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Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

blogs.microsoft.com

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Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#91

Post by giaour »

chimeracoder wrote: post #70
rcme wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The HHS disagrees with you: https://www.hhs.gov/healthcare/about-the-aca/pre-existing-co... > Health insurers can no longer charge more or deny coverage to you or your child because of a pre-existing health condition like asthma, diabetes, or cancer, as well as pregnancy. They cannot limit benefits for that condition either. Once you have insurance, they can't refuse to cover treatment for your pre-existing condition…

No, you are misreading it. They cannot limit benefits due to your condition , but that doesn't mean that they have to cover treatment for your condition. If you have a disease or syndrome, the treatments for that condition (whether pharmaceutical, outpatient, or inpatient) may simply not be on the list of benefits provided by the insurance plans offered. It's legally distinct from, but analogous to, a nodiscriminatio…

The ACA has "minimum value" requirements and defines what constitute "essential health benefits" that plans must include to satisfy the ACA's coverage requirements and be eligible for sale on healthcare.gov or state-level marketplaces: https://www.healthinsurance.org/obamacare/essential-health-b...

Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#92

Post by coldpie »

onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #43
shiftingleft wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft net income 2022: ~$70B. Why force pay cuts or fire workers when you have roughly $300k of net income per employee to work with?

Why make a profit when you can pay your employees >100% of your revenue and just go into debt instead? It's not how business works. You hire people if you need people, and you pay them the least you can get away with, so you maximize profits - because long ago, you raised money with the promise to the people you raised the money from that you would do this, and you have a Fiduciary obligation to do so...

> you pay them the least you can get away with, so you maximize profits

We agree then that employees should put in the least amount of work that they can get away with, right? Fair's fair.

Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#93

Post by foogazi »

chimeracoder wrote: post #70
rcme wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The HHS disagrees with you: https://www.hhs.gov/healthcare/about-the-aca/pre-existing-co... > Health insurers can no longer charge more or deny coverage to you or your child because of a pre-existing health condition like asthma, diabetes, or cancer, as well as pregnancy. They cannot limit benefits for that condition either. Once you have insurance, they can't refuse to cover treatment for your pre-existing condition…

No, you are misreading it. They cannot limit benefits due to your condition , but that doesn't mean that they have to cover treatment for your condition. If you have a disease or syndrome, the treatments for that condition (whether pharmaceutical, outpatient, or inpatient) may simply not be on the list of benefits provided by the insurance plans offered. It's legally distinct from, but analogous to, a nodiscriminatio…

> But they can choose to say they they don't cover Nosferatudone for anyone

Does private employer insurance not have the same limitations?

Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#94

Post by mathieuh »

mc32 wrote: post #53
jstx1 wrote: post #3

> When I think about this moment in time, the start of 2023, it’s showtime – for our industry and for Microsoft. He could have left that part out.

It echoes of Steve Ballmer. I hate it when head honchoes try and get cozy with you by signing off with their First Name only --way to take the name away from anyone else in the company with the same name. 99% of the people in a large company like that never met you and don't know you on a first-name basis.

It's an attempted mind fuck to disguise the true power dynamic. If they say "we're making cuts, you're done. Leave your laptop on your desk and clear off", it's clear what the power dynamic is.

Instead they present themselves as your friend. Even if you don't believe it, social norms dictate that in general you act like you do. Like Zizek says, "fuck you, you're a boss, act like it!". Then you're unsure of what's happening. Do they really feel bad? Maybe they're trying their best, maybe they really care about me personally.

It's same with all this corporate-speech that's been emerging recently. They're not your family, they're not your friends, and if it comes to it they will fist you so hard you'll be tasting their perfectly-manicured nails.

I think it's very important to always have this in mind and not to tie up your identity with your work. You are a line item on a spreadsheet somewhere to them, nothing more. If you start believing otherwise you are setting yourself up for mental health problems when your use runs out and they kick you to the kerb.

Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#95

Post by chimeracoder »

rcme wrote: post #87
chimeracoder wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you are misreading it. They cannot limit benefits due to your condition , but that doesn't mean that they have to cover treatment for your condition. If you have a disease or syndrome, the treatments for that condition (whether pharmaceutical, outpatient, or inpatient) may simply not be on the list of benefits provided by the insurance plans offered. It's legally distinct from, but analogous to, a nodiscriminatio…

Yes, you're always able to buy a bad health insurance plan. But you're also able to buy a good health insurance plan, and your pre-existing condition won't impact the price of the good insurance plan.

> Yes, you're always able to buy a bad health insurance plan. But you're also able to buy a good health insurance plan,

If one exists, and as I stated in the original post, in many states, even the best plans available on the marketplace are quite terrible. And that's a problem that's actually gotten worse in recent years, not better, as plans have left the exchange (and providers have dropped marketplace plans from their networks).

> and your pre-existing condition won't impact the price of the good insurance plan.

Your "pre-existing condition" won't impact the price of the insurance plan relative to others who are purchasing that same plan, but you quite likely will be in a situation where the "good" (eg, gold) plans are the only ones which will provide the coverage that you need, and those are the most expensive ones. This satisfies the letter of the law, but in practice it still means that often people with chronic health condition either are are forced to pay more for coverage or are literally unable to get coverage for their conditions at all (because none of the marketplace plans will cover it).

The protections provided by the ACA are much more narrow than you're portraying them as, which is understandable because it's a common misconception about how the ACA operates, but it's unfortunately a very important distinction.

Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#96

Post by chimeracoder »

foogazi wrote: post #93
chimeracoder wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you are misreading it. They cannot limit benefits due to your condition , but that doesn't mean that they have to cover treatment for your condition. If you have a disease or syndrome, the treatments for that condition (whether pharmaceutical, outpatient, or inpatient) may simply not be on the list of benefits provided by the insurance plans offered. It's legally distinct from, but analogous to, a nodiscriminatio…

> But they can choose to say they they don't cover Nosferatudone for anyone Does private employer insurance not have the same limitations?

> Does private employer insurance not have the same limitations?

Yes, but insurance sold to private employers is a completely different market, and it is almost universally better than the insurance plans available on the exchanges.

Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#97

Post by notch656c »

galdosdi wrote: post #90
Karunamon wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Entirely serious question: is COBRA actually of any use to anyone? From where I sit it's always been pretty aspirational since it requires you to also pay the employer side of the insurance which is colossally more expensive than the employee side, and you are expected to do this while being out of work?

It's useful for 60 days, since for 60 days (or maybe it's 90 or 30, I forget -- look it up yourself if you need it, don't listen to me) you can elect it retroactively. So you can go without insurance, and as long as you haven't hit the 60 days, you can retroactively pay for it if a devastating emergency happens. Actually dealing with this would be a huge logistical hassle, and god help you if you're hospitalized, unc…

That would explain why COBRA is so insanely expensive.... No one is buying it unless they retroactively needed it and thus the risk pool is sky high

Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#98

Post by Cthulhu_ »

jstx1 wrote: post #3

> When I think about this moment in time, the start of 2023, it’s showtime – for our industry and for Microsoft. He could have left that part out.

I mean I don't understand the big announcement in the first place; with a company that large, reducing staff count by 10K can be done organically, simply by not hiring replacements.

Which makes me think of two things; one, they want to get rid of very specific people, people who wouldn't quit on their own. And two, that they can't just reduce staff count without an announcement, because staff count is one of those metrics that shareholders use to determine whether they're staying, buying or selling stocks.

A quiet reduction of staff? They can't hire people anymore, this is bad, I should sell my stocks!

A round of layoffs? They're cutting costs, which will be good for profits, I should buy more! Or sell because I've lost confidence.

Honestly, the stock market and shareholders are not rational.

Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#99

Post by chimeracoder »

giaour wrote: post #91
chimeracoder wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you are misreading it. They cannot limit benefits due to your condition , but that doesn't mean that they have to cover treatment for your condition. If you have a disease or syndrome, the treatments for that condition (whether pharmaceutical, outpatient, or inpatient) may simply not be on the list of benefits provided by the insurance plans offered. It's legally distinct from, but analogous to, a nodiscriminatio…

The ACA has "minimum value" requirements and defines what constitute "essential health benefits" that plans must include to satisfy the ACA's coverage requirements and be eligible for sale on healthcare.gov or state-level marketplaces: https://www.healthinsurance.org/obamacare/essential-health-b...

> The ACA has "minimum value" requirements and defines what constitute "essential health benefits" that plans must include to satisfy the ACA's coverage requirements and be eligible for sale on healthcare.gov or state-level marketplaces

Yes, I'm well aware of that, and those requirements are incredibly bare-bones. Nearly any insurance provided by employers far exceeds those requirements, whereas the same cannot be said for insurance provided on the marketplace.

This post is about people who are losing employer-provided insurance, and there's almost no universe in which the non-COBRA options available to most of those people aren't markedly worse than what they're losing, even if we ignore the increased cost of self-purchased insurance.

Re: Microsoft to lay off 10k workers

#100

Post by randomdata »

college_physics wrote: post #75

There was a sentiment in an earlier discussion [0] that this is "a war on tech wages" but for years the argument was that tech will make many other jobs obsolete (which would justify wage growth for tech employees). Remember, e.g., the Jack Ma era and his proclamations that we should all get into arts because tech will take care of the rest? Is the current round of layoffs an admission that the "software will eat the…

Neither. The assumption is that, due to various reasons, the world in need of eating will shrink next year (if not later this year). As software requires a not insignificant amount of time to develop, work intended to eat next year is in development now, which means less work to go around compared to last year.

It is quite possible that these businesses are wrong about the future. They have been before. But as predicting the future is impossible, one has to make an educated guess and live with it.

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