Some states may have additional employment laws that protect smokers.
[1] https://www.eeoc.gov/employers/smallbusiness/faq/who_is_prot...
I’m not sure nicotine addiction fits the bill, what major life activities does it substantially inhibit?
Apparently, holding a job.
"We can't not hire black people but we forbid coconut oil hair product use among employees" How well do you think that would go over in a court?
Which reminds me that not consuming nicotine and caffeine could be a proxy for being Mormon. So those policies might find their way into courts as well.
Unless one were to count the Juul cult.
— Also, the presentation of evidence under the above standard would be done at summary judgement, before the discrimination issue even got near discovery or trial.
What you eat, drink or smoke is not the basis for any protected class unless it's linked to a religious practice.
Hmmm.
It's not equivalent: when I got my first job at 19 I was incredibly naive, I'd barely used source control, and I had a bad case of NIH syndrome. BUT, it's given me a depth of experience that is rarely matched by my people in age group.
Actual professional experience is often quite routine, and time pressured. You don't get the same opportunity to experiment and learn things in depth that one has as a teenager. It might not be the most efficient way to learn, but it's certainly effective.
Do I sometimes feel a bit of a fraud putting "12 years of experience" on my CV? Yes. But I also know I can hold my own in a room of people who have 12 years of "real" professional experience, and that it was this early experience that enables me to do that. So it seems equally disingenuous to not put it on my CV.
By the way, I started coding at the age of 13.
The extra years of experience in Delphi, C#, JavaScript, HTML, CSS, PHP, Python, Ruby (before Rails even :-) that I had before the age of 18 are certainly a significant part of why I'm ahead both in seniority and pay of many people who work side-by-side to me, or for me.
For the record, I did paid screwing-around-with-computers from 15 on, but the unpaid stuff added at least as much value to me as an employee.
Ditto my abandoned humanities degree, which I also don't put on my résumé. More valuable to my work as a software developer than the CS degree I eventually got. I wouldn't present it that way for obvious reasons, but that doesn't change the reality of it.
For an NFL player, running speed is clearly a BFOQ. For Hooters the case is more complicated (IIRC there is case law)
No one gives a damn about the law. Many companies have job ads that barely conceal their bias. As long as the money keeps pouring in, no one will cook the goose that lays the golden eggs. This has been the case for the finance industry for decades.
It's a shame, but I am fortunate, in not needing to work again. Many of my peers are not so fortunate. Some of the younger folk are in for a nasty shock, when their hair starts to turn gray. I hope they are keeping their 401Ks maxed each year. They'll need them.
Um, that claim is not even supported by the evidence. Several studies have found health benefits of moderate alcohol use over teetotalling. Heavy drinkers OTOH definitely fare worse than even the teetotallers.