[Taiki]

So I just found out a couple of days ago at my job that they're no longer going to be offering health insurance for people who work less than 32 hours. I didn't think it'd be a problem since I usually work that much but I realized that over the past 6 months they had only been scheduling me 22-26 hours so my average hours dropped below that amount and now I'm losing my benefits. It makes me wonder if they did that on purpose because it happened to a lot of people.

What makes that worse is that I only qualify for the lowest insurance plan from the new Healthcare Reform thing. And because I qualify for that one, if I want ANYTHING better I have to pay full price for it with no government subsidies. And of course I can't afford anything like that.

AND now that my job is screwing everyone out of their hours so they can't have insurance they're doing this ridiculous thing where they schedule everyone shorter shifts over more days. I keep getting schedules that have SIX 4.5 hour shifts. Sure, 4.5 hours doesn't sound like a big deal, but it sucks when you take into account travel time and the time spent on getting ready for work. And even though shifts are shorter, they still expect you to get the same amount of stuff done. And because I only get 1 day off a week, sometimes if that day is at the beginning of the week I'll end up working 8+ days straight if my day off the next week is at the end of the week.

Long story short, I need a new job and/or a 2nd job. Especially since my student loan payments go up every 2 years and luckily (not) for me this is the year they go up again. I'm already paying $515 a month to them so I can't even imagine what they'll be like in May.

So unfortunately I don't think I'll be able to work on Trisphee stuff much longer. :/

[Lawtan]

:-(
It could be the company's attempt to work with new laws and regulations, but regardless, I'm sorry.
I'd say I could help - I'd like Trisphee to stay around, but I doubt I know enough to be able to.

[Taiki]

Haha thanks for your kind words. C:

They kept telling me it was in MY best interest that they cancel my insurance. Saying that none of the part time employees would qualify for the Government Subsidies unless they cancelled it for EVERYONE. Which is stupid. Because the deductibles on the insurance plan the government is forcing me to choose is so high that I don't even see the point in having insurance. @_@

[Espy]

That sense of "Hey, trust us, we're a company an we're bigger than you". Daaaaah.

But seriously I hope things work out somehow o.o;;

[Lawtan]

*Looks through Facebook, followed by news* It's not just the company thing. Today seems to be a day for this sort of stuff. (Governments - England and America - doing the same...as well as colleges like Yale)

Again, if I can help, let me know. I'm not much, but I am a 98 degree carbon unit.

[Espy]

98.6 degree, and more water than carbon; if you were more carbon than water, I'd be very much concerned.

[Quiet Man Cometh]

It likely was done on purpose, because not having to pay benefits saves the company money and they can at least give the impression they aren't leaving you high and dry if the government will step in, even if it won't actually help.

If you can, I'd say try and find a better job than working two, because travel time and such gets worse when you have two jobs. I tried it once and it was hideous.

I hope you are able to work something out.

[Fauxreal]

And yet the government is doing nothing to these companies and when is the damn revolution going to be... it's getting to be the tipping point.

[Lawtan]

Issue with revolution - America is not ready for it. Revolution would not be like the shutdown. Power would fail. Running water would stop....

(Not saying revolution is not needed...it just needs to be handled carefully, or it will just make things worse)

[Quiet Man Cometh]

Originally Posted by Fauxreal

And yet the government is doing nothing to these companies and when is the damn revolution going to be... it's getting to be the tipping point.

What could the government actually do? Unless the companies are actually breaking a law about how many hours they give their staff then there isn't much that can be done, and making something like x hours or x benefits mandatory is going piss off a lot of businesses since it's money out of their pocket. There's health care reform, but what reforms would be made that people could reasonably agree with?

[Suzerain of Sheol]

Originally Posted by Lawtan

Issue with revolution - America is not ready for it. Revolution would not be like the shutdown. Power would fail. Running water would stop....

(Not saying revolution is not needed...it just needs to be handled carefully, or it will just make things worse)

To expand briefly on this,

1.) The prospect of a violent revolution against the United States government is rather absurd. Only something on the scale of a military coup would have a hope of gaining any measure of success, and the resulting chaos would effectively destroy the nation. Which leads me to

2.) The ensuing total catastrophic crash of the global economy on a scale never before witnessed in human history would soon render the cause of such a revolution utterly meaningless, and would quite likely incite a third world war.

It is therefore rather irresponsible to advocate such, considering the literal billions of lives that would be affected (destroyed) by the economic fallout and geopolitical destabilization that would follow. The age of globalization has effectively made any sort of rebellion in this country into an act of apocalyptic international suicide.

[Alpha]

Not necessarily Suze. It might not result in a third World War, but it certainly would result in a second and much more widespread Civil War for the United States with old alliances being either honored or ignored by allies (similar to what we saw in the 1800s) and new alliances being forged with those ideologically similar to the side making it at first, but moving more towards anyone who can and will support/aid them as they grow more desperate either due to the length of conflict or circumstances which would lead to their defeat coming about.

I certainly agree that it would take a revolution starting within the military though to be of any use, but each state's National Guard would be called and respond to the Governor of their respective state to fight for the side they chose. It is likely that many would change sides or attempt to abstain from the conflict, but certainly it would be inevitable that a draft would come around on both sides.

Anyways, this thread is getting a bit off track. That sucks Taiki...I know it's rough for everyone right now with some companies doing stuff like that.

[Lawtan]

Yeah...I was hoping to skip over analysis by being brief. (Delving there would be better in a thread all its own)

@Taiki - So, should a thread be started on what to do in the case you have to leave? (I am not meaning to sound cold, there, but one of the only other forums I'm on died/permanently ended due to the host/manager leaving without there being a backup plan, and I'd like to avoid that if possible.)

[Taiki]

Thanks everyone for the input. I'd much rather have a new better job than add on a 2nd one. Mainly because I want out of my current job as soon as possible. I'm just very limited on options because the public transit here isn't very good and I currently cannot afford a car.

And Lawtan, I've already talked with Galla and I've just had to step down from some pixeling duties for the time being. Luckily Twigg has some extra time to work on the things that I won't have time for.

As for the other topic that was starting to develop... I don't think these companies like the one I work for will ever go back. When I first started working there, it was fun and I enjoyed it. But when the recession hit hard, they started skimping on everything and then even though they're making more money, they realized how "little" was needed to keep the business going and so they won't ever go back to the way it was because they will lose out on potential profit. I feel like if there wasn't a stock market maybe they wouldn't care as much. My employer seems to care more for the stock holders than the actual employees that do all the labor in making their actual profits. However, I don't know much about economics or how companies work so I don't know if a stock market not existing would change anything.

[Lucid:]

I'm sorry Taiki. :( **hugs** I hope you can find a better job soon.

I work for a startup with only 12 employees, so I don't get any health benefits either. Luckily my parents can keep me on their insurance for a few more years; however, my husband is turning 26 and is still going to school, so he doesn't have anywhere to go for insurance. He decided that he's just going to not have any until he graduates and (hopefully) gets a job in April, but it scares me to death thinking that if something happens between now and then, he's not covered.

[Taiki]

I'm turning 26 in exactly a week so I can't be on anyone else's insurance either. xD;

I hope your husband makes it to April with no trouble! I've had insurance since I started working almost 8 years ago and I've never needed it so far. However my current plan doesn't end until April so I'm going to use the heck out of it before then. lol Mainly because the deductible on what I'm going to have to sign up for is ridiculous. Might as well not even have insurance...