When I was a teenager, I did not have a good relationship with my parents. We clashed about big things. We battled over miniscule things on misguided principles. I was a generic sixteen year old piss and vinegar know it all. Moving to Pittsburgh and getting enough distance where I could make my mistakes on my own allowed me to have a good relationship with my parents once I got to my early twenties to today.
One of the things that I truly appreciate my parents doing was making it extremely and repeatedly clear over the course of five or six years that they were more than willing to be the designated asshole whenever my friends were thinking about doing something that was truly and spectacularly dumb that I knew was a bad decision ahead of time. I could always blame my parents for being completely unreasonable assholes if I needed an escape hatch that allowed me to save face and maintain social cohesion with my group of friends. And I used the designated asshole card once or twice that probably saved me a long and significant interaction with either the medical or criminal justice system.
I thought about my parents last night when the President announced that OSHA would be issuing rules that large employers would either need to require vaccination or enact “test to stay” policies and medical groups that receive federal money for Medicare, Medicaid or other direct health programs would have to require vaccination of all staff. The Feds are taking on the role of the designated asshole. Bosses can say to their employees and protestors “Don’t blame me, blame CMS or OSHA and we can’t afford the fines/loss of Medicare eligibility….”
NEW: The President will announce that all employers with 100 or more employees will be required to mandate COVID-19 vaccines or require testing at least once a week, and they’ll have to provide paid time off.
The new rule will impact over 80 million workers in private sector.
— Weijia Jiang (@weijia) September 9, 2021
COVID-19 vaccinations will also be required for more than 17 million health care workers at hospitals and other facilities that receive Medicare or Medicaid reimbursement—roughly 50K providers. (This covers a majority of health care workers nationwide.)
— Weijia Jiang (@weijia) September 9, 2021
These are the steps needed to allow a new normality without overwhelming our hospital systems this winter.
randy khan
I couldn’t agree more. I bet there are quite a few employers that wanted to mandate vaccination but were worried about backlash and now can say “I have no choice.” And while obviously the mandate doesn’t cover everyone, and a lot of the people covered by the mandate already are vaccinated, it could result in maybe another 10-15% of the population getting the shots, so it’s going to mean a big improvement in the total numbers.
(And, while I’m at it, I think we’ll find that nearly all the people saying they’ll quit rather than getting vaccinated actually value their paychecks more than their “freedom.”)
SiubhanDuinne
Yup. And in particular, President Biden seems more than willing to have the “designated asshole” label affixed to him. It’s a rare and very welcome example of political courage on behalf of a far greater good.
Terrific essay, David.
Math Guy
This mandate is long overdue in my opinion. Glad he did it.
Benw
Looks like they’re going to let me back into the US. Or at least put me on a plane heading in that direction…
Baud
I might have to make Designated Asshole my next campaign slogan.
New Deal democrat
Exactly. I’m copying a comment I made downstairs here, because it fits here as well.
Will the Delta tide roll out, as it did in India and the Netherlands, or briefly recede and then increase again (but not to a new peak as of now) as it has in the U.K.? Part of the answer is the actual seroprevalence among the unvaccinated (i.e., how much dry tinder is left?), part of it is changes in behavioral conditions (e.g., schools reopening), and part is changes in public policy.
I’m heartened by two things: (1) Biden’s speech yesterday. In particular, even if the OSHA vaccine mandate is struck down by the courts,* it is likely that a lot of employers will use it as a reason to mandate vaccinations on their own. If States – which absolutely have the police power to do so – also use it as a reason for their own coordinated mandates, so much the better. (2) the LA school district mandating vaccinations for children and staff. I also expect this to start a cascade of similar mandates in many other large districts.
Put those two things together, and you’ve got some serious progress against the virus.
*Don’t put it past the Roberts Court to declare this Unconstitutional – but only next year, after refusing to enjoin enforcement of it in the meantime. A sneaky way to have your cake and eat it too.
debbie
@Baud:
No, you must do so!
Tony Gerace
@SiubhanDuinne: Long overdue, but great! I always thought that Biden was “too old” for the presidency, but being old has its advantages. There’s a good chance that he won’t seek re-election, so he an afford to do things like this.
lowtechcyclist
Biden’s been a dad, and knows the score. The Covidiots have been acting like a bunch of spoiled, whiny kids, and now he’s treating them the way you need to treat spoiled, whiny kids. And about freakin’ time.
Aimai
I’m concerned that the designated asshole role also allows the anti vacxers to cintinue to evade and resent responsibility for learning to be adults. I mean its good we are doing it but we are going to watch in real time how fox and others weaponize both the nanny state/mommy party and the strict dad party and become even more the party of resentful teens.
SiubhanDuinne
@Tony Gerace:
And for sure, one of those advantages is being able to say, repeatedly, “Whoops! I seem to be fresh outta fucks!”
Baud
@Aimai:
We can’t control what they do next They left us with no alternative.
Chief Oshkosh
Thank you, David, for another great post. I read your posts, but don’t often comment, so thank you.
So many vaccines are mandated to attend kindergarten through college. Vaccines are mandated in the military. Vaccines are mandated in many work places, especially if international travel is involved. Many of these mandates are, of course, local and otherwise specific to situations. However, the school and military mandates seem to be more universal. I know that a military mandate is coming. What is involved in mandating school mandates? And was there resistance in the past to school mandates?
Chief Oshkosh
@Baud: Agreed. I hope Biden continues to take the car keys away from them. Next step is grounding them. Those FEMA trailers are finally going to come into use!
PST
@SiubhanDuinne:
That is also a valid way to view the Afghanistan withdrawal. It was obviously necessary but could not be done without drawing fire from every hot-take artist in politics and the media. He’s willing to take a political hit for important causes. I hope it will pay off in the long run. It very well might. The lesson of the California gubernatorial recall election may turn out to be that firmer handling of COVID denialists is a popular issue for Democrats. You can gin up enthusiasm in our party and with many independents while angering only the lost causes. Newsom vs. Elder is being fought on that issue because Newsom is pushing it.
sab
And, unlike the school boards, Biden gets the mandates in place two months ahead of winter and the holidays, so he might even be successful in this approach.
tom
@Aimai: We have to stop worrying about what the other side will think. They will think what they will think regardless what Biden or any other dem or left-leaning person does. So let’s just do the right thing and get on with it.
WaterGirl
@Benw: Yay for that!
Facebones
Exactly this. We tried carrots for months to encourage vaccinations – free donuts, free beer, lottery tickets, scholarships, even free weed. And they had a negligible effect. The only thing that has made the “vaccine hesitant” (ie: whiny pissbabies “just asking questions”) get the shot has been the threat of unemployment. Biden should’ve announced this in July, but I understand the optics of waiting till the school year is starting.
BC in Illinois
@Chief Oshkosh:
I have my father’s “Immunization Register” from WW II (Army Air Corps).
Smallpox, typhoid, tetanus, yellow fever, typhus, cholera, influenza.
I don’t have my own record from my service time, (USN, ’69-’73) but I can say for certain that the Navy didn’t ask me for my “input” before they input what they were going to put into me.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@BC in Illinois: Yeah, a friend of mine who was in the army said someone would say “Stick out your arm” and you stuck out your arm.
The military personnel who are objecting know perfectly well that this isn’t the first shot they’ve been ordered to take. Their objections are political.
lowtechcyclist
@Aimai:
It’s been true for years that the Dems are both the Mommy Party and the Daddy Party. So let’s own it, and run against the Tantrum-Throwing Children Party.
lowtechcyclist
@Chief Oshkosh:
Nuts to trailers, probably not enough of them anyway. FEMA camps!!
gvg
I am worried about the clash of working for a state with a nutty government who says no vaccines can be required where our paychecks and operating funds are mostly from them versus I am pretty sure OSHA’s decrees DO apply to us. The university president has actually said he wishes their was a National vaccine and mask requirement (about a week ago in a zoom “townhall”) however he says we have no authority and can’t sue the state/ourselves. He says Florida’s university system is a part of the state government in a way that is not true of other state university systems. So I don’t know what will happen.
I wonder if OSHA can start fining the state Governor and Legislatures offices? I don’t know if the actual elected officials fall under the labor departments authority, but I hope their offices do. They may be exempt though.
mali muso
@Benw: Good to hear! Do I remember from another thread that you’re in France? My husband is transiting through CDG in a few days on his way to visit family in Africa. Just seeing reports of some new travel restrictions in France but if I’m reading correctly, they apply to unvaccinated folks, so shouldn’t be an issue for him.
Safe travels!
geg6
@lowtechcyclist:
Yes, this.
Blue in SLC
Great post. I had the exact same thought, though the phrase “designated asshole” sums it up perfectly and succinctly. As a parent and as a manager/boss,* that was my first thought when I heard about Biden’s announcement. As you note, even the petulant teenager can appreciate this–even if they won’t say so to their friends. Seems like the right approach given our current political climate …
KSinMA
@tom: True, true, true.
Aimai
@lowtechcyclist: yes, agreed. My concern was not that they will be resentful (fuck ‘em ) but the way they will weaponize it without the dems being able to push back. I wish we controlled more media or had a plan to flood the zone with pro vaccine/anti teen crybaby resentment propaganda.
geg6
Someone yesterday was telling me that using Title IV funding to force universities to require vaccines is not possible. I don’t agree but what about if they have federal contracts? For instance, Penn State gets well over 11% of their budget from federal contracts. Medicaid, DOD, NIH, etc. all contribute to that. These aren’t grants (though that is another stick option), they are contracts with the federal government. Now, our policy already meets and exceeds the new federal mandate, but what about schools in FL, TX, etc? Can they afford to lose those? I doubt it very much.
Barbara
Evidence has been mounting for a while that health care facilities, but especially nursing homes and skilled nursing facilities, would like to mandate vaccination of their employees but are too afraid of losing employees to facilities that don’t impose a mandate. It has to be all or none. It’s unbelievable to me that so many medical workers think they have a right to be an overt danger to their patients, based on some phantom or theoretical “concern” about a vaccine taken by hundreds of millions of other people. Anti-vaxxers must score very high on the narcissism index. The only interest that counts for them is self-interest.
Lacuna Synecdoche
David Anderson @ Top:
I rather like the idea of a medical justice system … (gazes wistfully, thoughtfully, into the distance).
Barbara
@geg6: Right, that was me doubting the extent to which general educational funding programs could be used as a basis for imposing vaccine mandates on employees (or students). WRT contracts, my assumption is that the component that receives the contract could be subject to a mandate, but I am not sure about the entire enterprise. It might depend on who signs the contract, e.g., an affiliate or subsidiary versus the parent university entity, or the terms of the contract itself. This is already a live issue on related matters, such as who has to undergo a background check. Typically, it would not be everyone employed by the university, but only employees whose salary is being paid in whole or part with contract funds.
LadySuzy
@Facebones: Before enacting stronger rules, President Biden waited for the FDA final approval of the vaccines. Makes sense to me.
The Moar You Know
You’re not the only one.
Chief Oshkosh
@BC in Illinois: It’s cool that you have your father’s records. I always find it interesting to learn anything about the lives of my parents prior to having kids.
oclday
Don’t get too excited about the mandate effect. I work for a health care system that is requiring full vaccination by 10/31. It’s a big system with over 40,000 employees. They are also allowing a religious exemption and apparently granting most of them. They are receiving requests for exemption at over one per minute.
Ken
I think I know what you mean, but to me it sounds like a horror-movie scenario. Say, a guy in surgical garb growling “And now for some medical justice” as he reveals a tray of instruments, screaming follows.
Lacuna Synecdoche
@New Deal democrat:
Maybe, but I actually think even the Roberts Court will uphold vaccine mandates.
First, SCOTUS has supported vax mandates for over a century – that’s a lot of precedent to override.
Second, the Roberts Court has already had several opportunities to knock down vaccine mandates at the employer and state levels and declined to do it. See:
1) Supreme Court upholds Indiana University’s vaccine mandate
2) Opinion: The Supreme Court Ruled That States Can Mandate and Enforce Compulsory Vaccines
3) Federal Court Upholds Employer’s COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate
Chief Oshkosh
@Aimai:
One way would be for Biden to invite people like Howard Stern to the Whitehouse. Let Howard opine on all the asshole behavior while Father Biden shrugs and says “whocuddaknowed Howie was gonna say such things?” and then laugh and slap Stern on the back and wink. IOW, be mean as fuck to the anti-vaxxers by proxy. And when they get “outraged,” turn the knob up. Pretty soon they’ll realize that, truly and finally, nobody gives a fuck about their feelings and that everyone is rightly blaming them for being THE problem.
Barbara
@oclday: Right. But that means they are now locking themselves into a weekly testing regimen. It also means they are exposing themselves to a greater risk of Med mal liability if they can’t produce verification of negative tests for unvaccinated employees. Most large hospitals are self-insured for Med mal, but if they aren’t, their insurers might have something to say to them about their risk management practices. So no, not a panacea but it shifts the weight of responsibility to the institution in proving that they are maintaining a safe environment.
geg6
@Barbara:
Every employee at PSU is required to have a background check every five years, including finger printing, for the obvious reasons. Not sure how the contracts are worded because the university budget does not break it out by department in the budget we employees can easily view. But over 11% is quite a large chunk regardless.
Chief Oshkosh
@Barbara: It’s usually the Institutional Official (IO), and what they sign binds the entire university. That may or may not include affiliates like clinics.
Barbara
@geg6: Of course. But you don’t screen every employee on a monthly basis against the federal exclusion database, which is what you are required to do to receive certain types of federal funds. That’s what I’m talking about.
geg6
@Barbara:
Most employees go through the background check every five years. There are some, I know, who are checked more often but not sure why.
Lacuna Synecdoche
@Facebones:
I think it was more the optics of waiting until a majority of voters were already vaxxed and pissed at the unvaxxed.
Barbara
@geg6: This issue comes up for us because there are federal programs that require employees to be checked monthly against the integrated exclusion database if they are providing certain types of services. Large organizations find that to be rather burdensome and try to limit it to people whose salaries are being funded or who are providing actual services under the contract.
Elizabelle
Another word for being the designated asshole: Adulting. It’s a powerful concept. Avoided by many.
Good essay, David.
Lacuna Synecdoche
@Ken:
I’m imagining Donald Trump as the patient.
yellowdog
@tom: I don’t worry what the other side will think but I’m worried that health care providers, especially in rural areas, will cease to be Medicare/Medicaid providers because of the mandate. Rural health care is already in a precarious state.
Lacuna Synecdoche
@Chief Oshkosh:
I doubt it. With 15%-30% of the population in the AV Club, they’ll always be able to burrow within and commiserate with their own anti-vax cliques for affirmation.
BC in Illinois
@Chief Oshkosh:
Yes. It’s an interesting perspective, looking at my parents’ high school and college records, and the coming of WW II. My father became an Army Air Corps officer at age 20, my mother a WAC.
I then look down the generations at a 15-year-old g’daughter. My parents were 19-year-olds at Pearl Harbor. Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose, but it’s not always easy to picture.
John Cole
This was my thinking exactly yesterday when I heard it. Corporate America will do what it takes to cover their asses while wingnuts sue, and even if the shit is overturned or the Supreme Court writes a new law, we’ll have done what is necessary to advance the ball.
Matt McIrvin
@New Deal democrat:
I was thinking more the opposite–enjoin enforcement to fuck with Biden and prolong the crisis to hurt him politically, then uphold the mandate later to reestablish their constitutional bona fides as balls-and-strikes callers.
Matt McIrvin
@Chief Oshkosh:
CONSTANTLY. This is why we still have measles outbreaks sometimes. There are whole hippie-ish private school systems that don’t have them.
Matt McIrvin
Like I said in the other thread, it’s worth remembering that there are a bunch of states where, up to now, employers have been not just not required, but FORBIDDEN to have vaccine mandates, or to even ask about vaccination status. Presumably this OSHA regulation overrides that for the big ones.
Miss Bianca
@geg6: I think the federal employee mandate covers federal contractors as well. However, since IANAL, I couldn’t say for certain sure that it applies to universities’ federal contracts. But I would bet a case could be made for it.
Nora
@Matt McIrvin: I remember back in 2019 when there was a huge outbreak of measles in a couple of communities in Rockland County, NY, because the religious groups there refused vaccinations. We had no idea at the time that this was a foreshadowing of a much larger problem to come.
hw3
Great post David.
I am concerned at this point about the availability of the rapid Covid testing kits and the related infrastructure to keep the tests available and free/low cost. This is the area that seems to be lacking in my area. Availability of Covid testing has declined as the incidence of infections has increased — in my area at least (Western Wa.) . Which seems counter to the interests of tracking the spread.
Tony Gerace
@Tony Gerace: In general, willingness to be a Designated Asshole is an important part of leadership. For more than ten years my (female) boss in an IT department would periodically give profanity-laden pep talks when she perceived that the underlings were getting sloppy. At the end of each pep talk the punch line would be “and if you don’t like it, go look for another job”. It got results.
Tony Gerace
@Matt McIrvin: Yeah, the pseudo-hippies are sometimes as bad as the MAGAs. But the pseudo-hippies don’t have the political power that the MAGAs do.
Procopius
@Barbara:
It’s unbelievable to me, too, which is why I think it’s propaganda to demonize vax “reluctance.” I have no faith at all that our conservative media tell us the truth about what people who deny “the narrative” say they believe. And any time they tell us what other people believe, they’re lying anyway. They have no idea what people think or believe, they only know what they say, and they edit that to suit their own ends. I admit I’m more a Daoist or Mohist than a legalist. I believe that people are basically good but they can taught to be bad, or they can be bad through lack of proper moral teaching. The media never interviewed the real Trump supporters, the 1% (the median income of Trump voters in 2016 was $70,000, well above the national median income of $52,000, not the rural/working class population.
Matt
One can hope, but TBH there’s a serious correlation between “employers too wingnutty to enforce this” and “employers who have a long history of evading OSHA regulations”.
For instance, this won’t mean dick to the red-state meatpacking plants unless whole facilities get shut down – and even then, they’ll whine about “ZOMG MAH SUPPLY CHAINS” and insist on an exemption.