problems' Earlier this year he told the BBC that reports he was so fat he was unable to bend down to tie children's shoelaces were untrue. Describing his work with...

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Workers' Compensation: NCCI Takes Aim At Obesity

Jun 21, 2012

In a report issued by NCCI Holdings Inc., a company that generates workers' compensation insurance rates in many jurisdictions, the increased cost factors for obesity were reported. "The statistical analysis shows that ...

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Workers Compensation Insurance Company Ordered to Pay ...

Mar 20, 2010

Now a Court has ordered that an insurance company must treat a persons obesity as an extension of its medical benefits so that weight reduction can occur and the underlying work related condition can be addressed.

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The NFL's surprising occupational hazard: obesity that kills

Sep 23, 2011

We thought it was a fitting topic for our workers' law blog because NFL linemen must embrace this condition in order to stay in peak performance. It's called chronic obesity. These days, to be an NFL lineman, you not only have ...

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Workers' Compensation May Cover Weight Loss Treatment ...

Mar 15, 2014

Workers' compensation is affected by obesity as well. A work injury or disease, coupled with chronic obesity, frequently becomes much more difficult to deal with. The usual methods of treatment may not be possible for an ...

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Wal-Mart must pay $188 million in workers' class action

Today's post was shared by Steven Greenhouse and comes from www.reuters.com

(Reuters) - The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ordered Wal-Mart Stores Inc to pay $188 million to employees who had sued the retailer for failing to compensate them for rest breaks and all hours worked. Wal-Mart said on Tuesday that it might appeal the decision, which upheld lower court rulings, to the U.S. Supreme Court. Monday's ruling on the class-action lawsuit will reduce Wal-Mart's earnings for the quarter ending on Jan. 31 by 6 cents a share, the company said in a securities filing. That amounts to roughly 4 percent of its profit forecast of $1.46 to $1.56 for the period. Wal-Mart shares were up 0.5 percent at $84.39 in midday New York Stock Exchange trading. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court upheld a 2007 lower court ruling in favor of the workers, who said Wal-Mart failed to pay them for all hours worked and prevented them from taking full meal and rest breaks. Wal-Mart spokeswoman Brooke Buchanan said the company did not believe the claims should be grouped together in a class-action suit. "Walmart has had strong policies in place to make sure all associates receive their appropriate pay and break periods," she said. The decision, which affects about 187,000 Wal-Mart employees who worked in Pennsylvania between 1998 and 2006, marks the second unfavorable ruling in a week for the retailer, the largest private employer in the United States. On Dec. 9, a National Labor Relations Board administrative law judge found Wal-Mart had threatened employees trying to organize...

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On Black Friday, Walmart Is Pressed for Wage Increases

Nov 30, 2014

While millions of shoppers flocked to Walmart stores nationwide on Black Friday, thousands of protesters descended on Walmarts to protest what they said were the retailer's low wages. About 300 people rallied Friday ...

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Wal-Mart workers plan Black Friday protests for higher pay

Nov 25, 2014

Wal-Mart workers and their supporters plan to launch protests at stores across the country on Black Friday to push for higher wages and better working conditions for employees.Organizers say rallies and marches will occur at ...

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Walmart workers plan Black Friday protests over wages

Nov 17, 2014

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A group of Walmart employees pushing for higher wages said on Friday they were planning protests at 1,600 Walmart stores nationwide on Black Friday, the biggest shopping day of the year in the ...

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Walmart Workers Demand $15 Wage in Several Protests

Oct 20, 2014

Labor activists have long denounced retailers like Walmart for employing an army of low-wage, part-time workers to staff their stores. As retail sales flounder in an uncertain economy, those activists — and even a growing ...

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Two hotel industry groups sue L.A. over minimum wage hike

Today's post was shared by Steven Greenhouse and comes from www.latimes.com

Two industry groups sued Los Angeles on Tuesday over its planned minimum wage at larger hotels, saying it would cause "irreparable harm" and run afoul of federal labor law. The American Hotel and Lodging Assn. and the Asian American Hotel Owners Assn. said the city's law, which imposes a $15.37 minimum wage, improperly interferes with labor relations, tipping the scales in favor of unions. The law has national implications for the hospital industry, which wants to keep other cities from adopting similar rules. "If L.A. does this, other large cities will see it as something sensible for them to do," attorney Michael Starr said. The wage law allows unionized hotels to be exempted from paying the minimum wage if workers agree in their contract to relinquish that opportunity. That provision, Starr said, will pressure hotel managers to give in to demands from labor leaders on the process used to let workers join a union. Amazon workers lose fair-pay case over hours spent in security screenings The groups want to block enforcement of the law, approved by the City Council in September. The measure is set to go into effect in July for hotels with at least 300 rooms and expand a year later to hotels with at least 150 rooms. Backers of the measure said it would prevent hotel workers from having to take second jobs that keep them from seeing their families. They also argue that the hotels in Los Angeles have benefited from city efforts to boost the tourism industry. ...

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Wages should be growing faster, but they're not. Here's why.

Oct 07, 2014

I've tried to be particularly vigilant in ringing this lack-of-real-wage-growth alarm bell in recent months, as the tightening job market has led to threatening chatter about the need for the Federal Reserve to ratchet up rates ...

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Falling Wages at Factories Squeeze the Middle Class

Nov 22, 2014

For nearly 20 years, Darrell Eberhardt worked in an Ohio factory putting together wheelchairs, earning $18.50 an hour, enough to gain a toehold in the middle class and feel respected at work. He is still working with his hands, ...

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Workers' Compensation: This is why wages have risen so ...

Aug 24, 2014

It's no coincidence that there's been an outpouring of research on wage trends of late, just in time for the annual meeting of the world's central bankers at Jackson Hole, Wyo. But one noted monetary expert who should but ...

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Walmart workers plan Black Friday protests over wages

Nov 17, 2014

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A group of Walmart employees pushing for higher wages said on Friday they were planning protests at 1,600 Walmart stores nationwide on Black Friday, the biggest shopping day of the year in the ...

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NY unlikely to face lawsuits over fracking ban, experts say

Today's post is shared from reuters.com/

When Governor Andrew Cuomo announced a ban on fracking in New York on Wednesday, he predicted "a ton of lawsuits" against the state. But that is unlikely as the end of a drilling boom has left the industry in no mood for a fight, industry experts and lawyers said. "I think most of the companies in the industry are disinterested in fighting," said Brad Gill, the executive director of the Independent Oil and Gas Association of New York, a trade group. Six years ago, before the start of a lengthy New York moratorium on hydraulic fracturing of natural gas, the governor might have been right. But since then, the fracking phenomenon has turned from mania to mundane. Chesapeake Energy, once one of the biggest leaseholders in New York, last year gave up a legal battle to retain thousands of acres in the state. Norse Energy went bankrupt in 2012 after more than 100,000 acres in the state it leased were deemed off-limits to drilling. The industry's less confrontational stance reflects the dramatic shift in the U.S. natural gas industry over the years since the state's de facto ban came into force in 2008. That year, natural gas prices spiked to a near record around $14 per million British thermal units (mmBtu), and drilling were racing around the country snapping up land rights to exploit new techniques that would unlock decades worth of reserves. Fracking involves blasting large volumes of water, sand and chemicals into shale rock to release...

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Terrorism Insurance Set to End After Senator’s Objections

Today's post is shared from bloomberg.com/ A U.S. program that backstops insurance companies’ losses from acts of terrorism is set to end after the Senate adjourned without extending it. Efforts to reauthorize the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act for six years fell apart after Senator Tom Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican who is retiring, held up the legislation. Without a renewal, the program will expire Dec. 31. “It’s unfortunate, but his objection is going to kill TRIA,” Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, said last night on the Senate floor. “I’m very sorry about that, but it’s a fact.” Congress first passed the backstop after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, when insurers said they were hesitant to sell coverage on New York City office buildings. Coburn’s objection stemmed from concerns over the underlying policy and a plan to set up a regulatory body to supervise insurance agents and brokers. Taxpayers assume most of the risk while “the insurance industry makes all the money,” Coburn said last night. The House passed an extension on Dec. 10 that would reimburse insurers after industrywide losses reach $200 million, compared with $100 million under the current law. The House measure would also increase companies’ co-payments to 20 percent from 15 percent and gradually raise the threshold for government involvement. In approving the extension, the House added an unrelated provision tied to the Dodd-Frank...

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Is There a Link Between Firefighting and Cancer? – Epidemiology in Action

Today's post is shared from cdc.gov/ Epidemiology is the art and science of using data to answer questions about the health of groups. In occupational epidemiology, we use that data to understand how work affects health. This blog entry is part of a series that shares the stories behind the data. Firefighters face numerous hazards in the line of duty. The risks of acute and potentially fatal injuries and stresses from the dangerous environment of a fire scene are well known. In addition to these hazards, fires generate toxic contaminants, including some agents known or suspected to cause cancer. Less is known about the potential long-term health effects firefighters may experience as a result of work-related exposures. In particular, do firefighters face a higher risk of cancer than is found in the general population? In 2010, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) embarked on a multi-year effort to conduct a large-scale study to better understand the potential link between firefighting and cancer. The research was a joint effort led by NIOSH researchers and conducted in collaboration with researchers at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and the University of California at Davis Department of Public Health Sciences and supported, in part, by the U.S Fire Administration. The study found that a combined population of firefighters from three large U.S. cities showed higher-than-expected rates of certain types of cancer...

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