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Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

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Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#51

Post by ROTMetro »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #43
Apocryphon wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not just the money. Losing health insurance is pretty bad, especially if there are others on one’s insurance.

COBRA, or a state-equivalent, is available for nearly all US employees for 18 months after a layoff. Yes, it's expensive, but not outrageously so - I've been on COBRA a few times, and the expense is just because you're paying for the piece the company used to. Point being it's still just money at the end, and saving up for a rainy day fund should also include COBRA payments in the calculation of how long the fund wil…

Cobra is on average $600 per person per month. For a family of 4, that's $2400 per month. For something for people who are specifically unemployed that seems outrageously expensive.

Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#52

Post by ROTMetro »

vkou wrote: post #46
dboreham wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"small fraction" is optimistic imho. Health insurance costs me more than my home mortgage payment (and it's crappy insurance that pays almost nothing). In my experience it isn't possible to reproduce the "BigCo health insurance" experience yourself, regardless of expense, unless you allow buying your own hospital.

Your home must either be a cardboard box, in the middle of nowhere, or you bought it two decades ago. Its value is not what it pays for, it's value is capping out-of-pocket maximums in the worst-case. (Any serious medical situation will quickly run you up to them.) Also, have you ever looked at the 'Employer pays' line item on the insurance section of a bigco paystub? Mine is more than my rent. (Maybe I should move t…

Why are you making assumptions about OPs numbers? Instead let's talk the numbers you are trying to minimize. Cobra averages $600 per person per month. That is $2400 per month for a family of four. I agree when I was self employed my largest cost was always health insurance, but for someone who has never been self employed a new $2400 a month bill on top of being fired can be quite a shock and add a ton of addition stress and pressure.

Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#53

Post by ROTMetro »

snowpid wrote: post #22
aaomidi wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You’re on an American website, and talking with people who are statistically likely to be American. So yes.

So I thought Hackernews is an international website where everybody assume we are spread across the globe. Looks like some people are very narrow minded.

I'd argue it's the low empathy, low effort 'America problem' comment spawning responses worthy of it versus narrow mindedness.

Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#54

Post by snowpid »

Apocryphon wrote: post #49
snowpid wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the context might be different for people in different countries. SAP is more important for me than lets say Meta.

Yes, but it would seem not to the HN audience, otherwise threads like this wouldn’t have 600+ replies because the mostly North American audience is unfamiliar with SAP. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32776276 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22244750

again, then Americans wouldnt care about SAP lay offs which should be a bigger thing in Germany. Please accept different perspectives.

Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#55

Post by dragonwriter »

luckylion wrote: post #27
Apocryphon wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not just the money. Losing health insurance is pretty bad, especially if there are others on one’s insurance.

So it is about the money, then? Surely, insurance companies don't object to you paying them directly.

> Surely, insurance companies don't object to you paying them directly

Adverse selection means an individual can’t get the same insurance a big organization buying for a large group can; ACA exchanges may (state markets vary a lot) mitigate that somewhat, but they don't fully make up for it. Part of this is orice for benefits, but the same benefit packages may not be available to you at any price (adverse selection means creates a kind of feedback loop where for certain things, there is no price where offering an option isn't a losing deal for the offeror, because the only people who would take it would be the ones for whom it would be a net loss for the seller to provide it.)

COBRA, though, allows you to keep your bigco insurance when you lose your job, as long as you take over both sides of the payment, for up to 18 months. So, in that sense, it is about the money.

Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#56

Post by Apocryphon »

snowpid wrote: post #54
Apocryphon wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but it would seem not to the HN audience, otherwise threads like this wouldn’t have 600+ replies because the mostly North American audience is unfamiliar with SAP. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32776276 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22244750

again, then Americans wouldnt care about SAP lay offs which should be a bigger thing in Germany. Please accept different perspectives.

Yes, then please accept the different perspective of people concerned about losing their health insurance.

Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#57

Post by throwaway5959 »

Apocryphon wrote: post #16
nightski wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally I'd focus more on making a layoff less of a traumatic event than playing ultra safe with a low salary in a low risk company. For most software engineers it's not hard to build up a significant emergency fund. I'd advocate for 6 figures. Feel free to invest 80% of that as well in something liquid. Keep at least 3 months in cash.

It’s not just the money. Losing health insurance is pretty bad, especially if there are others on one’s insurance.

In the US, at least in decently managed states, you can transform money into subsidized health insurance. (Covered CA for instance)

Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#58

Post by vkou »

ROTMetro wrote: post #52
vkou wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your home must either be a cardboard box, in the middle of nowhere, or you bought it two decades ago. Its value is not what it pays for, it's value is capping out-of-pocket maximums in the worst-case. (Any serious medical situation will quickly run you up to them.) Also, have you ever looked at the 'Employer pays' line item on the insurance section of a bigco paystub? Mine is more than my rent. (Maybe I should move t…

Why are you making assumptions about OPs numbers? Instead let's talk the numbers you are trying to minimize. Cobra averages $600 per person per month. That is $2400 per month for a family of four. I agree when I was self employed my largest cost was always health insurance, but for someone who has never been self employed a new $2400 a month bill on top of being fired can be quite a shock and add a ton of addition st…

The average mortgage in my town is north of $5000/mo.

That $2400/mo is the true cost of insurance. Your bigco employer pays most of it, and you pay the rest.

So, yes, when that part of your pay is lost, it sucks. It sucks a lot. But that's not what we're discussing. We're discussing the financial situation you're in when you get paid bigco wages, and have to deal with 8% layoffs every 8 years, or working somewhere else, where you get paid substantially less (And also probably have to deal with layoffs, it's just that they don't hit the front page of HN).

It's a financial no-brainer to me. If the wage delta is more than a rounding error, I'm much better off, financially in just taking the money.

Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#59

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

ROTMetro wrote: post #51
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

COBRA, or a state-equivalent, is available for nearly all US employees for 18 months after a layoff. Yes, it's expensive, but not outrageously so - I've been on COBRA a few times, and the expense is just because you're paying for the piece the company used to. Point being it's still just money at the end, and saving up for a rainy day fund should also include COBRA payments in the calculation of how long the fund wil…

Cobra is on average $600 per person per month. For a family of 4, that's $2400 per month. For something for people who are specifically unemployed that seems outrageously expensive.

Adding people to the plan is not linear, i.e. there are individual plans, spousal plans and family plans (I'm sure they probably exist somewhere but I've never seen a plan that charges more per kid on a family plan).

But yes, family plans are expensive (I've seen them average about $1500 a month for COBRA family plans), but that just gets to the point about saving enough in a rainy day fund to include healthcare costs.

Re: Tell HN: IBM and SAP are cutting thousands of jobs

#60

Post by woobar »

Apocryphon wrote: post #25
ericd wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It stings a little, but is ultimately not that bad if you have a very healthy emergency fund. It’s generally much cheaper than housing.

How much would it be?

Look at your paycheck. Combine health insurance premiums that you and your employer pay each pay period. That would be your COBRA premiums.
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