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Ask HN: Who Is Firing?

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Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?

#491

Post by forgotmylogin2 »

dsfargeg wrote: post #214

Babylon Health furloughed 140 people. I think they're using this as an excuse to re-structure their organisation. The tagline is that they are furloughing 5% of staff. They've used it as an opportunity to make 30% of their mobile engineers redundant, as well as push many senior engineers on higher salaries towards the exit

Can you explain more about why you think they would need an excuse to re-structure?

If they thought their senior engineers were getting paid too much, what was stopping them from cutting their salaries before the pandemic?

Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?

#492

Post by FridgeSeal »

squiggleblaz wrote: post #200
akdor1154 wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. social gatherings / hospitality industry / gyms etc are banned, and anyone who can work from home is doing so, but you still can leave your house for "essential reasons", e.g. exercise, buying takeaway lunch every day. many retail stores and public transport are still functioning. I think it's our - low density - government actually listening to scientists and reacting quickly and non-ideologically.

Density differences are overblown. No-one is catching coronavirus in the uninhabited deserts or cattle stations hours from the nearest town. They catch it in crowded public transport vehicles and in grocery stores. The government responding quickly and non-ideologically is the number one reason why Australia is doing good and the rest of the west is doing so badly. Whether it's the ideology of freedom of travel or th…

> The government responding quickly

For real? Morrison’s response to this has been lacking in its effectiveness and treacle-like in its speed. Up until a few weeks ago he was saying that people shouldn’t stop going to football games, and up until teachers put their foot down and in spite of health professions advice and common sense he thought keeping schools open indefinitely and as a fine idea.

Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?

#493

Post by aetherspawn »

squiggleblaz wrote: post #174
aetherspawn wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our government basically hasn't shut down our economy. To quote, "all jobs are essential services".

I'm an Australian living in Europe. What's it actually like there? It sounds like you're under strict lockdown but everyone seems to be saying the government is doing a terrible job (even though the test positive rate is low and the relative number of cases, even the absolute number of cases, is low). Here you say the economy is still humming along but other people say there's queues outside of Centrelink and down th…

Just to clarify, the guy below said he lives in Sydney and retail is closed, but in Melbourne the corona cases density seems a bit less than Sydney.

Most of our retail is still open, for example Target, Kmart, most coffee shops are still open doing takeaway and I can still go to JB HiFi, BBC shop, book shop, EB Games etc. So it seems like not a lot has changed regarding my current lifestyle except working from home.

Gyms, Massage, Casinos, Pubs, Clubs etc. that you’d expect to spread the virus really quickly are all closed.

Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?

#494

Post by weixiyen »

cannaceo wrote: post #486
e40 wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they are audited and can't show impact by COVID19, then there might be fines. Big ones. I just signed the loan app for my 36 yr old software company which has been hit by a drop-off in sales.

I didn't see proving harm by COVID19 as a requirement for applying for the loan. The loan is to minimize unemployment claims. Without the loan I would've been looking to make proactive staff cuts immediately despite not being dramatically impacted by COVID19. With the loan I feel comfortable keeping my workforce employed. My understanding is the requirement to not pay back the loan is that you keep 75% of your staff…

The company applying for the loan is liable for fines if it gets audited and somehow it is shown that the relief was not 'necessary'. Not only that but the signatory is also exposed to the risk of imprisonment.

The language in the terms of the loan is far too ambiguous for anyone that's not in a life-and-death situation to take on the risk imo.

Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?

#495

Post by Nasrudith »

andrewSC wrote: post #15
reubensutton wrote: post #3

I’ve been checking layoffs.fyi every day and it is incredibly bleak

What I don't quite understand is why startups who either just received funding or companies who were doing reasonably well decide to do mass layoffs during economic downturns? I mean they provide $reasons but I have a hard time taking them at face value.

Non-essential demand has been down and even those who are essential suffer from a logistical hellscape. Unless you are involved with COVID mitigation directly now is not the time to attempt growth. Even those which service those stuck at home have to suffer from the rest of the economy collapsing. Advertising rates are in the toliet because they can't do much good to bring in sales.

Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?

#496

Post by SiempreViernes »

floatrock wrote: post #463
Spooky23 wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the covid costs are actually not terribly high. The other thing is that as millions of employees get laid off, millions of health insurance premiums stop getting paid.

> as millions of employees get laid off, millions of health insurance premiums stop getting paid. Failure mode of a system where healthcare is tied to employment -- works as long as people keep shuffling around, shatters when a systemic black swan comes along. And no, cobra doesn't address it. It's just a patch. Anyone actually pay cobra for more than a month or two? You quickly realize just how expensive employer gr…

> shatters when a systemic black swan comes along

Well, whatever colour the swan is, a pandemic is no any unprecedented crisis. It's frankly more predictable than large scale earthquakes, but many people simply didn't give a shit to plan for it in advance.

Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?

#497

Post by apozem »

erdos4d wrote: post #448
onychomys wrote: post #136

Hospitals are having a surprisingly tough time of things. I work for a very famous hospital in a small town in the American midwest, and we've (our IT department, that is) laid off all our contractors and the rest of us have mandatory furloughs coming up too. They're doing everything they can to not let us go, but some of us will probably end up getting sacked. And this is maybe the richest and most well-connected ho…

My stepfather is a doctor and reports the same. Unless you are actually swamped with COVID-19 cases, the lockdown is having the perverse effect that people are going to the hospital less often. Diseases in general are spreading less now, fewer accidents are happening, fewer elective procedures, along with a general fear of going to the hospital in general (presumably for fear of catching COVID-19 from someone there).…

My fiancee is a veterinarian, and it is the same there.

* Absolutely no overtime for hourly employees (the salaried doctors, of course, do 18-hour shifts) * Doctors in elective departments (dermatology) are furloughed * They've all but confirmed the techs will have layoffs

Re: Ask HN: Who Is Firing?

#500

Post by atlgator »

gjmacd wrote: post #388

Not naming the company, but I know of a startup that's got a round of $10M (not much but enough) who just applied for relief because their burn rate is $200K+ a month. They have no customers, have been in the red for 2 years and have been slowly building their product out -- like most early funded startups -- they are building potential without revenue (yet). Their theory is, get some free money and treat it like 6 m…

It's a LOAN of $1000 per employee, and you have to retain your employees for 180 days in order for the loan to be forgiven... do the math. I assume most employees make more than $2000 per year. The money is only "free" if you were going to stay open anyway.
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