Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their way home • Hacker News Board

Re: Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their way home

#391

Post by c22 » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 6:06 PM UTC

CamperBob2 wrote: post #327

dlubarov wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My understanding is that Fedex and especially UPS trucks are very highly optimized for their work and for fuel efficiency and that their routes are also extremely optimized (for example, UPS truck routes almost never include a left turn). Apparently UPS trucks get around 10 mpg [1]. Not many consumer vehicles are that inefficient. I'd be surprised if UPS's ORION is better at route optimization than a consumer app l…

The no-left-turns rule isn't crude, it's an incredibly valuable (and incredibly obvious) optimization. A mapping service that tells me to turn left in downtown San Francisco at rush hour is literally worse than useless. In many cases, if I follow its directions blindly, not only will I be delayed, I'll delay the traffic around me. It's mind-boggling that Google, Apple, and other consumer-grade routing providers haven…

From my house to the interstate, if you follow arterials, you take one left (at a protected light), followed by a right 6 blocks later and then the on ramp. Usually this is the route Google recommends. However during times of heavy traffic Google attempts to shield you from the horrors of waiting for two light cycles at the first intersection by instead directing you to take a left turn 2 blocks early, across traffic to a residential side street. You proceed for two blocks and turn right, then it expects you to do an acute blind left back onto the arterial street (with no light). This maneuver during times of heavy traffic is virtually impossible. The best part is that Google will invariably suggest this route to multiple drivers, so there is always a small line of suckers stacked up at the impossible left, unable to move forward or even back since it's a one lane residential road.

Re: Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their way home

#392

Post by mythrwy » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 6:36 PM UTC

rbanffy wrote: post #386

mythrwy wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you can't have a kid on this money. Nor is it a very good life in terms of material possessions. You probably can't afford a horse either. But none of those things were specified in OP's post.

That's more or less what it meant - a meaningful, healthy life, above merely survival. I would know - I'm the OP.

Ah yes, indeed you are. I had to go further up the tree it appears.

I don't disagree. Not a good life.

People live on a buck here and there and change they find in vending machines as far as a "living" goes. Technically they are "alive" but it can't be nice way to live.

Kind of makes one wonder exactly what level of "living" is acceptable. I suppose preferences vary.

Re: Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their way home

#393

Post by CamperBob2 » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 9:26 PM UTC

dboreham wrote: post #347

dlubarov wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's crude because it's too general. Making three right turns might be the right choice on a busy street in SF, but on a side street in a quiet suburb, making a single left is normally the better choice.

For me it would also need to know the date because it is reasonable to make a left turn in winter but not in summer.

As I pointed out elsewhere, that's what user preference settings are for, but I'm curious: why the seasonal difference? Snow routes?

Re: Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their way home

#394

Post by timthelion » Sat, Jun 03, 2017, 9:48 PM UTC

dominotw wrote: post #350

timthelion wrote: post #294

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same thing stopping them from rasing prices right away without any change in the law.

walmart and target pay the same wages.

How does that effect the conversation?

Re: Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their way home

#395

Post by gozur88 » Mon, Jun 05, 2017, 2:04 AM UTC

jlarocco wrote: post #336

sokoloff wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the delivery is on the employee's typical route home, this could be a win for both the employee and for Walmart (and a minuscule reduction in overall traffic and miles driven). That's not at all the case of Walmart buying a Sprinter van and driving it around all day on routes that weren't naturally being covered.

You've completely missed my point. No doubt it's favorable to Walmart - they've had a team of people running the numbers and they get to set the rules. The question is whether or not it's actually favorable to employees and whether or not Walmart will inform them of the costs they'll be responsible for. "Here's $10 to deliver this" sounds great until you realize it's $5 in gas, your insurance is going up $50 a month,…

The math on this really depends on the assumptions you make. $5 in gas would carry my car an extra 40 miles, which isn't really my idea of dropping something off on the way home. As far as insurance goes, it would be easy for Walmart to get a group policy that covers you until you drop off the package, the same way they would for the delivery van.

People who make ten bucks an hour are really sensitive to these kinds of costs. If Walmart institutes a program that isn't worth it for employees everybody's going to know within a week.

Re: Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their way home

#396

Post by anigbrowl » Mon, Jun 05, 2017, 6:00 PM UTC

xienze wrote: post #304

anigbrowl wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A specious mischaracterization of the arguments on display.

Is it? The arguments boil down to: * I bet this isn't really "optional" * I bet they're not going to get paid enough to make it worthwhile

And none of those made the same inference as you that they were lucky as a result, which was the specious mischaracterization I referred to.

Re: Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their way home

#397

Post by ghostly_s » Tue, Jun 06, 2017, 2:44 PM UTC

alistairSH wrote: post #289

mtberatwork wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Internist as in "internal medicine", not as in "unpaid intern".

In the US, we have medical interns. They have completed their classroom studies, but not yet started residencies. They typically work as poorly paid interns for 18 months(?), doing quick rotations through the various specialties, before moving on to their residencies. They are paid poorly. I think the base rate is about $35k/year. But, at this point, they are still effectively students. I believe the MD is granted up…

Ugh. Internist is not a synonym for intern, unpaid or otherwise. An 'internist' is a sub-specialty of fully-licensed medical doctor, as in 'internal medicine'. It's equivalent to a pediatrician except specifically focused on care for adult patients, in contrast to a 'family practice' or 'general practice' doctor, who focuses on both adult and pediatric patients.

Re: Wal-Mart will pay employees to deliver packages on their way home

#398

Post by ghostly_s » Tue, Jun 06, 2017, 3:18 PM UTC

potatoyogurt wrote: post #105

ghostly_s wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Doctors can choose to moonlight and get paid extra, and I don't think anyone is complaining about that. Doctors have that choice, and yet they don't do that. I wonder why?

>In Medical Economics’ 2013 annual survey, 36% of family medicine/general practitioners and 35% of internists reported earning income from sources other than their primary practice/employer in 2012. That number was about the same for cardiologists (38%), but was higher for hospitalists (40%). Pediatricians and gastroenterologists were lower, at 25% and 27%, respectively. http://medicaleconomics.modernmedicine.com/med…

I'm pretty skeptical of the level to which they've dived into these results. 43% of the respondents said they receive supplemental income from "other medical" work. There exists a massive network of funding backed by pharmaceutical companies which essentially launders money into the pockets of physicians through things like highly-paid consultancy roles, speaking engagements, etc. Ostensibly these types of things would be covered by the 'speaking engagement' and 'consulting' categories, but the low figures there do not jive with my anecdotal knowledge of the field so I'm not really willing to accept these self-reported results as accurate considering that massive "other" result.

Just looking at the figures as presented, it seems the average rate of moonlighting is in the range of 34%, and of the types of moonlighting reported, I'd only characterize about 37% as direct medical practice. So that adds up to 13% of practitioners who are actually practicing medicine somewhere else in their free time. Not unheard of, but far from the norm, so I stand by my point. The great majority of doctors are not picking up shifts somewhere else, because the great majority of them don't need the extra income.