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I am totally on board with this. I get extra subsidy for health insurance at work if I walk 7000 steps a day - $750 per year. I was already walking over 10k s

I am totally on board with this. I get extra subsidy for health insurance at work if I walk 7000 steps a day - $750 per year. I was already walking over 10k steps daily for years. But what if you have bad knees or live in a dangerous neighborhood or simply don't like walking? That to me is paternalistic behavior. If you want subsidize my health insurance, just do it. But I don't need my employer to be my mommy, no matter the intentions.

gls2ro 6y ago
I don't know if it is good or not to have gym benefits so I cannot comment if removing it is a good or bad decision. With regards to "But what if you have bad knees or live in a dangerous neighborhood or simply don't like walking?" This is very simple to fix: thing about this in terms of equity not equality. Do not eliminate a benefit but think how can include more people by changing the metric. If someone has bad knees or don't like walking but still want to participate in this subsidy then the fix is not to eliminate the subsidy for everyone, but to have different metrics for people to opt in.
yerwhat01010 6y ago
> I get extra subsidy for health insurance at work if I walk 7000 steps a day - $750 per year. Really? How does this work? Your company tracks how many steps you take?
- starik36 6y ago
  Yes, through an app called Virgin Pulse. It hooks into Apple Health and syncs steps with it when you start it up. There is also a portion that tracks your sleep habits, but it requires you to enable the Bedtime feature on the iPhone, which I don't want to do.
  - yerwhat01010 6y ago
    "My employer tracks my biometrics as a condition of my compensation sounds like dystopian scifi. Welcome to the future?
    - derwiki 6y ago
      Not even as a condition! Willing opt-in
randomsearch 6y ago
> But what if you have bad knees or live in a dangerous neighborhood or simply don't like walking? Don't walk 7000 steps and don't get $750?
xref 6y ago
> But what if you have bad knees or live in a dangerous neighborhood or simply don't like walking? Then your health insurance billings will likely be higher, and you’ll be more expensive to insure, which pushes up the company group rate. Measures like getting employees to exercise more fall under the umbrella of “preventative care”
- x3n0ph3n3 6y ago
  What about swimming? Or weight lifting? There are other ways to get that exercise than walking that don't qualify for that 10k steps reward.

gls2ro 6y ago

I don't know if it is good or not to have gym benefits so I cannot comment if removing it is a good or bad decision. With regards to "But what if you have bad knees or live in a dangerous neighborhood or simply don't like walking?" This is very simple to fix: thing about this in terms of equity not equality. Do not eliminate a benefit but think how can include more people by changing the metric. If someone has bad knees or don't like walking but still want to participate in this subsidy then the fix is not to eliminate the subsidy for everyone, but to have different metrics for people to opt in.

yerwhat01010 6y ago

> I get extra subsidy for health insurance at work if I walk 7000 steps a day - $750 per year. Really? How does this work? Your company tracks how many steps you take?

starik36 6y ago
Yes, through an app called Virgin Pulse. It hooks into Apple Health and syncs steps with it when you start it up. There is also a portion that tracks your sleep habits, but it requires you to enable the Bedtime feature on the iPhone, which I don't want to do.
- yerwhat01010 6y ago
  "My employer tracks my biometrics as a condition of my compensation sounds like dystopian scifi. Welcome to the future?
  - derwiki 6y ago
    Not even as a condition! Willing opt-in

randomsearch 6y ago

> But what if you have bad knees or live in a dangerous neighborhood or simply don't like walking? Don't walk 7000 steps and don't get $750?

xref 6y ago

> But what if you have bad knees or live in a dangerous neighborhood or simply don't like walking? Then your health insurance billings will likely be higher, and you’ll be more expensive to insure, which pushes up the company group rate. Measures like getting employees to exercise more fall under the umbrella of “preventative care”

x3n0ph3n3 6y ago
What about swimming? Or weight lifting? There are other ways to get that exercise than walking that don't qualify for that 10k steps reward.