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As part of Starbucks’ new diversity push, they have expanded their health benefits for transgender employees.
Surgeries that were once considered cosmetic, like breast reduction and augmentation surgery, will now be covered. The coffee company offered health insurance plans with coverage for gender reassignment surgery since 2012, according to reports.
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“The approach was driven not just by the company’s desire to provide truly inclusive coverage, and by powerful conversations with transgender partners about how those benefits would allow them to truly be who they are,” said Ron Crawford, vice president of benefits at Starbucks, in a statement.
Marketwatch reports that Starbucks is the first company to extend this type of coverage to transgender people. They teamed up with the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) to create the new benefits plan.
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In April the coffee chain dominated the headlines after two Black men sitting quietly at one of their Philadelphia branches were arrested for basically breathing while Black. And after #BoycottStarbucks took off like wildfire, their CEO Kevin Johnson went on a national apology tour that ultimately resulted in the announcement that they would be closing 8,000 company-owned stores on May 29th to put its 175,000 employees through “bias training.”
In the preview Starbucks shared with reporters, they revealed that rapper Common is set to appear in a video message during the training, along with similar videos from Starbucks execs.
Starbucks will have an open-door bathroom policy, a decision that marks one of the first initiatives the restaurant will implement after being widely criticized following the arrest of two black men at its Philadelphia store.
Philly.com reports that Executive chairman Howard Schultz spoke at a Q&A session called “The Role and Responsibility of a Global Company” in Washington last month and said that moving forward the restaurant will work to foster an inclusive environment by giving anyone the bathroom key.
“In terms of the bathroom, we’re going to have to make sure that—we don’t want to become a public bathroom, but we’re going to make the right decision 100 percent of the time and give people the key, because we don’t want anyone at Starbucks to feel as if we are not giving access to you to the bathroom because you are less than,” Schultz said.
“We want you to be more than.”
