Ask any boss what life’s greatest pleasures are and you’ll get answer’s ranging from pressing a filthy mop into someone’s hand and saying “If you can lean you can clean,” to a cathartic scream of “You’re fired!” to cap off a stressful day. But somewhere on the list is always going to be “surveilling those loafing freeloaders so they can’t rip me off!”
Well bosses, I’m sorry to say the state of Washington is looking to ban a promising form of surveillance before you can even try it: microchipping your employees like the pack of lowly mutts you know they really are.
House Bill 2303 is summarized on the Washington State legislature homepage as “Prohibiting employers from microchipping employees.” I know what you’re thinking: here comes yet another onerous regulation, stifling entrepreneurship and disrespecting job creators.
Has any employer in Washington figured out how to execute a microchipping policy for employees yet? Fox 13 Seattle says it doesn’t know of anyone who has. But some innovators in the boss space are based in Washington—companies like Amazon and Starbucks. Washington is also home to big employers like Costco and Microsoft, which to be absolutely clear have not proposed anything like this, but this law would prevent them from engaging in any such experiments right in their corporate backyards.
The bill itself, which is primarily sponsored by West Seattle’s Brianna Thomas, is actually pretty specific about what it would ban: “An employer may not request, require, or coerce any employee to have a microchip implanted in the employee for any reason,” it says—so it leaves room for employees to volunteer to be microchipped as long as they’re not asked to do so.
And according to the bill, we’re talking about microchips that are “subcutaneously implanted in the body of an individual”—yes, like the ones in dogs. Notably, encouraging employees to get medical devices implanted in their bodies, as long as it’s exclusively for medical reasons, has a carve-out and would still be allowed.
Another very interesting thing to keep in mind about this bill: The text says the term “subcutaneously” excludes “information temporarily attached to the skin by an adhesive strip or bracelet.” Washington-based Amazon holds a patent on a wristband that tracks employee movements. The use of such a device in Washington would not, it appears, be considered microchipping an employee according to this proposed law.
At press time, things aren’t looking good for Washington’s purely theoretical microchip-loving bosses. The bill has been passed by the Washington State House, and is listed as “on the floor calendar” in the Senate.
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