McKesson worker dresses up as CEO with $159M pension, suspended without pay

McKesson Halloween. Whitener is back row, left. 

A McKesson worker who dressed up as the company's CEO got suspended for four days without pay. The CEO gets a pension worth $159 million, even after the company was fined close to $1 billion to settle charges it ripped off its customers while he was in charge.

We ask you: Is that fair?

Josh Eidelson at Salon wrote the story that appeared today about Bo Whitener, who works in a McKesson warehouse in Georgia. Whitener, like many of his co-workers, wants to be a Teamster. Eidelson wrote that Whitener:

...showed up to a McKesson Halloween party dressed up as company CEO John Hammergren. Whitener told Salon he gave out chocolate coins and told co-workers, “You’re not going to get any money here until you get a union...”  

Whitener said fellow employees “were thrilled with it.” But ... management ejected him from the party with a threat to call the police, and then interrogated and suspended him once he returned to work — only bringing him back after the union filed charges with the National Labor Relations Board. 

McKesson's shareholders weren't too thrilled with Hammergren's $159 million pension at the latest shareholders meeting. Especially after the company paid close to $1 billion in fines to settle charges of Medicaid fraud and price-fixing while Hammergren was CEO.

Whitener was told he was 'disrespectful.' Well, we think it's disrespectful to taxpayers to rip off Medicaid.