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The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

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Re: The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

#151

Post by aestetix »

sjg007 wrote: post #130
onezerozeroone wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really the company's fault here. Policies like this exist because candidates have and will sue the shit out of you for any flimsy accusation of discrimination they can cobble together. Companies didn't create these policies arbitrarily and unprovoked. They became necessary because of some people who took advantage of the legal system to get settlements. It's in the company's best interest to protect itself from f…

This fear is overblown in my opinion. If people really want to sue then they will sue based on the fact that companies hire H1Bs into the position that they applied for. Then the company would have to prove not that the H1B was the better candidate but that the American was not qualified. Who decides on that qualification? Well a judge/jury based on the job description. If your resume matches those qualifications and…

And because lawsuits are expensive, and often lawyers won't take a case unless it will bring them publicity or a big cash payout.

Re: The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

#152

Post by jdminhbg »

rifung wrote: post #87
jdminhbg wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Time with kids, no worries about the future, or how you are going to eat when you retire, if you get to retire. Good times. The numbers say you're wrong: http://www.nber.org/aginghealth/summer04/w10466.html

Is this the right link? This article is about poverty and not about how far you could go on a middle class income

It's about elderly people living in poverty. It's very relevant to whether retirements and pensions are falling off a cliff and whether people won't be able to eat when they're retired, as alleged.

Re: The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

#153

Post by jamiegreen »

osrec wrote: post #137
jamiegreen wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am also interested in the route you took, so I wonder if you would be open to talking about how you found your first clients?

Sure drop me an email via my company website and ask away :)

Cheers I will do that!

Re: The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

#155

Post by jdminhbg »

lowbloodsugar wrote: post #119
jdminhbg wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Time with kids, no worries about the future, or how you are going to eat when you retire, if you get to retire. Good times. The numbers say you're wrong: http://www.nber.org/aginghealth/summer04/w10466.html

I say "the middle class was better off only a few decades ago". You show me a graph that ends two decades ago. About poverty.

You say "no worries about the future, or how you are going to eat when you retire, if you get to retire," and I pointed out that the number of the elderly in poverty has fallen off a cliff since your mythical golden age.

The current poverty rate for seniors is now below that of when the above graph cuts off, naturally [pdf warning]: https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publicatio...

Re: The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

#156

Post by phkahler »

zdragnar wrote: post #141
sjg007 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This fear is overblown in my opinion. If people really want to sue then they will sue based on the fact that companies hire H1Bs into the position that they applied for. Then the company would have to prove not that the H1B was the better candidate but that the American was not qualified. Who decides on that qualification? Well a judge/jury based on the job description. If your resume matches those qualifications and…

I worked for a company who was sued because a candidate told us he was the second coming of Christ. We didn't really address it, and ended up not hiring him. He used The fact that he mentioned it as grounds for religious discrimination. He didn't win, but we still had lawyer costs and what not. It is not an overblown fear at all.

If he sued with representation this illustrates another point. His lawyer took on a stupid frivolous case, probably because he also needed the money.

I think the real problem is that people today are on an economic treadmill. That need to survive economically is what make people willing to put up with all the other things.

Re: The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

#157

Post by zz32asdf »

ag_camel wrote: post #108
enraged_camel wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>Agree this is a US problem and I don't understand why. Because the US has very severe issues related to racism, sexism, ageism and many other types of discrimination. So the laws are much tighter, which results in extreme caution and risk aversion on the part of employers.

And other paces dont? Almost every country has severe issues related to all the above. In the US, we have litigation everywhere, you fall and slip in a supermarket? Lawsuit! You tripped over a pothole? Lawsuit! Heck, lawyers advertise to do this...

Talk about people that don't read enough outside of tech topics.

They have the same issues, but a different historical context for treating them.

In America, the first nation to be founded on a set of utilitarian guidelines, rather than random edict of a mad man claiming divine right, situations are codified in law

As the industrial changes of the last 100 years lead to exploitation, laws sprang up and needed tweaking.

I'm not saying it's perfect, but let me explain WHY these laws still exist and don't seem to change: because the public doesn't force the issue.

They think they can go to their job and change things, then realize every 50 years or so that really not much did, because the social order codified in law didn't change.

Google and Facebook aren't changing things; they're inventing new gadgets and bullshit. Change in human societies has ALWAYS come from the top-down administrative changes.

Re: The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

#158

Post by phkahler »

bmpafa wrote: post #43
mathattack wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are liability reasons for not giving feedback. If I’ve had a good connection then I will give informal feedback on the phone only.

Most any form of helping someone out carries risks. Part of what makes acts of kindness praiseworthy is the acceptance of those risks for the sake of another person.

>> Most any form of helping someone out carries risks.

Really? I've never heard that. Can you give some examples? Preferably ones that seem harmless but could go wrong. I guess providing such examples is my job but I'm too tiered, so help me out.

Re: The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

#159

Post by vageli »

phkahler wrote: post #156
zdragnar wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked for a company who was sued because a candidate told us he was the second coming of Christ. We didn't really address it, and ended up not hiring him. He used The fact that he mentioned it as grounds for religious discrimination. He didn't win, but we still had lawyer costs and what not. It is not an overblown fear at all.

If he sued with representation this illustrates another point. His lawyer took on a stupid frivolous case, probably because he also needed the money. I think the real problem is that people today are on an economic treadmill. That need to survive economically is what make people willing to put up with all the other things.

This is exactly it. The thirst for the dollar makes us more willing to swallow bullshit with a (feigned) smile. But what can we do about it? That's the worst part. To dismantle the machine requires the coordination of a significant number of cogs.

Re: The health care toll today’s work culture exacts on employees

#160

Post by innocentoldguy »

While I applaud his efforts, Jeffrey Pfeffer probably doesn't really want his book to "be the 'Silent Spring' of workplace health," considering that Rachel Carson had a bad habit of citing suspicious sources, falsifying scientific research, and twisting words to fit her agenda. For example, egg thickness tests done on eagles didn't support the thin-shell claim she wanted to push, so her researchers lowered the calcium levels in the birds' diet until thinner egg shells were achieved. Also, Carson claims in her book that when quails were fed DDT, "few of the eggs hatched." If you actually read the research she's citing (from an article in "Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry," by James DeWitt), you find that around 80% of the DDT eggs hatched, compared to 83% in the control group, who weren't fed DDT. Since when are 80% and "few" synonymous? In the tests on pheasants, contained in the same article by James DeWitt, the control group (no DDT) hatched 57.4% of their eggs and the DDT pheasants hatched 80.6 of theirs. After eight weeks, the survival rate amongst the DDT chicks was also higher. I'm not saying we should use DDT as an ice cream topping, and that there's nothing wrong with it, but I'd prefer actual science on the matter rather than inaccurate sensationalism. I'd also prefer to believe Pfeffer's research is impeccable and that he's above the sort of consequentialism that Carson apparently embraced.

I don't have anything against saving the environment nor saving ourselves from toxic work practices. I just don't think we need to stoop to mountebankery to demonstrate the need for awareness and change. Such consequentialism undermines good causes, I think.

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