Under Obama Care, as part of the negotiations to get health care coverage for people with pre-existing conditions, insurance companies received the right to impose premium costs on smokers that are as much as 50% higher than the same plan for non-smokers. Premiums may also be applied for people who are overweight or have high cholesterol.
Studies have proven Hypnotherapy to be extremely effective for weight loss, smoking cessation. and positive lifestyle changes. Encouraging employees to live a healthier lifestyle reduces real corporate overhead and boosts employee productivity. How can you afford not to do it?
“We found that while less than 10 percent of workers at large employers smoke, their impact to health care costs is disproportionately huge,” said LuAnn Heinen, Vice President for the National Business Group on Health. “Helping them quit — however you do that — has the most obvious near-term payoff in terms of savings and productivity gains.”
An Ohio State University study found that businesses pay nearly $6,000 more annually per employee who smokes compared with a nonsmoker. The study, by Micah Berman and colleagues, published in the June 3, 2013 online edition of Tobacco Control, revealed that low productivity due to more missed days at work costs employers, on average, $517 annually for each employee that smokes. Meanwhile, presenteeism (present at work, but ill) costs $462 annually for each smoker, smoking breaks cost $3,077 a year per smoker and excess health care expenses cost $2,056 annually for every employee that smokes. Because smokers are more likely to die at a younger age than nonsmokers, annual pension costs were an average of $296 less for each employee who smoked, the researchers noted. Overall, the total estimated cost to employers was $5,816 per year.
This is becoming so much of an economic burden to business that many employers are not only rewarding employees who are enrolled in smoking cessation classes or programs to lose weight, but they are also footing the bill for these programs. Some employers are passing some costs onto their employees, so there are both employer and employee incentives driving healthier choices.
Likewise, studies show that obese employees cost employers over $4,000 more in healthcare and related costs than employees who are a healthy weight. Click here for more details from the Health Behavior News Service, part of the Center for Advancing Health.
Learn more about how NLP Coaching and Hypnotherapy techniques can help your employees to maximize their potential. Smoking cessation and weight management are only two examples of how employee costs are reduced and productivity increased through a very minimal investment. Improved sleep, stress reduction and a whole host of other positive behaviors that add real profit to your bottom line also result from these services.