7 ms·

A 3000% jump in jobless claims has devastated the US job market

48 points by finphil 7y ago

BossingAround 7y ago
So as a non-US citizen, I didn't know about "at-will employment" [1]. Apparently, in some states, companies can fire people "at will" (so without any reason, at any given moment). As an EU citizen, this sounds utterly horrifying to me. How can the US have that little protection of their workers..? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At-will_employment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At-will_employment
- Insanity 7y ago
  Yeah it's quite crazy, and worse for people whom are there on a visa as their visa depends on their employment. And even worse again is that healthcare is tied up to your employer..
  - lotsofpulp 7y ago
    Tax free health insurance is tied up with employer, not healthcare (or health insurance). Anyone can purchase health insurance at healthcare.gov. Recently, the ability to purchase health insurance with pre-tax money has been expanded to self employed, but people who work for an employer that does not offer health insurance are still discriminated against.
    - Insanity 7y ago
      Okay fair enough, but from what I gather from my relatives over there is that this is quite expensive? At least compared to EU
      - lotsofpulp 7y ago
        Yes, this pdf shows how much health insurance costs per month for a person in the state of New Jersey (a higher cost of living state, but not far off New York/California): https://www.state.nj.us/dobi/division_insurance/ihcseh/ihcrates_2020.pdf https://www.state.nj.us/dobi/division_insurance/ihcseh/ihcra... The metal levels indicate what portion of your expected healthcare costs the insurance is expected to pay. Bronze is 60%, Silver is 70%, Gold is 80%. At the bottom you will see age rating, so you have to multiply that factor with the premium to get the premium at your age. For example, if you purchase bronze coverage (lets say $250) as a 50 year old in NJ, the factor is 1.78 times $250 = $445 per month divided by 0.6 due to it being bronze = $742 per month is your expected healthcare expenses. Obviously this is not per month, but becomes more accurate amortized over ones' lifetime, as you might go with zero healthcare expenses for years and then get hit with $10,000 easily. Bottom line is eat right, exercise, and either be poor enough to get taxpayer paid healthcare or be rich enough to not care about spending ~$20k per year per couple in their 50s on health insurance premiums plus have ~$30k or so ready for out of pocket costs in case of emergency. If something happens to you at the end of December, the out of pocket will reset Jan 1, so you need to have two years worth of out of pocket costs, and at around $13k or so, I ballpark it at $30k. If I'm in the middle 30% to 80% wealth band of the US, I would plan on killing myself if my prognosis was poor to avoid draining the family's wealth.
        Insanity 7y ago
        that's just depressing to be honest. :/ EDIT: Follow-up question, the table ends at 64+, how do senior citizens pay for this without having a job?
        lotsofpulp 7y ago
        65+ enter the magical land of Medicare, where the taxpayers start taking care of you and paying for your medical care. But over the years, even that has been chipped down and is extremely confusing, with a combination of means testing and supplementary insurance programs that you need to buy to get "full coverage". But basically, 65+ means if you go to the hospital, and get a $300k bill, it won't ruin your finances as the government picks up the hospital bills. I'm pretty sure. But there's Part A/B/C/D/etc, which cover different things like prescription medicines, non hospital healthcare, etc that are not paid for or partially paid for, and you have to buy supplementary insurance for those. Also, health insurance in the US is not just insurance, it's also buying access to a set of healthcare providers that the insurance has negotiated pricing with, so that you don't get taken advantage of by the healthcare providers who can otherwise charge you whatever they want. As you can see, the US spends a decent portion of its time trying to figure out how to take advantage of the system (i.e. each other) and wring out as much as possible while putting in as little as possible.
        Insanity 7y ago
        Thanks for clarifying, it does sound like a bit of a mess to be honest. Hopefully things change for the better given in light of the current crisis.
    - mgkimsal 7y ago
      > Recently, the ability to purchase health insurance with pre-tax money has been expanded to self employed I've been doing it for 12 years. This isn't 'recent'.
      - lotsofpulp 7y ago
        Oops, I got that mixed up with the ability for small business to reimburse employees with tax free money for purchasing health insurance from healthcare.gov
        mgkimsal 7y ago
        gotcha. that's recent, iirc, like... in the last year? weren't many companies already doing 'HSA funding' as a benefit before that? Was it just taxable (but... contribution to a HSA would be deductible for me even if the income is initially taxable, so would seem a wash?). I understand this is the actual insurance though.
        lotsofpulp 7y ago
        HSA’s and related tax benefits are a different topic than paying for the monthly health insurance premiums with pre-tax income. People whose employers offered health insurance got to pay their premiums with pre tax money and contribute to HSA with pre tax money. People whose employers don’t offer health insurance have to pay the premiums with post tax money. But they still get to contribute to HSA with pre tax money.
    - jorblumesea 7y ago
      > Anyone can purchase health insurance at healthcare.gov. But in practice, it's so prohibitively expensive that many people just...don't. Pre or post tax, it's insanely expensive. Europeans would be shocked.
  - marcosdumay 7y ago
    > as their visa depends on their employment You know, it's probably not that a large problem because those are very few people, but this one is completely insane. I have no idea how nobody still found it completely opposite to fundamental freedoms. It just escapes being outright slavery because those people can run away to their home country.
    - HarryHirsch 7y ago
      The visa issue cripples non-citizens' ability to negotiate better salaries. The salary issue affects everyone, citizen and stranger.
- commandlinefan 7y ago
  On the flip side, European countries had high unemployment even before the Coronavirus recession because employers were reluctant to take on new employees knowing that it's much more difficult to get rid of bad ones there than here.
  - fxtentacle 7y ago
    In the US, there's the risk of lawsuits after you fire someone, which I guess creates the same resistance and hurdles to hiring as the added protection in the EU. Plus, my personal experience is that we easily found many OK candidates in the US but had trouble finding one in the EU. That either suggests that the EU has less skilled coders overall, or that the US has a higher rate of people who are unemployed or very unhappy with their current job.
  - jaynetics 7y ago
    Well, Germany @ 3% unemployment vs US @ 3.5%? Seems it's somehow possible to employ people even with protections.
    - gullyfur 7y ago
      > Germany @ 3% Did you cherry-pick that one? Spain @ 14.2%, Italy @9.7%, France @8.5%. Spain was actually at 26.2% back in March 2013. https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=z8o7pt6rd5uqa6_&met_y=unemployment_rate&idim=country:es:it:fr&fdim_y=seasonality:sa&hl=en&dl=en https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=z8o7pt6rd5uqa6_...
      - yokaze 7y ago
        It doesn't invalidate the grandparents point. You can easily find dozens of countries with at will employment, and high unemployment. And I think, Spain has actually less stringent worker protection laws than Germany.
  - Oletros 7y ago
    Difficult to get rid of an employee in Spain? No, not at all
- boxy310 7y ago
  > How can the US have that little protection of their workers..? The US has spent the last 65 years chipping away at unionization rates and other pro-employee protections. The overall rate of unionization in the US peaked in 1954 [1]. [1] http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2011/0311reuss2.html http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2011/0311reuss2.html
- influx 7y ago
  On the flip side, hiring is much easier since the employer doesn't have to go through so much red tape for hires that don't work out. There's tradeoffs to each method.
  - HarryHirsch 7y ago
    If hiring is so easy, why does everyone complain about how hard it is to hire someone competent? Employers inflict on the candidate two rounds of phone screening, a take-home project, two rounds of on-site interviews, psychometric testing, augury from flight of birds, augury from feeding of chickens, a haruspicium, diversity statement and inquiry from the I-ching, and despite all these measures they still complain how hard it is to hire a decent programmer.
    - lotsofpulp 7y ago
      I'm assuming selection bias. You're not going to hear non complaints. Also, the buyer's goal is to buy the best product for the lowest price, and many people are probably offering too low a price for the product they want.
    - edmundsauto 7y ago
      The act of hiring is still very difficult. However, the risk of a poor hire is less. That makes companies less risk averse.
    - michaelt 7y ago
      Imagine how you would treat a really great employee - someone you certainly wanted to retain. Would a person getting that treatment from you quit for a job where 10% of people got fired after the first month?
  - SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
    Which is why we see companies willing to take risk on people and not asking for ridiculous qualifications?
    - 7y ago
- dwaltrip 7y ago
  I agree that workers need protection. For most people, there is a large power imbalance that can allow companies to take advantage of their workers. However, things can go too far in the other direction. Imagine a small business having to spend months and months trying to fire someone who isn't doing their job and hasn't been receptive towards coaching or critiques. This could seriously harm the team they work on, not to mention the overall health of the company. I don't know what the best solution is. But there are some complexities here.
  - pjc50 7y ago
    Most places allow a probationary period for new employees. In practice, if you have actually done the assessment process and formal critique in a documented way, it's not a problem to get rid of someone who actually isn't working. What you can't do is fire people on a whim or personal anger.
    - dwaltrip 7y ago
      Do you think that those describing difficulties in firing people as well as negative second order effects are significantly overstating these issues? I haven't researched this much myself, but the potential downsides seem fairly plausible to me. Thinking about it more, I suppose I've also had this implicit assumption that at-will employment has contributed to the disproportionate success of startups in America. It seems like it could be the case, but I don't have any hard evidence.
- alistairSH 7y ago
  But as an employee, you can also quit without notice. It's fair and balanced. </sarcasm> There is the federal WARN Act (1) but it has holes big enough to drive a train through (natural disaster and unforeseeable circumstance exclusions mean it doesn't apply right now). As the sibling noted, potentially the most devastating impact of the jobless claims is loss of medical insurance. We'll likely see tens of thousands of personal bankruptcy filings as a result of this pandemic, many of which will be due to ER/ICU bills. 1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_Adjustment_and_Retraining_Notification_Act_of_1988 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_Adjustment_and_Retraini...
  - sorokod 7y ago
    See your fair and balanced and raise with The rain it raineth on the just And also on the unjust fella; But chiefly on the just, because The unjust hath the just’s umbrella
  - onlyrealcuzzo 7y ago
    I thought the bill covered ALL Coronavirus expenses. I can't find a source, so I'm not sure if it does or not. Do you know? I also know that people can use COBRA to keep their employer's insurance if they're laid off, but often this can be too expensive. But are they able to get a new insurance plan or do they just not have insurance if they don't keep their employer's insurance? I get it that people will have other medical issues during this time. But whether it covers Coronavirus related-expenses makes a HUGE difference. Coronavirus is BY FAR the leading cause of hospitalization in the US right now. It's also the leading cause of death. For a month, it's likely to get exponentially worse. It's likely to remain this bad for 2-3 months minimum. Meaning, the costs could be astronomical, and as you pointed out, would DESTROY people not covered by insurance. This could honestly be almost as bad as the Subprime housing crisis. Something like 800k people filed bankruptcy from Subprime. Conservatively, we're likely to see 500k semi-severe hospitalizations. If 30% of them are unemployed, I don't know how that doesn't lead to 150k bankruptcies. YMMV, but I would say that's on the conservative side.
- whb07 7y ago
  As a EU citizen how do you deal with larger unemployment, most especially seen in sub 30 yo unemployment rates of 10%+? Better mobility and ability to create and destroy has costs and benefits.
- rconti 7y ago
  How can the US have that little protection? By not passing laws protecting workers, it's quite simple, actually. The implied "why" would be a more fluid workforce. We've all heard the horror stories of companies/industries/nations paralyzed by an unmotivated/unproductive workforce. Hell, we have the same jokes here about jobs in some government agencies and big corporations. The thought is "quick to hire, quick to fire". I don't mind it; I just think the situation where you lose your job AND your health care is insane. I'd like a stronger social safety net. On the other hand, perhaps countries with a stronger social safety net make it harder for companies to fire, so they push the burden back on the companies to keep from stressing social services.
- ValentineC 7y ago
  > So as a non-US citizen, I didn't know about "at-will employment" "At-will employment" might be a US legal concept, but it's everywhere in Asia. A few first-world economies (like Singapore, where I'm at; perhaps Hong Kong too) have similar (or less) employment protection to keep their reputations as "business-friendly" countries.
- petercooper 7y ago
  You can do exactly the same in the UK if they've worked for you fewer than two years. You just have to pay their notice period (which is probably just two weeks of salary so hardly much protection).
jb775 7y ago
Big surprise, CNN blasting out misleading & sensational headline because it aligns with the owner's personal political agenda. If you don't believe me, follow the money. Edit: and if you downvote me without a response, you are a coward.
- Ididntdothis 7y ago
  What are you objecting to specifically?
  - jb775 7y ago
    I object to major news networks using agenda setting and sensationalized media framing strategies to mislead the general public. For example let's dissect the headline: 1.) "3000%" - Let's calculate the highest possible number to use here! 2.) "% jump" - Let's only consider the increased aspect of the jobless claim ratio! 3.) "jobless" - Let's not point out that most of these people will be immediately back to work shortly! 4.) "devastated" - Let's find the most dramatic verb to use here! 5.) "US" - Let's only focus on the US, since that allows us to use the highest possible number in #1! 6.) "has" - Let's use an auxiliary verb that implies the ensuing claim has already occurred, when it hasn't! 7.) "has devastated the US job market" - Let's make a sensational claim that not only isn't measurable, but hasn't had enough time to play out yet, so therefore isn't true! I could probably do this for 90% of articles coming from CNN. It's not just about the clickbait, it's about what they're choosing to report on, and how they are framing it.
    - Ididntdothis 7y ago
      What media would you recommend?
      - jb775 7y ago
        Twitter and never CNN
        7y ago
01100011 7y ago
Any idea why the stock market is still holding up? Whether or not you think the virus will be resolved quickly, the economy has now taken a serious hit. Is the feeling that the government stimulus actions will be enough to completely erase the Covid damage? Will they resolve the shaky fundamentals and sky-high valuations we saw heading into this mess? Perhaps I'm a simpleton for expecting rational markets, but it seems like equities should be falling further.
- eloisant 7y ago
  I'm not sure the economy is getting a hit as big as it looks, but it's rather on "pause". I think many of these workers are laid off so they can get unemployment benefits, and they'll be hired again by the same companies as soon as the quarantine ends - which should take a couple month if we look at what happened in China. Sure, some companies will die from losing all of their business during the quarantine, but the number of jobless claims is not representative of the workers who will still be out of a job after the quarantine.
  - 01100011 7y ago
    The million dollar question is, will this be a 'V shaped recovery', a.k.a. 'pause' or will it turn into something worse. I hear a lot about companies with cash flow problems which may not survive the hit. Is that true? Beats me. It seems credit is cheap right now. What about long term though? For many industries, it takes a while to spin things back up and see cash flow. Will the economic mitigation measures be enough to see those companies through? We may also be looking at permanent changes in behavior. Sure, there is a lot of pent up demand for getting out and socializing, but if people are being bled dry by meager stimulus checks, they're not going to rush to fill the restaurants and malls when this is over. Edit: Just saw this, an interview with El-Erian on liquidity issues, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjzBKtVTdtQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjzBKtVTdtQ
    - ta1234567890 7y ago
      Credit being cheap only works if you have a good plan and expectations that the business is going to survive. Most small businesses are not in that position (and even large businesses like Macy's, Cheesecake Factory and Subway). Shops that are not getting foot traffic now have no idea when they'll be able to reopen, getting a loan to pay their lease would probably be unpayable afterwards. Business owners also need to make a living, so they are looking into getting jobs or starting alternative businesses. Their original businesses are most likely not coming back. And there's no way the economy will fully reopen before at least a year. China is not a good comparison, because 1) the US did not follow the same approach as China in dealing with the virus, 2) China has been lying about their economy and number of cases and 3) even if China was fully open for business now, the biggest markets are not buying - Europe and the US are just beginning a huge recession, that in turn will hit China back and will affect the recovery of the world economy. A V shaped recovery is, in my opinion, a made up dream to keep people from panicking.
11thEarlOfMar 7y ago
I'd be interested in an analysis of Layoffs vs. Furloughs. Layoffs being permanent job losses. Furloughs expecting to go back to work when the social restrictions are lifted. A lot of these are people taking advantage of state unemployment insurance, but who expect to return to work in the next few months.
- SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
  Yeah, I'm not personally aware of many layoffs, they are all furloughs.
  - logicalmind 7y ago
    And the level beyond furloughs are paycuts. Many companies are doing fairly large paycuts (20% or more) in order to retain jobs.
- elicash 7y ago
  Unless small businesses know how long they'll be closed, I'd guess it's hard for them to know whether they'll survive. It's also unclear, once things open up again, whether people will spend like they used to or whether the loss of potential customers' paychecks will add to the pain of small businesses.
jorblumesea 7y ago
I would say that these people lose their health insurance, but sadly they probably didn't have any to begin with, as many of the losses are service industry jobs. There are many positive things about the US, but the lack of comprehensive affordable medical coverage seems cruel. Especially tying it to employment.
jeffdavis 7y ago
I'm curious what will happen to restaurants. Will there be a permanent setback as people realize how to cook at home and how much money it saves? If so, that seems like a long-term win for physical and financial health. But in the medium term will hit people in the industry pretty hard. I'm also curious how much it really helps health (and maybe even financial health) overall. Real home cooking is good compared to burgers and fries. But frozen pizzas are not great compared with some healthier restaurant options. And some restaurant food is pretty cheap and some packaged food surprisingly expensive.

48 points by finphil 7y ago

So as a non-US citizen, I didn't know about "at-will employment" [1]. Apparently, in some states, companies can fire people "at will" (so without any reason, at any given moment). As an EU citizen, this sounds utterly horrifying to me. How can the US have that little protection of their workers..? [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At-will_employment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/At-will_employment

Insanity 7y ago
Yeah it's quite crazy, and worse for people whom are there on a visa as their visa depends on their employment. And even worse again is that healthcare is tied up to your employer..
- lotsofpulp 7y ago
  Tax free health insurance is tied up with employer, not healthcare (or health insurance). Anyone can purchase health insurance at healthcare.gov. Recently, the ability to purchase health insurance with pre-tax money has been expanded to self employed, but people who work for an employer that does not offer health insurance are still discriminated against.
  - Insanity 7y ago
    Okay fair enough, but from what I gather from my relatives over there is that this is quite expensive? At least compared to EU
    - lotsofpulp 7y ago
      Yes, this pdf shows how much health insurance costs per month for a person in the state of New Jersey (a higher cost of living state, but not far off New York/California): https://www.state.nj.us/dobi/division_insurance/ihcseh/ihcrates_2020.pdf https://www.state.nj.us/dobi/division_insurance/ihcseh/ihcra... The metal levels indicate what portion of your expected healthcare costs the insurance is expected to pay. Bronze is 60%, Silver is 70%, Gold is 80%. At the bottom you will see age rating, so you have to multiply that factor with the premium to get the premium at your age. For example, if you purchase bronze coverage (lets say $250) as a 50 year old in NJ, the factor is 1.78 times $250 = $445 per month divided by 0.6 due to it being bronze = $742 per month is your expected healthcare expenses. Obviously this is not per month, but becomes more accurate amortized over ones' lifetime, as you might go with zero healthcare expenses for years and then get hit with $10,000 easily. Bottom line is eat right, exercise, and either be poor enough to get taxpayer paid healthcare or be rich enough to not care about spending ~$20k per year per couple in their 50s on health insurance premiums plus have ~$30k or so ready for out of pocket costs in case of emergency. If something happens to you at the end of December, the out of pocket will reset Jan 1, so you need to have two years worth of out of pocket costs, and at around $13k or so, I ballpark it at $30k. If I'm in the middle 30% to 80% wealth band of the US, I would plan on killing myself if my prognosis was poor to avoid draining the family's wealth.
      - Insanity 7y ago
        that's just depressing to be honest. :/ EDIT: Follow-up question, the table ends at 64+, how do senior citizens pay for this without having a job?
        lotsofpulp 7y ago
        65+ enter the magical land of Medicare, where the taxpayers start taking care of you and paying for your medical care. But over the years, even that has been chipped down and is extremely confusing, with a combination of means testing and supplementary insurance programs that you need to buy to get "full coverage". But basically, 65+ means if you go to the hospital, and get a $300k bill, it won't ruin your finances as the government picks up the hospital bills. I'm pretty sure. But there's Part A/B/C/D/etc, which cover different things like prescription medicines, non hospital healthcare, etc that are not paid for or partially paid for, and you have to buy supplementary insurance for those. Also, health insurance in the US is not just insurance, it's also buying access to a set of healthcare providers that the insurance has negotiated pricing with, so that you don't get taken advantage of by the healthcare providers who can otherwise charge you whatever they want. As you can see, the US spends a decent portion of its time trying to figure out how to take advantage of the system (i.e. each other) and wring out as much as possible while putting in as little as possible.
        Insanity 7y ago
        Thanks for clarifying, it does sound like a bit of a mess to be honest. Hopefully things change for the better given in light of the current crisis.
  - mgkimsal 7y ago
    > Recently, the ability to purchase health insurance with pre-tax money has been expanded to self employed I've been doing it for 12 years. This isn't 'recent'.
    - lotsofpulp 7y ago
      Oops, I got that mixed up with the ability for small business to reimburse employees with tax free money for purchasing health insurance from healthcare.gov
      - mgkimsal 7y ago
        gotcha. that's recent, iirc, like... in the last year? weren't many companies already doing 'HSA funding' as a benefit before that? Was it just taxable (but... contribution to a HSA would be deductible for me even if the income is initially taxable, so would seem a wash?). I understand this is the actual insurance though.
        lotsofpulp 7y ago
        HSA’s and related tax benefits are a different topic than paying for the monthly health insurance premiums with pre-tax income. People whose employers offered health insurance got to pay their premiums with pre tax money and contribute to HSA with pre tax money. People whose employers don’t offer health insurance have to pay the premiums with post tax money. But they still get to contribute to HSA with pre tax money.
  - jorblumesea 7y ago
    > Anyone can purchase health insurance at healthcare.gov. But in practice, it's so prohibitively expensive that many people just...don't. Pre or post tax, it's insanely expensive. Europeans would be shocked.
- marcosdumay 7y ago
  > as their visa depends on their employment You know, it's probably not that a large problem because those are very few people, but this one is completely insane. I have no idea how nobody still found it completely opposite to fundamental freedoms. It just escapes being outright slavery because those people can run away to their home country.
  - HarryHirsch 7y ago
    The visa issue cripples non-citizens' ability to negotiate better salaries. The salary issue affects everyone, citizen and stranger.
commandlinefan 7y ago
On the flip side, European countries had high unemployment even before the Coronavirus recession because employers were reluctant to take on new employees knowing that it's much more difficult to get rid of bad ones there than here.
- fxtentacle 7y ago
  In the US, there's the risk of lawsuits after you fire someone, which I guess creates the same resistance and hurdles to hiring as the added protection in the EU. Plus, my personal experience is that we easily found many OK candidates in the US but had trouble finding one in the EU. That either suggests that the EU has less skilled coders overall, or that the US has a higher rate of people who are unemployed or very unhappy with their current job.
- jaynetics 7y ago
  Well, Germany @ 3% unemployment vs US @ 3.5%? Seems it's somehow possible to employ people even with protections.
  - gullyfur 7y ago
    > Germany @ 3% Did you cherry-pick that one? Spain @ 14.2%, Italy @9.7%, France @8.5%. Spain was actually at 26.2% back in March 2013. https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=z8o7pt6rd5uqa6_&met_y=unemployment_rate&idim=country:es:it:fr&fdim_y=seasonality:sa&hl=en&dl=en https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=z8o7pt6rd5uqa6_...
    - yokaze 7y ago
      It doesn't invalidate the grandparents point. You can easily find dozens of countries with at will employment, and high unemployment. And I think, Spain has actually less stringent worker protection laws than Germany.
- Oletros 7y ago
  Difficult to get rid of an employee in Spain? No, not at all
boxy310 7y ago
> How can the US have that little protection of their workers..? The US has spent the last 65 years chipping away at unionization rates and other pro-employee protections. The overall rate of unionization in the US peaked in 1954 [1]. [1] http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2011/0311reuss2.html http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archives/2011/0311reuss2.html
influx 7y ago
On the flip side, hiring is much easier since the employer doesn't have to go through so much red tape for hires that don't work out. There's tradeoffs to each method.
- HarryHirsch 7y ago
  If hiring is so easy, why does everyone complain about how hard it is to hire someone competent? Employers inflict on the candidate two rounds of phone screening, a take-home project, two rounds of on-site interviews, psychometric testing, augury from flight of birds, augury from feeding of chickens, a haruspicium, diversity statement and inquiry from the I-ching, and despite all these measures they still complain how hard it is to hire a decent programmer.
  - lotsofpulp 7y ago
    I'm assuming selection bias. You're not going to hear non complaints. Also, the buyer's goal is to buy the best product for the lowest price, and many people are probably offering too low a price for the product they want.
  - edmundsauto 7y ago
    The act of hiring is still very difficult. However, the risk of a poor hire is less. That makes companies less risk averse.
  - michaelt 7y ago
    Imagine how you would treat a really great employee - someone you certainly wanted to retain. Would a person getting that treatment from you quit for a job where 10% of people got fired after the first month?
- SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
  Which is why we see companies willing to take risk on people and not asking for ridiculous qualifications?
  - 7y ago
dwaltrip 7y ago
I agree that workers need protection. For most people, there is a large power imbalance that can allow companies to take advantage of their workers. However, things can go too far in the other direction. Imagine a small business having to spend months and months trying to fire someone who isn't doing their job and hasn't been receptive towards coaching or critiques. This could seriously harm the team they work on, not to mention the overall health of the company. I don't know what the best solution is. But there are some complexities here.
- pjc50 7y ago
  Most places allow a probationary period for new employees. In practice, if you have actually done the assessment process and formal critique in a documented way, it's not a problem to get rid of someone who actually isn't working. What you can't do is fire people on a whim or personal anger.
  - dwaltrip 7y ago
    Do you think that those describing difficulties in firing people as well as negative second order effects are significantly overstating these issues? I haven't researched this much myself, but the potential downsides seem fairly plausible to me. Thinking about it more, I suppose I've also had this implicit assumption that at-will employment has contributed to the disproportionate success of startups in America. It seems like it could be the case, but I don't have any hard evidence.
alistairSH 7y ago
But as an employee, you can also quit without notice. It's fair and balanced. </sarcasm> There is the federal WARN Act (1) but it has holes big enough to drive a train through (natural disaster and unforeseeable circumstance exclusions mean it doesn't apply right now). As the sibling noted, potentially the most devastating impact of the jobless claims is loss of medical insurance. We'll likely see tens of thousands of personal bankruptcy filings as a result of this pandemic, many of which will be due to ER/ICU bills. 1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_Adjustment_and_Retraining_Notification_Act_of_1988 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worker_Adjustment_and_Retraini...
- sorokod 7y ago
  See your fair and balanced and raise with The rain it raineth on the just And also on the unjust fella; But chiefly on the just, because The unjust hath the just’s umbrella
- onlyrealcuzzo 7y ago
  I thought the bill covered ALL Coronavirus expenses. I can't find a source, so I'm not sure if it does or not. Do you know? I also know that people can use COBRA to keep their employer's insurance if they're laid off, but often this can be too expensive. But are they able to get a new insurance plan or do they just not have insurance if they don't keep their employer's insurance? I get it that people will have other medical issues during this time. But whether it covers Coronavirus related-expenses makes a HUGE difference. Coronavirus is BY FAR the leading cause of hospitalization in the US right now. It's also the leading cause of death. For a month, it's likely to get exponentially worse. It's likely to remain this bad for 2-3 months minimum. Meaning, the costs could be astronomical, and as you pointed out, would DESTROY people not covered by insurance. This could honestly be almost as bad as the Subprime housing crisis. Something like 800k people filed bankruptcy from Subprime. Conservatively, we're likely to see 500k semi-severe hospitalizations. If 30% of them are unemployed, I don't know how that doesn't lead to 150k bankruptcies. YMMV, but I would say that's on the conservative side.
whb07 7y ago
As a EU citizen how do you deal with larger unemployment, most especially seen in sub 30 yo unemployment rates of 10%+? Better mobility and ability to create and destroy has costs and benefits.
rconti 7y ago
How can the US have that little protection? By not passing laws protecting workers, it's quite simple, actually. The implied "why" would be a more fluid workforce. We've all heard the horror stories of companies/industries/nations paralyzed by an unmotivated/unproductive workforce. Hell, we have the same jokes here about jobs in some government agencies and big corporations. The thought is "quick to hire, quick to fire". I don't mind it; I just think the situation where you lose your job AND your health care is insane. I'd like a stronger social safety net. On the other hand, perhaps countries with a stronger social safety net make it harder for companies to fire, so they push the burden back on the companies to keep from stressing social services.
ValentineC 7y ago
> So as a non-US citizen, I didn't know about "at-will employment" "At-will employment" might be a US legal concept, but it's everywhere in Asia. A few first-world economies (like Singapore, where I'm at; perhaps Hong Kong too) have similar (or less) employment protection to keep their reputations as "business-friendly" countries.
petercooper 7y ago
You can do exactly the same in the UK if they've worked for you fewer than two years. You just have to pay their notice period (which is probably just two weeks of salary so hardly much protection).

jb775 7y ago

Big surprise, CNN blasting out misleading & sensational headline because it aligns with the owner's personal political agenda. If you don't believe me, follow the money. Edit: and if you downvote me without a response, you are a coward.

Ididntdothis 7y ago
What are you objecting to specifically?
- jb775 7y ago
  I object to major news networks using agenda setting and sensationalized media framing strategies to mislead the general public. For example let's dissect the headline: 1.) "3000%" - Let's calculate the highest possible number to use here! 2.) "% jump" - Let's only consider the increased aspect of the jobless claim ratio! 3.) "jobless" - Let's not point out that most of these people will be immediately back to work shortly! 4.) "devastated" - Let's find the most dramatic verb to use here! 5.) "US" - Let's only focus on the US, since that allows us to use the highest possible number in #1! 6.) "has" - Let's use an auxiliary verb that implies the ensuing claim has already occurred, when it hasn't! 7.) "has devastated the US job market" - Let's make a sensational claim that not only isn't measurable, but hasn't had enough time to play out yet, so therefore isn't true! I could probably do this for 90% of articles coming from CNN. It's not just about the clickbait, it's about what they're choosing to report on, and how they are framing it.
  - Ididntdothis 7y ago
    What media would you recommend?
    - jb775 7y ago
      Twitter and never CNN
      - 7y ago

01100011 7y ago

Any idea why the stock market is still holding up? Whether or not you think the virus will be resolved quickly, the economy has now taken a serious hit. Is the feeling that the government stimulus actions will be enough to completely erase the Covid damage? Will they resolve the shaky fundamentals and sky-high valuations we saw heading into this mess? Perhaps I'm a simpleton for expecting rational markets, but it seems like equities should be falling further.

eloisant 7y ago
I'm not sure the economy is getting a hit as big as it looks, but it's rather on "pause". I think many of these workers are laid off so they can get unemployment benefits, and they'll be hired again by the same companies as soon as the quarantine ends - which should take a couple month if we look at what happened in China. Sure, some companies will die from losing all of their business during the quarantine, but the number of jobless claims is not representative of the workers who will still be out of a job after the quarantine.
- 01100011 7y ago
  The million dollar question is, will this be a 'V shaped recovery', a.k.a. 'pause' or will it turn into something worse. I hear a lot about companies with cash flow problems which may not survive the hit. Is that true? Beats me. It seems credit is cheap right now. What about long term though? For many industries, it takes a while to spin things back up and see cash flow. Will the economic mitigation measures be enough to see those companies through? We may also be looking at permanent changes in behavior. Sure, there is a lot of pent up demand for getting out and socializing, but if people are being bled dry by meager stimulus checks, they're not going to rush to fill the restaurants and malls when this is over. Edit: Just saw this, an interview with El-Erian on liquidity issues, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjzBKtVTdtQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjzBKtVTdtQ
  - ta1234567890 7y ago
    Credit being cheap only works if you have a good plan and expectations that the business is going to survive. Most small businesses are not in that position (and even large businesses like Macy's, Cheesecake Factory and Subway). Shops that are not getting foot traffic now have no idea when they'll be able to reopen, getting a loan to pay their lease would probably be unpayable afterwards. Business owners also need to make a living, so they are looking into getting jobs or starting alternative businesses. Their original businesses are most likely not coming back. And there's no way the economy will fully reopen before at least a year. China is not a good comparison, because 1) the US did not follow the same approach as China in dealing with the virus, 2) China has been lying about their economy and number of cases and 3) even if China was fully open for business now, the biggest markets are not buying - Europe and the US are just beginning a huge recession, that in turn will hit China back and will affect the recovery of the world economy. A V shaped recovery is, in my opinion, a made up dream to keep people from panicking.

11thEarlOfMar 7y ago

I'd be interested in an analysis of Layoffs vs. Furloughs. Layoffs being permanent job losses. Furloughs expecting to go back to work when the social restrictions are lifted. A lot of these are people taking advantage of state unemployment insurance, but who expect to return to work in the next few months.

SketchySeaBeast 7y ago
Yeah, I'm not personally aware of many layoffs, they are all furloughs.
- logicalmind 7y ago
  And the level beyond furloughs are paycuts. Many companies are doing fairly large paycuts (20% or more) in order to retain jobs.
elicash 7y ago
Unless small businesses know how long they'll be closed, I'd guess it's hard for them to know whether they'll survive. It's also unclear, once things open up again, whether people will spend like they used to or whether the loss of potential customers' paychecks will add to the pain of small businesses.

jorblumesea 7y ago

I would say that these people lose their health insurance, but sadly they probably didn't have any to begin with, as many of the losses are service industry jobs. There are many positive things about the US, but the lack of comprehensive affordable medical coverage seems cruel. Especially tying it to employment.

jeffdavis 7y ago

I'm curious what will happen to restaurants. Will there be a permanent setback as people realize how to cook at home and how much money it saves? If so, that seems like a long-term win for physical and financial health. But in the medium term will hit people in the industry pretty hard. I'm also curious how much it really helps health (and maybe even financial health) overall. Real home cooking is good compared to burgers and fries. But frozen pizzas are not great compared with some healthier restaurant options. And some restaurant food is pretty cheap and some packaged food surprisingly expensive.