From: (Dave=A0Hall)
On Wed, 15 Jun 2005 16:37:58 -0400, (I
AmnotGeorgeBush) wrote:
From: (Dave=A0Hall)
On Mon, 13 Jun 2005 11:29:46 -0400, (I
AmnotGeorgeBush) wrote:
David T. Hall (N3CVJ) wrote:
The number of
those without health care (seniors included) far outnumber those healthy
workers who get laid off.

Most companies who employ skilled workers,

have some form of healthcare coverage as

part of their benefits package. I've never had a
job without it.

Your personal situation is irrelevant to the majority.

Not really. Most people who are in full time

gainfully employed jobs have some form of

health care coverage. Unless you're a part

time worker, chances are you have some

coverage.

Each year (for the last 4 years) the number of part-time workers has
increased as the number of those laid off has increased. A growing trend
has been major employers hiring at 32 hours or less to avoid offering
health care benefits.

There are laws to discourage this practice.

Bull****. Any company can fill their positions with ft or pt employees.
There is no law that claims copanies must offer ft work.

You are right. But wasn't there some provision
that stated that if a "part time" worker works

consistently more than 32 hours that they

become considered full time?
=A0

That's a hell of a way of merely saying jobs that require more than 32
hours per week are considered full time.


=A0Just as there are laws to prevent an employer

from paying you a "Salary" instead of an

hourly rate to avoid paying overtime. Look into
the federal wage and hour laws.


There is nothing that prevents management from working longer hours when
they are salaried and their job requires it.
=A0 I have to abide by the laws you speak of but it seems you are not
familiar with them. Another easy way to avoid offering benefits is to
hire people as independent cotractors, from laborers to clerical..this
is very common in Fl. It also negates the need for federal withholding,
placing the burden on the worker with a 10-99.

Independent contractors are common here

too. I know many professionals who actually

prefer working this way. My company hires

contractors for special projects. For the

company it's a win-win situation since, if they

like the person and they do a good job, they

have the option of hiring them on full time. If

not, they can just let him go when his contract

expires. But the thing is, the company usually

pays much more for a contractor than they

pay for a full time employee.



They actually pay LESS since they don't have to pay for the contractor's
health insurance and workman's comp insurance. When the cost does
actually cost the company more, it is simply a deduction taken at tax
time as a cost of doing business.

The people who like contract work claim that

they can make enough to easily pay their own

medical coverage and still end up ahead of

the game. The biggest downside is the

uncertainty of finding consistent contracts.


And many of them have been doing such work for twenty some years or
longer.

Many of these people work through an agency
to help them find contract jobs. The downside

to that though is that the agency takes a "cut"

of what a company would otherwise pay you.


Not true in the medical field at all. I have a good friend who is a
respiratory therapist. He has been working with a medical agency since
1989 that specializes in 12-52 week contract assignments. He goes all
over the country and his apartment/house is always paid for, he often
gets to choose his own place to live or he can accept a stipend of
usually around 1000-1200 per month. He makes up to 32 bucks an hour, no
less than 26 an hour, depending on specialty floors he works and
geographical areas. His agencies receive a flat fee from the hospitals
or they charge the ospital two bucks more on the hour than he actually
makes per hour. This is not money that the company would otherwise pay
him, as these contract workers would never make that hourly wage working
for a hospital directly.


On the other hand, some of these agencies

will pick up medical coverage, and you end up
becoming an employee of the contract

agency. There are many variations.




The medical agencies are standard. They all are covered under health
insurance, but the worker often must contribute, as the agency covers
only a portion of the insurance cost.

=A0Resumption of healthcare coverage is tied to

the laid-off worker's need to find another job.

So what happens in between when on needs prescription medication? When
one is laid off from their job and offered the mandated COBRA, the cost
is always greater than the original. Now, you have people who can not
only pay their bills, but can't afford their medical covereage. What is
your solution?

No one said that life would always be easy.

If you don't have a solution, say so, but saying resumption of
healthcare is tied to finding another job goes without say. Problem is,
the jobs do not exist..check your stats from the feds. Last month, the
feds fell short of 100,000 jobs they expected to add to the stats of
added jobs for the month.

On the other hand, the federal unemployment

rate is around 5.1%. Even if that number

under represents the total number of

unemployed people, and it's really 10%, that

also means that 90% of eligible people are

working.
=A0


That is not what those statistics mean, but I'll play devil's advocate
for a second...the stats don't mean squat when those certain areas are
hotbeds of layoff activities, such as the example you gave with your
small towns no one ever heard of outside of Pa with the exception of
Allentown.



=A0Try growing up during the great depression in
the 30's as my parents did, and then tell me

what hardship is.

How are your parents any different from any other of our parents who did
the same thing?

They're different in that they understood the

hardship and got through it without screaming

for the government to bale them out.


And you just naturally assumed these traits were inherent only to your
parents. Interesting.


What we are going through today is a walk in

the park compared to back then.

When I was a kid, all I would hear were

stories of how people did "this and that" to get

by. You've probably heard the stereotypical

stories of people walking to school with ratty

shoes full of holes in the snow.

Uphill,,,both ways.

And they were glad!

Except that these were true. I guess my

perspective is a bit different than yours. To

me, the examples you've given are a speed

bump compared to life during the depression.

Except you weren't there and did not experience anything remotely
associated with such a hardship as that.

Not directly no. But when the family would talk
about it seemingly endlessly when I was a kid,
you'd swear they were reliving it.
-
That way, no one layoff can cripple a

significant portion of the population.

Depends what you consider a significant
portion of the population. I can think of several examples..Reagan
importing cheaper metals from the Asians decimated the steel industry in
Pa and Ohio.

I live within an easy drive of 4 different steel

plants. The towns that surrounded them were

dependant on those mills for the majority of

their income.

Not one of those small towns you mentioned were major steel producing
towns. In fact, those towns are obscure to all but those who live near
them, except for Allentown, and that was made famous by Billy Joel.

But the problem was very real to those who

lived there.


As is today, even with you pointing to what you feel is an aceptable and
positive unemployment rate to undermine those who were laid off.


Phoenixville was especially hard hit when not

only the steel mill closed, but the Firestone tire
plant closed, and the Budd Company (Made

truck and train bodies) closed as well. But

today, the town is doing alright. A whole new

host of tech and office type jobs opened up.

But 20 years later and things

have pretty much recovered. People can get

pretty creative when they need to be.

Recovered from what? You said it couldn't happen, but by invoking the
fact they recovered, you unwittingly admit the towns were indeed
crippled from such layoffs..

Only temporarily.

It happened. An entire generation came of age and went during that
"temporary" era you refer.

.20 years is a blink of an eye in the grand

scheme of things.


Not when those are the years one is growing up in such a town.

Recovery started sooner than that.


Not in the majority of US Steel towns it didn't.

It took 20

years to finally raze the old buildings.

That's the whole point. Life goes on. People

adapt and adjust. Allow them to do that, give

them a few tools to help them, and they will

solve their own problem.

Except many cities did not recover.

Most did, and still do.


No, most did not recover for over an entire generation coming of age.
Again, I direct you to the real steel cities, not some small industry
town that has a single mill or so.

If not, people always have the option to move.


No, that option is not always available for people.

We don't need the government mollycoddling

us and indoctrinating us into becoming

dependant on them.

Asking for health care from those who are charged with regulating it
when they have the best care available and toss our cash away like
****ing in the wind and give away health care to the very same people
you say are trying to kill us and wage war and terror on us, is not
mollycoddling. Kind of difficult to explain your position when you
suport these leaders who "mollycoddle" with healthcare those you
repeatedly insist are our enemy and hate us and want us dead.

I'm not so sure how true it is that we are giving
free healthcare to all Iraqi's.


Only you said "All" Iraqis.

That was a rumor started by a liberal rag,

based on war related casualties. That doesn't

mean that every sick person in Iraq gets free

healthcare at our expense.


That's exactly what is happening, Dave. Instead of knee-jerk reactional
blames from you, try a little investigation and reading. ANY Iraqi can
walk up to the military and ask for health care and recieve it, to some
extent. I'm not talking about an MRI, I'm talking about antibiotics,
treatment for wounds, injuries, etc., whether "war" related or not.


If the government provided all of us

healthcare, it would cost a huge sum.



It would be a fraction compared to what the war is costing.


Just the medicare prescription benefit that

Bush signed in (And I strongly opposed) is a

huge adder to the deficit.



A deficit created and made deeper daily by the war on thee wrong people.
That sucking sound could have been avoided if only Bush would have been
honest.

To cover every American, it would require a

sizable increase in taxes.


Bull****. The war in Iraq cost much more than it would cost to subsidize
every living American.

I already have good coverage, and it costs me
less than the tax increase to cover the

.government's plan. So why should I favor it?



That's the "As long as I got mine" attitude that put this country in the
financial pit it is become.


It's nothing more than socialism.


And socialized medicine is long overdue.

Taking from those according to their means, to
give to those according to their needs.



It's not taking, Dave. It's fixing the system with the cash they already
have as opposed to ****ing it away waging war in some foreign land that
never attacked us or was even a diect threat.

And when the government is paying the bill,

those "needs" will increase exponentially.


Sort of like the war. People are waking up though, as Bush had his
extension of a portion of the (un)Patriot Act rightfully defeated
yesterday and he threw his usual baby tantrum and threatened to start
vetoing other things.

There is a certain segment of the population

that like to take advantage of as much free

money as they can get.


And when you stop equating medical care with giving away things, you may
begin to understand each.

David Hall Jr. (N3CVJ) wrote:
Yes, as we continue to become more efficient

at manufacture,

Whaaaa? Manufacturing is DOWN, not becoming more efficient.

.Down in this country.


Where it matters most.

It's growing strong in other places where it is

cheaper (Hence more efficient) to

manufacture things.

Yea, but that isn't "we". "We" is,,,,er,,,are the USA!

"We" still own many of the companies and still

manage the operations overseas.


Nope, "we" the people don't own ****..you are speaking of a very select
and elite group of private investors who do not by any means make up
"we" or represent the majority of the people in the US.


That employs people.


Sure,,overseas.

True, it requires a more advanced

management skillset, but the jobs usually pay

better too.
=A0

Ummm....no, that's why these manufacturing jobs are sent overeeas,
because they are cheaper.



The automobile pretty much ended the

demand for blacksmiths.

=A0But we shouldn't

blame the automobile for causing the demise

of the blacksmith industry. The smart

blacksmith went back to school and learned to
repair cars.

Blacksmiths were never a large industry and the position was never one
of those that most in a city were employed, rendering the example
fruitless and non-related.

.It's very much related. A particular vocation

doesn't have to be large to be relevant.

It does to be compared to an entire industry such as the steel industry
of which we were speaking.

The principle is the same, regardless of the

size of the industry. When technology allows

the reduction of manual labor, or the

obsolescence of a particular vocation, and a

savings in costs, should we not take

advantage of it? Isn't part of an individual's

responsibility to remain marketable?

The

blacksmith example highlights quite accurately
what happens when our society evolves and

old skills and crafts are no longer needed.

The loss of blacksmith jobs never crippled any towns or cities and that
was what we were speaking.

Again the scale of the effect is irrelevant.


It's very relevant in relation to the economic health of a town, city,
or vocation.


The principle is the same. When jobs become

obsolete, people must learn new current skills.
At the same time newer skills open up as a

result of advancing technology. People need

to keep up with the trends so that the skills

they posses are not obsolete.

That's one of the reasons why I still live where

I do. I was once contemplating a move to both
Florida and North Carolina. But the lack of

.diverse skilled jobs and much lower pay

scales pretty much nixed that move.

Lack of diverse skilled jobs?

Excuse me, I should have said diverse high

.paying skilled jobs.

When was the last time you checked the
stats? Florida has led the country in adding new jobs and has not felt
the inflation the country has felt the last so many years. The pay here
was always offset by the lower cost of living.

All that sounds fine and all, but the long and

short of it is that for the field that I am in, the

salaries offered were between 20 and 40%

lower than they are here. The employers there
(And I interviewed with quite a few) once they

find out where you're from, tell you right up

front not to expect a comparable salary.

Ok,,in the same manner you claimed one who lived in another state could
not tell you about Pa, what makes you feel you can tell a lifelong
resident of another state about their state?

Because I did some extensive research

So did Shark on your laws,

Says you.

No, says Shark.

I saw no evidence of that.

So it comes down to your personal core beliefs of when to selectively
apply your rules.

But please stay focussed.

but you stil claimed because one lived
somewhere else, they cold not know the particulars as well as one who
resided there.

Which is true in most cases.


Except in yours, of course,

when I was considering the move there 15

years ago.

15 years ago was another era in Fl.

Things have changed that much? Ok, I'll take

your word for it, since you live there.

I walked into a K-Mart and compared prices of
the things that I normally buy with what I pay

up here. My wife was especially knowledgable
about clothing prices.

It's not a myth, Dave. There is no state income tax and prices have
always been lower in Fl,,until recently (last 10 years).

Slightly lower in specific cases, like locally

produced goods like fruit and other food. =A0Yes,
there are certain costs which are lower in

Florida. The homestead exemption saves a

bundle on property tax. Homes are (were)

cheaper.


No more.

There is no state tax, and utilities are

somewhat lower.

Utilites are higher, especially electric, as the majority of homes do
not have gas.

Actually, when I was checking, I was currently

paying 15 cents per kilowatt hour. In Florida (

In Brevard County), the rate was about 8

cents per kilowatt hour. Water rates varied

depending on whether you had "city" water or

a privately owned "utility", but they were

cheaper by and large than what I paid up

here.

What do you refer to as a privately owned utility? You either have city,
county, or well water. I have city -and- a well.

Wells were usually used to water the grass.


And for agriculture, animals, drinking, bathing, etc.


The new homes I was looking at all had one.


Oh, THOSE type wells are into the water table just below the
surface,,that's sulphur water and as you say, used just for grass
watering.

What I meant by a privately owned utility was

a utility that was built by the housing

developer to provide water to their

developments. It's not owned or operated by

the city, it is a private entity. I understand that

after a certain number of years passed many

of these private utilities were sold to the city.


I'm not aware of any such utility being built by home developers here.


Heat was not an issue as most homes used

efficient heat pumps, which spent most of their
times as air conditioners. With insulation

ratings of R34 in most new homes, the cooling
costs offset the normal eastern PA winter

heating cost by a considerable margin.

Gas was only recently introduced as a choice for heating and cooking,
and even in most cities, it has to be trucked in (propane).

I prefer electric for cooking (When I'm not

grilling).

Not me. I hate it, but until we get gas lines, I'm not paying for
propane.

Personal choice I guess. I grew up with

electric appliances, so that's what I'm used to.

=A0=A0And heating in Florida is not normally an

issue, as you know. A couple of logs on the

fireplace will take the chill off on those few

chilly mornings.

Depends where you live. The top of the state, even from Ocala northward
use their heat all winter every winter. 30's is a bit chilly and a
fireplace can't heat the entire house.

I was in Central Florida (Brevard), and was

told that heat was a rarity for about a three

week span in January.



Yea,,,that would be about right, but it damn right gets cold in the
winter time, now. Never used to, but it does.



=A0Yes, many costs ARE lower to an extent. But

if you try to buy something like a car, gasoline,
or a major appliance or consumer good, the

cost is pretty mush the same as it is in any

other state.
=A0
=A0Again,,nope. Autos are not only in better condition (speaking of
used, of course) but new cars are somewhat cheaper here, so are most
manufactured goods.

Not according to what I found. I didn't bother

with used car pricing because there is a

certain amount of subjective perception.

(shrug) I go by NADA or edmunds.com perceptions, as does the auto
industry. Check resale and trade-in values.

But the MSRP of new cars there was the

same (or very close) as what I see up here.


I still say they are cheaper here. I've seen the SUV prices in the north
and they are higher. That's why when you check out a major car maker's
site on the net, they need to put in your zip code for pricing.

Sure, no one pays MSRP, but the degree of

discount is not going to be any more

significant there than here.

And Georgia is even cheaper.


Gasoline was actually more expensive back

then than up here. What do you pay for gas

now? Last week, I paid $1.94/gallon
=A0
Last week I paid 1.94 also. This week it's 2.03 but I haven't checked
gasbuddy.com in a few weeks.

I'm up to $2.04 as of today. But that just goes

to show that there isn't enough of a difference

in most consumer costs in Florida to justify a

30% reduction in salary.



I disagree. Quality of life is much better, at least for me. I would
trade for the weather...I need to see the sun daily.
_
=A0The exceptions are the tourist areas and coastal regions that are
developed. I can get a gallon of milk for 3 bucks here. I can get a
gallon of milk in Chiefland for 2.29. this is the norm, not the
exception.

I can do the same up here. Orange Juice is

$2.00 a half gallon (for the "Not from

concentrate" stuff). That's something I would

expect to be much cheaper in Florida.

It is, bit not in the stores. Go to the stands or groves.

And it's better there too. There's nothing

tastier than a fresh from the grove Florida

Orange juice.

We have vegetable stands too. Obviously we

can't grow citrus fruits, but we do tomatoes,

cucumbers, corn, lettuce and most common

produce. And it's cheaper than the stores

usually too.


Stores rape us on the prices for citrus.

Dave

"Sandbagger"