Low Hanging Fruit

[Horse with no Name]

In the past few months, I have seen 4 friends get terminated from their jobs because of their illness.
The latest is a man who has been with the company for 10+ years and never missed any time from work until recently. He had some problems with circulation in his legs, ended up getting an infection and landed himself in the hospital for a week. Less than 2 months later, it happened again. He was out of the hospital less than a week before they fired him for "performance issues" even though he had previously won sales awards.
Another woman I worked with fell and broke a leg. She was out of work 12 weeks on FMLA--12 weeks 1 day she was out of a job she held for 22 years.
Another is a friend who injured her knee at work (they made her use FMLA instead of Workman's Comp--still haven't figured out that one--and again, when it ran out, she was relieved of duty.
I think the corps(e) are just using illness to cull the herd. If I know this many people in my small corner of the world--I know this has to be a frequent practice.
Now, when I read Straight Story's post about corps(e) not hiring unemployed folks--and in light of the fact that our congress failed to get us a suitable health insurance bill--it seems like we have a perfect storm brewing with folks that are employed with chronic diseases--fire them, make them unemployable, and leave them without health insurance. The perfect way to pick the low hanging fruit--just knock it to the ground and let it die on it's own. Relatively painless and really nobody to blame.:puke:
Gawd I am hating this country more and more every day.

[demosincebirth]

1. The first two, surely have a case. One a civil lawsuit...the other to the state labor board.

[Horse with no Name]

2. It is Texas

"right-to-work" aka "right to fire you for any reason they want to".
But it should be against the law.

[Lugnut]

4. PA is a right to work state.

Five years ago my daughter was "let go" the day before her gallbladder surgery. She was very ill and her gallbladder was barely functioning. Her surgeon squeezed her in because the procedure couldn't wait.

[Horse with no Name]

8. I hate that for your daughter

I know firsthand how that feels. I hope she was able to recover both physically as well as financially.

[demosincebirth]

5. try Federal, if they do intra-state business.

[TexasObserver]

3. recommend

[muffin1]

6. K&R nt

[Quantess]

7. Too late to recommend.