White-Collar Welfare

Hilzoy disagrees with the new "health worker protections" implemented by Bush:

The rule (pdf) covers not just employees who refuse to perform a medical procedure they find objectionable, but to those who refuse to refer people to others who do provide such services. It would, for instance, protect people who not only refuse to perform abortions themselves, but who refuse to tell their patients who else might provide one, where to get the morning-after pill, etc. (See p. 106.) And as the Post notes, it would prevent organizations whose mission is to provide a small set of services from "discriminating against" people who refuse to perform those very services. (E.g., Planned Parenthood can not "discriminate against" people who object to providing contraception, even though providing contraception is 38% of their services delivered.)

This is a wonderful rule for slackers, since it provides a legally protected way to get paid while doing no work at all.