Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler thinks businesses should be able to set their own vaccination policies, and I understand that — in a perfect world. But in the current world, having a government mandate levels the playing field for businesses. They can “blame” the need on government, instead of telling their employees to do something they may not want to do; it means they don’t have to worry about getting sued because they have a policy for or against vaccinations; and it means they don’t need to worry about competition based on another business making a different choice.
For consumers, we now can be more comfortable going to places (where the company has more than 100 people) and spending our money knowing we are less likely to get exposed to COVID-19.
And, of course, this is a good thing for our community at large. I read just a day or two ago that Clark County hospitals are almost full, due largely to the influx of COVID patients. As more people get vaccinated, the demand on hospitals will be reduced.
In a perfect world, people would get vaccinated and businesses wouldn’t have to be involved. But since people aren’t getting vaccinated, a government mandate helps businesses by removing the decision from them.
