SAMPLE LETTER TO THE EDITOR: Lifestyle Discrimination

I want to express my concern about the practice by some employers of using information about people's personal lives in making hiring, firing and promotional decisions.

There are documented cases of employers firing or refusing to hire or promote applicants based on factors such as: off-the-job use of tobacco, medical conditions such as cancer or hereditary diseases, being overweight, and off-the-job engagement in high-risk activities such as skydiving or motorcycle riding.

These practices are generally motivated by the desire to reduce health care costs. While it is understandable that employers are concerned about rising health care costs, it is not acceptable to use a strategy that requires delving into individuals' private lives and private behaviors.

Employment decisions should be based on job performance criteria alone. What you do in your own home, on your own time, is none of your boss's business. Employers have no right to access information about employees' private lives, or to base employment decisions on those facts. Access to and use of such information is an invasion of privacy.