Curing Industry's $1 Billion Hangover

THE PROBLEM DRINKER-

MORE than 2,000,000 U.S. workers are either alcoholics or problem drinkers. Last year they cost U.S. industry more than $1 billion and 13 million man-hours lost through absenteeism (average: 22 days), slowdowns, inefficiency, accidents and loss of trained personnel. Time was when industry ferreted out such workers and fired them. Today the boss still keeps a close eye out for the problem drinker, but it is more often to help than to fire him. Faced with new understanding of alcoholism as a mental illness--and with a nationwide shortage of trained workers--more and more companies are trying to reclaim the problem drinker for productive work.

Progress toward solving the problem was blocked in the past by the refusal of many companies to recognize that they had a problem, as well as by the fear that a program to help alcoholics would make the company appear to be a home for drunks. But many big corporations have courageously set examples for industry by creating their own programs or joining with other companies in community-type clinics. New York's Consolidated Edison Co. is one of the pioneers, in 1952 underwrote the cost of setting up a consultation clinic at New York University-Bellevue Medical Clinic which has since been joined by 13 other companies, including Bell Telephone Laboratories, Metropolitan Life Insurance, the New York Times. Du Pont, Eastman Kodak, Allis-Chalmers and Boeing Airplane all have excellent and extensive programs of their own for rehabilitating alcoholics. Scores of other companies have informal programs or refer their workers to outside clinics, psychiatric help or such organizations as Alcoholics Anonymous, Chicago's Portal House, Boston's Committee on Alcoholism, and Cleveland's Center on Alcoholism.

The man such companies are out to help is not the employee who goes on an occasional binge but the worker whose job suffers from his drinking. "You must be very careful," says Dr. Harold Vonachen, head of Caterpillar Tractor Co.'s medical department, "that you're not dealing with just the social phenomenon of martinis before dinner or drinking one too many on Saturday night." To discover the man who is having real trouble handling his liquor --and the problem strikes executive and machinist alike--companies brief supervisory personnel on the signs to watch for, such as frequent absenteeism (usually beginning on Monday), irritability, sloppy appearance. Supervisors are warned that sheltering the problem drinker does him a disservice.

Once a problem drinker is spotted, he usually gets a heart-to-heart talk from his supervisor or from a member of the firm's counseling staff, who refers him to the plant's doctor, local clinics or rehabilitation groups. Most programs are voluntary, but a worker who refuses help leaves the.company little choice but to discipline him by short layoffs or eventually fire him. Says an executive of California's General Petroleum Co.: "We're inclined to treat alcoholism as an illness, but if a man won't help himself, we have to dismiss him." Many unions still hogtie such programs-by shielding alcoholics or creating a fuss when it becomes necessary to dismiss them, but more and more companies are winning active union support for their programs.

The effort pays off handsomely for the employer. Most former alcoholics are so grateful for the help they receive that they become standout workers on returning to the job. Often they form counseling groups or act as personal missionaries to other company problem drinkers. Allis-Chalmers has cut its firing rate for alcoholics from 95% to 8% since it started its program in 1946, in the same time has cut its absentee rate among the treated from 8% to 3%--lower than the plant average. Considering such savings in production hours--and the fact that company programs for the problem drinker cost little--many companies consider help for the alcoholic not only humane but profitable. Says Henry Mielcarek, employee services manager for Allis-Chalmers: "We couldn't afford not to have an alcoholism program." He figures it saves the company at least $80,000 a year in absenteeism costs alone.

Nonetheless, says a member of Colorado's State Commission on Alcoholism, "many industries still are either unaware of alcoholism in their own plants or unwilling to acknowledge the problem." But, as many companies are beginning to realize, such attitudes not only encourage the problem drinker in his course but harm the company itself. The best way to eliminate the cost and waste of problem drinking in industry is to face up to the problem. Says Mrs. Elizabeth D. Whitney, executive director of Boston's Committee on Alcoholism: "We're encouraged by the gradual awakening that has occurred in business and industry. There is a growing awareness that alcoholism is everybody's business, especially that of business."

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