Vaccine Mandates Are in Limbo While Employers Wait Out Biden Rules
Companies say they’ll only require shots if OSHA guidelines are upheld by courts, while other incentives are waning.
Almost a third of companies say they will only impose a vaccine requirement for employees if President Joe Biden’s shot-or-test rules are upheld by U.S. courts, indicating that corporate mandates won’t be widespread without federal regulation.
A Willis Towers Watson survey released Tuesday found that 32% of employers plan to add vaccine rules only if the standards issued by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration take effect. About 18% of respondents already have a mandate and 7% plan to impose them regardless of the federal guidelines.
Most companies will offer weekly testing for all workers and a quarter will require unvaccinated staff to pay for their own tests, according to the survey of 543 U.S. employers, which collectively employ 5.2 million people.
Workplace policies are taking on added urgency as the U.S. contends with a fresh wave of Covid-19 cases and worries about the new omicron variant. The OSHA standards, which call for businesses with 100 or more workers to require vaccines or test employees weekly, had been set to take effect Jan. 4. They have been blocked by a U.S. court pending additional legal review.