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WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

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Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#111

Is this any weirder than how a lot of companies let employees charge their personal electric vehicles for free, but won't let you expense personal gasoline?

The average cost per mile for an electric is about 8 cents, gasoline is about 16 cents. https://avt.inl.gov/sites/default/files/pdf/fsev/costs.pdf

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#112
post #83
post #54

"The company estimates that the policy will save 445.1m pounds of CO2 emissions ... by 2023." That's 202,000 kt over a 5-year plan. Global fuel-based emissions in 2015: 36,061,710 kt CO2. In other words, they think they are so important as to "save" about 0.1% of global CO2 annually just by refusing to include meat in the menu of their own events and employee-expensed meals. I doubt the magnitude of their estimates.…

Also, if a group of urban westerners WERE to stop eating such a large quantity of meat en masse, it would have the effect of lowering the price of meat and not the effect of simply reducing the meat eaten in the world. Most of that meat will just get bought by others for a slightly cheaper price. Making protein cheaper for poorer people in the world would arguably be the best outcome of this experiment if the magnitu…

> Also, if a group of urban westerners WERE to stop eating such a large quantity of meat en masse, it would have the effect of lowering the price of meat and not the effect of simply reducing the meat eaten in the world.

This is equivalent to claiming that demand for meat is purely elastic and that the market for meat is frictionless with respect to shipping worldwide.

What evidence do you have for these claims?

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#113
post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a) force WeWork owners to pay for something they're morally opposed to paying for b) force staff to do what exactly? Pay for their own meat?

I'm pro-choice. The exact same argument is used for requiring companies and insurance plans to pay for abortion.

Maybe it is just me, but abortion and health care plans are in no way comparable to eating or not meat during company events.

But, it absolutely is strong argument for change of the laws so that employer paid healthcare plans are not privileged against individual plans. That way, insurance would be paid by government or employee without having to pay more money then what employers do. The root abomination is that employer has such advantage on insurance market against individual.

That would make healthcare kinda like eating dinner - none of employers business.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#114

Being a vegetarian is exactly as equal a choice of freedom as being an omnivore or carnivore. This feels wrong to push this lifestyle on people. Of course one can always just not do business with We Work.

Only exactly as equal a choice for the individual doing the eating. It's less of a choice for the other beings involved.

I'm curious about this mindset - it seems like you object to eating animals because they lack a choice. Do you have any problem with wild animals eating other wild animals (who presumably also have less of a choice)? I'm not trying to trick you or trap you, just genuinely curious.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#115

Being a vegetarian is exactly as equal a choice of freedom as being an omnivore or carnivore. This feels wrong to push this lifestyle on people. Of course one can always just not do business with We Work.

Let's not be hyperbolic here. Serving food that doesn't happen to contain meat isn't forcing you to be vegetarian any more than serving only soft drinks at an event would be forcing you to be a teetotaler.

Is it okay if my business only allows the expensing of meat, and refuses to allow carbohydrates for health reasons?

EDIT: Fair enough! Not contrarian, just finding the line. What interesting times we live in.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#116
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What exactly is the hypocrisy? Eating only meat is a very restricted and strange diet while excluding only meat can be a perfectly healthy diet. You're trying to make these equal opposites but they're not. Sort of like how not serving alcohol is acceptable but serving only alcohol (not even water) would be outrageous.

The fact that they are limiting people's choices and free will to eat meat and write-off (financial incentive) is the core problem.

They’re not limiting people’s choices, they’re just limiting what they want to pay for. It’s not like they’re threatening to fire anyone who eats meat on their own.

I don’t see the problem here. Lots of companies don’t buy their employees food at all. (And I say this as a meat eater who would definitely be affected by this change.)

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#117
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We usually divide the world into moral agents (pretty much just humans) and non-moral-agents. The default is not eating meat because the default is not eating anything . Humans must take a positive action to eat something. Generally perfect duties in the Kantian sense take the form of "thou shalt-nots", so a positive action you shouldn't take, like killing a random stranger or some such. This is contrasted with imper…

> Humans must take a positive action to eat something. If you're going to talk about morality and agency, it is not a positive choice to eat anything . It's acting out of necessity to survive. Choosing not to eat is self-destruction and there is absolutely nothing about that that's a moral choice. In fact, it's generally accepted to be immoral[1]. This is why we force feed people on hunger strikes and why suicide is…

Yes, per Sartre killing oneself is a course of action available to us at (almost) any moment, which must be justified against by any supposed moral system. This is pretty standard.

We aren't talking about what the law dictates, we're talking about how some moral system might inform our actions. Two very different things, although of course the relationship between them is fascinating in its own right.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#118

Being a vegetarian is exactly as equal a choice of freedom as being an omnivore or carnivore. This feels wrong to push this lifestyle on people. Of course one can always just not do business with We Work.

Only exactly as equal a choice for the individual doing the eating. It's less of a choice for the other beings involved.

If only the white rhino had chosen to be eaten!

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#119
post #96
post #54

"The company estimates that the policy will save 445.1m pounds of CO2 emissions ... by 2023." That's 202,000 kt over a 5-year plan. Global fuel-based emissions in 2015: 36,061,710 kt CO2. In other words, they think they are so important as to "save" about 0.1% of global CO2 annually just by refusing to include meat in the menu of their own events and employee-expensed meals. I doubt the magnitude of their estimates.…

Why does it make sense to compare global CO2 emissions to WeWork's CO2 emissions? One company with one decision making an 0.1% reduction on global CO2 annually sounds pretty darn good to me.

> One company with one decision making an 0.1% reduction on global CO2 annually sounds pretty darn good to me.

The point is that WeWork is being either credulous, fraudulent, or incompetent, because it isn't possible for this 2,000 person company to account for 0.1% of global CO2.

Re: WeWork Will No Longer Let Employees Expense Any Kind of Meat

#120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's not be hyperbolic here. Serving food that doesn't happen to contain meat isn't forcing you to be vegetarian any more than serving only soft drinks at an event would be forcing you to be a teetotaler.

Is it okay if my business only allows the expensing of meat, and refuses to allow carbohydrates for health reasons? EDIT: Fair enough! Not contrarian, just finding the line. What interesting times we live in.

Of course.

Though you might find it gets even more resistance. Plenty of people eat burgers, but almost all of them would expect it to be served on a bun, maybe with a condiment or two. I hear french fries are also popular.

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