Employee Benefits Market Check Survey: COVID-19 Vaccines in the Workplace – Post Supreme Court Ruling

Over the past year, employers have had to adapt and react to the constantly shifting political climate and public opinion relating to vaccine mandates for employees. The Supreme Court recently struck down President Biden’s vaccine and testing requirement focused on large businesses but allowed a vaccine mandate for certain healthcare workers to go into effect. While not required by federal law, many employers of all industries, demographics, and geographical locations have enacted their own vaccine requirements, including many large, public employers who have made the headlines.

We conducted a poll during a webcast on January 27 to get an updated perspective of employers thinking about requiring proof of vaccination from their employees. We compare these results against responses from the same poll taken in August, February, and April 2021. The results are in the chart below.

Key Findings

Employers’ stances on mandating COVID-19 vaccination have shifted dramatically over the last year. The additional time since the last poll, the continued emergence of virus variants, the recent Supreme Court ruling, state regulations, and insights into what other companies are doing have allowed employers to adapt and refine their positions.  

Our most recent poll demonstrates that many more companies are comfortable mandating vaccines than in the past, with 50% indicating they require it for at least some of their workforce. This is a dramatic shift from when we last asked in August of 2021, where only 27.5% of respondents indicated they had some type of mandate in place.

While employers can encourage and mandate vaccinations for employees, it remains critical to review several considerations, including:

• exceptions for those with disabilities or religious beliefs
• business need
• impact on company culture
• affect on public opinion of the company brand
• any collective bargaining issues
• state laws
• administrative effort to track vaccination status

We encourage companies to consult with counsel before enacting any mandate.

Should you have any questions regarding any of this information, please contact your local Assurex Global adviser.