This past week, Gwinnett Medical Center here in Georgia announced that they they will no longer hire smokers. This doesn’t mean banning smoking on hospital grounds. They’re refusing to even hire anyone who smokes (or, presumably, uses tobacco in a different form).

Legally, this isn’t quite discrimination. Smoking isn’t a disability, so the ADA doesn’t apply. Smoking also isn’t a protected class in Georgia, so the Civil Rights Act doesn’t apply. Since Georgia is also a right-to-work state, an employer is free to choose not to hire someone as long as the choice isn’t based in legally discriminatory criteria.

So I suspect this policy would survive a discrimination challenge, even if not smoking isn’t a bona fide occupational qualification. I still question whether it’s a good idea, though.

Let’s make it clear: I’m personally disgusted by tobacco usage and I absolutely believe that it’s a health hazard. But so are a lot of other things: a high-cholesterol diet, over-usage of alcohol, lack of regular physical activity, and so on.

If employers can legally discriminate based on one unhealthy activity, who’s to say they can’t start discriminating on other activities they deem unhealthy? The Centers for Disease Control have identified many health-related causes of lost productivity, so a loss-of-productivity argument doesn’t work. In fact, I can’t think of a single argument that smoking is uniquely different than other unhealthy habits. It’s only more visible.

Gwinnett Medical Center has every right to prohibit smoking on the grounds; that’s rooted in property rights. But prohibit smoking when employees aren’t on the clock? That opens the door toward a considerable level of interference in employees’ personal lives.

Regardless of whether it’s legal, that’s never a good idea.