Against Mitt, tougher but bigger win for Dems
I’m of the school of thought that it would be more fun run against Newt or Rick Santorum than Mitt simply because Newt and Rick are just crazy enough to say what they really think. On the other hand, Mitt would mislead his way into the presidency just like G.W. did.
It makes for a more fair contest for a right-winger to stand at a podium, saying what he really thinks, and then having to defend it. Does Newt want to abolish the minimum wage and do away with child labor laws? Great. Let’s talk about that. Is Rick Santorum against birth control? Fine. Let’s let him explain to America why it’s any of his business. That’s the kind of debate you like to have. That’s the kind of debate you want to have.
But it’s infuriating to watch a candidate convince people he’s different than what we know he is. We watched in horror as Bush convinced America in 2000 that he was folksy and reasonable “family values” kind of guy. He said he was going to make sure regular people would have more money in their pockets and be able to afford their own homes. Do you remember them asking him about gun control and affirmative action during the debates? “I believe in reasonable gun control.” ”I just don’t believe in quotas.” As if he’d found a magical middle-ground known only to himself, while those of us who knew better and looked on in horror. And, once elected, what was the first thing he went after? That’s right, tax cuts for the wealthy! And in 2008 all those “values voters” were left scratching their heads, trying to remember what they’d gotten out of two terms. Good ole’ you’d-like-to-have-a-beer-with-him George W. Bush gave us an economy custom-tailored to benefit the wealthy while putting everyone else out of work and out of their homes. Mr. “compassionate conservative” snuck one past the plate. Make that two.
You can expect the same from Mitt. No doubt, he’ll run on the premise (or promise) to make everyone as wealthy as he. “Why should I be embarrassed about my wealth? I just got what you want, and I’ll help you get it!”, he’ll declare as if hawking some get-rich-quick scheme on late-night TV for three easy payments of $19.95 (but it’ll cost us more than that, you can be sure). I know a lot of people think Mitt’s wealth will be his liability and that he’ll be easy to beat because he’s so out of touch, but Republicans have a way of steering into these things, and coming out on top. Karl Rove Politics 101 says he should try and turn it into a strength, and I’m betting that’s what he does. And it may work. If four years of slumping economy has done anything, it’s caused people to long for some wealth of their own, even at the expense of their values. If Obama’s going to beat Mitt, he’ll have to remind everyone it’s not their income Mitt’s looking out for. He’ll have to do more than inspire hope. He’ll have to plant some serious suspicion about what will surly be a wily opponent.
But having Mitt on the ticket does do one thing for Democrats – it takes the wind out of the sails of the same conservatives George W. Bush and Carl Rove felt were the key to everything: their base. And with those staunch conservatives staying home, unenthusiastic occupying the sofa on Election Day, it not only means victory for Obama, it means Democrats take back the House. If Mitt becomes the nominee, it may mean a more difficult and tricky election for Obama, but it also guarantees a low turnout election for Republicans.
Are Republicans Ever Right About the Media?
As much as we groan and roll our eyes every time Republicans bitch about the “liberal media”, we complain a lot about the media, too. I mean, Republicans have them so cowed that they can’t report an inconvenient fact about Republicans anymore without the “Democrats say…” qualifier or inviting some propaganda-spreading GOP strategist on to distort the issue.
So, it pains me to say this but Newt was sort of right about the CNN debate moderator asking him about his ex-wife:
(Forward to 2:15)
I hate Newt, but I think I’m a pretty objective thinker and I gotta tell ya’ – I’d be pissed off too!
Debates are supposed to be so that each candidate can answer the SAME questions so the viewer can decide between them. But it seems, as of very recently, that they’ve morphed into a series of gotcha questions directed at particular candidates.
And why do news outlets get to host debates anyway? They have motives and priorities that have nothing to do with the purpose of debates. In fact, you can say their motives are counter to what viewers of a debate hope to get out of it. News outlets are interested in ratings only. I wish I could say they were interested in ratings AND their reputation as a news organization, but that is evidently not true either.
If there were real debates hosted by an organization other than the news networks, the networks would still broadcast them. In fact, they would likely ALL carry the debate instead of each of them having exclusive rights to it like we have now.
Shouldn’t Republicans be hosting the Republican debate? They’re the ones who need to figure out who to choose, and I know their criteria are different than what the cable news hosts are asking in these debates because when these candidates show up to talk to primary voters in person, they get entirely different questions.
I know a lot of left-leaning folks are greatly entertained by what they’re seeing in these debates, but remember, cable news networks never get better; they only get worse! We’re next! Some day our favorite candidates will have to stand there and allow some cable news personality to play games and ask them each customized and personal gotcha questions right after another, right down the line.
The cable news networks have single-handedly, and in a short order, completely RUINED political debates! They’ve abused the privilidge of hosting them. We need to take it away from them and force them to go back to reporting ON the debate instead (as if they could even do that).
That’s it, you blew it! From now on, primary debates should be held by the political parties themselves. And what of the Presidential Debates for the General? Well, maybe they could be held in High School gymnasiums and hosted by student debate squads. I’m sure they’d do a better job.
Oh, and by the way, afterwards CNN had the nerve to refer to the GOP Primary as a “Soap Opera” on their website:
Alternet Gets it Wrong on Cable TV
Alternet is one of my most beloved news sites – has been for many years – and a frequent go-to, especially as an excellent alternative to “business news” sources.
But on this subject, I’ve got to disagree, and I hope they see it my way:
Sucker: How Cable Companies Make You Pay For Channels You’ll Never Watch | | AlterNet
An excerpt:
Since I still only consume 1% of what Comcast provides, my bill should not be $1500 a year but $15. Oh, I know the cable companies could not afford to provide service for that, so I’d happily raise it to $150 a year for my five channels of free market choice.
But you can’t get A La Carte service from cable/satellite providers. Even though anti-trust laws say these companies can’t coordinate their business plans, they do. None of them offer an A La Carte menu allowing their “customers”to pick and choose what programs they like and want to purchase, as in that old fashioned notion of “supply and demand,” and letting the market place decide which products move to the top and which fail because not enough people want or like them. That’s capitalism, and the cable/satellite companies want no part of it. And they’ve spent lavishly on politicians, federal, state and – most importantly, local, to assure they never will have to be subject to the efficiencies of a true free market.
I get the anti-trust, they’re-lobbying-against-consumers spirit of the piece, truly I do, but in this case, I have to caution against the notion of A La Carte service as a solution, as I did years ago when I wrote the following:
Cable TV: Buffet vs. Al A Carte « Jaundice James
An excerpt:
The knee-jerk reaction of most people, I think, would be to push for having the option of selecting (and paying for) only the channels they would watch, while opting out of the ones they wouldn’t. It is, really, a reasonable thing to want — in a perfect world. However, I think what most people fail to realize is that if we were to take this route, we would end up with fewer available options, and the ones we would be left with would be largely driven by ratings and popular demand.
What Pizzo defines as a benefit, citing “letting the marketplace decide” would clearly not be benficial when you consider the decisions the marketplace makes when it comes to our TV watching choices.
I prescribe a refresher on my piece, stated above. It’s always been a “Best of” on this site. I promise it’s a good read.
Radical Idea #6 : Put a Hold on Work Visas for a While
High unemployment doesn’t just mean there aren’t enough jobs. It also means there are too many of us. Jobs that non-Americans are hired for could and should be done by one of the millions of Americans who are out of work.
We hate outsourcing. And we’re not afraid of speaking up when a company is sending “our jobs” “over there”. But what about when those workers come here? How many jobs are being outsourced right under our noses?
Look around you. Millions of jobs that used to be done by young Americans are now being done by non-Americans. Fast food restaurants, the grocery store, the car wash, the copy shop. You name it. People used to work their way through college working at fast food restaurants. How often do you even see an American working in a fast food restaurant these days? It’s because this trend has the effect of lowering wages for everyone. These jobs are no longer paying enough to cover rent while someone goes to school.
“They do jobs Americans won’t do.” That’s what we’re told. We’re told that the higher labor costs would be passed along to the consumer. It’s all a lie. Companies choose to pay less for these jobs in favor of higher profits. And it works. Companies are making record profits, in part, because they’re paying record low wages in relation to their intake. It used to be that Americans worked cash registers, vacuumed floors and made copies. The difference is that their bosses weren’t flying around in private jets. They are now. Big business knows that if they paid Americans a living wage, consumers wouldn’t stand for those costs being passed along to them. So, if they hire Americans at decent wages, it comes straight out of their profits.
Some who used to be against immigration now sell it politically as a symbol of American opportunity. And it’s no wonder why. It’s not an opportunity for people so much as it is corporate opportunism. If America is still the land of opportunity for immigrants, it is just barely. When America was a land of milk and honey, we were right to welcome them all. We’re no longer a land of opportunity and prosperity for all. Instead, we’re largely limited to what the wealthiest among us allow us to have after they decide how much to keep for themselves.
Current dogma on immigration says that immigration only makes us stronger, but that largely depends on one’s definition of “stronger”. The business world has a good supply of recent immigrants who are willing to work for less than their American counterparts and, no-doubt, some view this as a strength. But we’re only the 5th most competitive country now (1.Switzerland, 2.Singapore, 3.Sweden, 4.Finland) [Source: World Economic Forum] Perhaps immigrants looking for a better life have better choices than the United States. Immigrants used to come here because we had the most. Now they come here because we’re the most willing to give up our jobs.
The economy is much stronger for Americans during periods of worker shortages. We are in the midst of an upheaval, and hopeful that we can rearrange our system to be more equitable for everyone. We hope to persuade American businesses to re-begin behaving in ways that are good for America. Until we do, we need to stop enabling them by importing cheap labor and flooding the American job market with people who aren’t Americans.
If this country ever again becomes a land of milk and honey, opportunity and upward mobility for all, then we should once again use our wealth for the betterment of others by allowing people to come here and share in that opportunity. But that is not currently the case, and we should put things on hold until we can re-tune our system.
Read more Radical Ideas.
12 Sarcastic Predictions for 2012
- The obesity epidemic ends - On January first, 132 million Americans made New Year’s resolutions to lose weight, and this year they’ll be keeping them. Grocery stores will sell out of fruits and vegetables, Health Clubs will begin hiring bouncers, and your Weight Watchers meetings will look like a Black Keys concert with general admission seating. Ben & Jerry are discovered in an apparent murder/suicide.
- Cable news short circuits – One day this year Pat Robertson will get caught having sex with Bruce Jenner in the back of Rick Perry’s campaign bus and TV cable boxes will catch fire in living rooms all across the nation. The FCC will have to declare cable news a fire hazard, require networks to cover more than one story per day and mandate that news actually be news.
- Fox News changes its business plan – Convinced their viewers will buy anything, Fox News morphs into a home shopping network. “Fox News” soon becomes shorthand for a diet drug and penis enlargement empire. “It was right under our noses all along”, declares Bill Ayers “These people can be convinced of anything!”
- Republicans are finished – Between opposing the payroll tax cut and nearly shutting down the government to protect tax breaks for private jets, the American people have had it. Republicans will never win another election. No longer will people vote against their own best interests just because Republicans mention “God” more often or because gay people give them the willies.
- The 1% give up – The 1% begin regretting the day they were born. They’re sorry they ever messed with us and promise to trim their stock portfolios and, instead, start giving Christmas bonuses again. They decide to just go enjoy their riches and sail their yachts out into international waters where they stay out of politics entirely.
- Obama loses his temper – Tired of not being able to have a bowel movement without Republican obstruction, President Obama finally loses his shit, ending his State of the Union Address with ”Ya’all can go suck it!”, and kicking over the podium while giving the finger. He installs Bernie Sanders as Attorney General with a recess appointment.
- Health insurers take up murder for hire – Health insurance companies discover that it’s cost effective to put contracts on the heads of people with pre-existing conditions. Bodies begin washing up on beaches, their pockets still full of statin drugs and asthma medication.
- The NRA will give up the act – In 2008 they said Obama would come and take your guns away, spurring the largest gun-buying spree in American history, but failing to prevent him from being elected. Now, after a half-hearted attempt at a “if-he-gets-re-elected-this-time-he-really-will-take-’em” campaign, they finally give up the ghost. “Oh, fuck it” Wayne LaPierre will be heard saying, “We never really gave a shit about gun rights – we were just a fund-raising scam for the Republicans all along. Oh, well, you got us. I guess we’ll have to go back to teaching gun safety and marksmanship like we did in the olden days.”
- There will be a marketing revolution – Some marketing genius will discover that it’s better to research what consumers want and give them that than it is to invent shit and convince people they need it. Cell phones will soon work if they’re dropped or gotten wet, and fast food restaurants will stop selling money orders and taking passport photos to move the lines along faster.
- Movie concessions will evolve even further – As ticket sales continue to fall, concession stands at movie theatres will begin to have such offerings as fresh lobster, sushi or sizzling fajitas served at your seat. Loan officers will be available at the customer service desk.
- Postal employees learn empathy – Faced with the prospect of losing their jobs without political support from the public, postal employees start pretending to care how long their lines are, sometimes even appearing to have a sense of urgency, or moving their bodies faster in attempt to gain public sympathy.
- America gets a raise - Rather than opening new operations in China, purchasing robots or enriching stockholders, American companies will use some of the cash they’ve been hording to provide value and give raises to the American consumers and employees who made them successful in the first place.
Take-Backsies – A Public “Oops” or New, Sinister, Type of PR?
First, it was Netflix that made the big “oops” of raising their prices and then being forced to back peddle after losing 800,000 customers. And they had the nerve to imply that all those customers had simply misunderstood what they were trying to do.
Next, Verizon had begun to implement a plan to charge its customers a $2 fee to pay their bills. These types of fees, by the way, are a perfect example of stealth inflation – something I like to rant about at length. (What Verizon was likely trying to do was herd people into another trap I’ve tried to familiarize my readers with, called “automatic payment”.)
Now, Verizon says it’s changed its mind about charging people the fee in response to customer outrage. And they had the nerve to try and make it sound like they were trying to do something good and it was the customers who blew it.
“At Verizon, we take great care to listen to our customers,” said Dan Mead, Verizon Wireless’ president and CEO, in a statement. “Based on their input, we believe the best path forward is to encourage customers to take advantage of the best and most efficient options, eliminating the need to institute the fee at this time.”
The decision to not implement the controversial fee came down “in response to customer feedback about the plan, which was designed to improve the efficiency of those transactions,” Verizon said in the statement.
Something funny is afoot! What is this, all of a sudden, with companies trying to get away with something, and then when it spurs outrage, acting like they should get credit for stopping whatever it was? Is this some new, sick, kind of PR?
Notice no one ever gets fired over these big, oopsies. That’s because it wasn’t a mistake so much as that they got caught.
Or, if I were to be really cynical (and I am) one could suppose these “we’re-sorry-see-we’re-really-listening” hooplas are occasionally, in fact, planned gimmicks – ones we’ll see more of in the future. Companies do benefit from such things; Coke-cola never sold as much Coke “Classic” as they did after they took New Coke off the market.
I’ve long known that business behavior gets worse as they see what each other are getting away with. Is this merely an extension of that trend? It’s easier to apologize than to ask permission? “Let’s try and sneak one by them, and if they notice and get angry, we’ll just apologize and make it look like their fault.”
It’s too soon to tell. The key, here is what happens next. No doubt, businesses are watching the results of Netflix’s and Verizon’s public apologies and trying to determine if there was a net gain or loss. The answer to that question determines how much more of it we see.
Radical Idea #5 : Require ballots to be paper and marked by hand
The notion that each State – even locality – can decide their own method for holding elections is ludicrous and rife with corruption. The Constitution should be Amended to forbid voting by electronic or mechanical means.
All the immediacy that was gained has now been lost due to voter irregularities and problems with electronic voting machines holding up the polls. When you consider that (except for mail-ins and early voting) we are able to get half the population of the United States herded through polling locations in one day, surely we can count those votes in less time. Is the following afternoon really too long to wait for the results? The immediacy of knowing who won the night of the election is unnecessary, especially since, due to election tampering and irregularities, it is often not possible. Electronic – even mechanical – methods of voting only lead to irregularities and facilitate tampering.
A ballot should be as simple as a card with check boxes which are marked by hand.
Question 10 for the reformed HR pro
I know you’re a union supporter and that it’s a big part of why you’re no longer in this horrid business. It’s amazing that so many regular joes hate unions when they themselves are the victims of the deunionization of America. So many people have forgotten that unions created the 40-hour work week, the weekend, and are responsible for time-and-a-half pay for overtime, among many other things. Is there any way back? And if so, how?
- Answers over at Progressive Underpants.
Republicans Use Untestable Ideology as Marketing Ploy
The thing about Republican ideology is that it’ll never be tested. We’re not going to arrest judges for handing down unpopular decisions. We’re not going to put school children to work cleaning toilets in their own schools. We’re not going to get rid of the Environmental Protection Agency.
And they know it.
And knowing that helps them cling to these crazy ideas. Untestable ideas make great marketing tools.
The inability to test ideology helps people hold onto that ideology. Whether it’s religion or economic theory, it’s easier to believe something to be true when it can never be tested.
Religion is the obvious one, and not worth elaborating on (though theremoval of the separation of church and state could be interesting), but, too, nobody will ever allow crazy conservatives to test some of their economic theories.
But, golly, does it work in a Republican Primary.
The real trick is to get the general electorate to forget all that crazy shit once you’re the Republican nominee. I can’t wait to see how that works out.
Don’t Fall for Price Matching Cons!
I’ve noticed that a lot of companies are advertising price matching guarantees this holiday season. Please, don’t fall for them.
Way back in the olden days when your local auto mechanic would tell you he would match what his competitor charged, he meant it. It was because he needed the businesses and the only way he knew if his prices were truly competitive was if his customers told him so.
Big business doesn’t work that way. Especially these days.
Like your insurance company who will send an investigator to your house to figure out how to get out of paying for a house fire, a retail store will immediately begin building a case against your price-matching claim. Perhaps it’s not precisely the same model number. Maybe the competitor didn’t have it in stock. They may point out that they have a free widget, coupon or upgrade they’re giving away with the purchase that, to them, counts as beating the price. Is it from a warehouse club? It doesn’t count. Limited Quantities? It doesn’t count. Is the competitor too far away? Did you find it on the internet?
Their employees aren’t taught how to match prices, they’re trained how not to.
Also, keep in mind, that huge companies like Walmart have many products manufactured ESPECIALLY FOR THEM and matching products DO NOT EXIST elsewhere in the marketplace.
They don’t intend to do ANY price matching. It’s a con.
Their motive is to get you into their store where they can try to convince you to buy their model or something else entirely. Or – and even more likely – they’re counting on the inertia of you already being in your store causing you to just buy your widget there.
Besides, they know exactly what their competitors are charging for things. If they wanted to lower their prices below their competitors’, they would.
Do yourself a favor, opt out of the con by doing your own research. Buy the cheapest one you find and avoid the heartburn of trying to convince some middle manager at a retail store to honor their “guarantee.”
Why Does the US Media Spread North Korean Propaganda?
US media fails to call out crocodile tears
Of the things our media is guilty of, the absence of critical thought, the failure to report obvious facts as facts, and parroting what they’re told has to be the worst of them.
They say, “The House voted down the payroll tax cut” instead of “Republicans in the House voted down the payroll tax cut.”
They’ll say something “Failed to pass the Senate” instead of “Republicans in the Senate fillibustered…”
During the early years of the Iraq War the media couldn’t simply report the fact that WMDs weren’t found without splitting the screen and placing some rightwing hackjob on one side to froth at the mouth and spew bile at liberals.
Now I’m not one for hyperbole (ok, maybe a little) but the US media spent yesterday spreading communist propaganda.
Every media outlet yesterday broadcast footage of North Koreans FAKE-crying in the streets over Kim Jong Il’s death. And every one of them described it as they were airing it as “North Koreans crying in the streets” (except for a two-minute exchange between a skeptical Dylan Ratagan and Andrea Mitchell on MSNBC during the mid-day news few people saw – one of them described them as “crying on cue”).
It should have been obvious to everyone that these people were fake crying because they were expected to by an oppressive regime. These people live in fear of their government and know better than to even be suspected of happiness over Kim Jong’s death.
Keep in mind, we didn’t have reporters over there shooting this footage and talking to people asking them why they were crying. (Reporters aren’t allowed in.) This is what was sent to us by the North Korean government (a fact which also went unmentioned) and, as with all things that the North Korean state-run media does, it was designed to present the North Korean government in the best possible light.
So, let me spell it out for you:
Our media broadcast propaganda to us that was given to them by North Korea without applying any critical thought whatsoever.
5 Ulterior Motives of Your Health Savings Account Administrator
It’s that time of year again. You can hear the music all around you and feel the chill in the air. It’s time for your health savings administrator to receive the gift of whatever’s leftover in your account.
When I first started using a health savings account, more than ten years ago, the plan was administered by a small local company that was separate from my health insurance provider. They were easy to deal with and relatively transparent. They were quick. Customer service was excellent. In fact, the second year I used it they came out with a neat debit card that was attached to my account. It allowed me to simply swipe the card to pay for medical expenses and prescriptions rather than filling out forms and FAXing them in.
Now, ten years later, things are much different. Like so many things these days, big business has figured out ways to use the system to their advantage, and we have to be very, very careful not to fall for their tricks and become victims of their tactics.
Before we begin, there are two important points to always remember: First, the administrator of the health savings account gets to keep what ever is left unclaimed in the account at the end of the plan year. They make their money by not giving you yours. Second, your health insurance company’s top priority is to avoid paying claims. They also make their money by not giving you yours.
The following are five ways that big business is using the system designed so you could pay your health expenses tax free, as a profit-boosting opportunity for themselves:
- Your health savings account and insurer are under one roof. What I’ve been seeing lately is that the health savings account administrator and the health insurer are now, very frequently, the same company. I believe this is by design. It benefits them to have control of both, to link those accounts together, and to keep you as much in the dark as possible as to the details of how they operate.
- Out of sight, out of mind. Previously, any amount not paid by your insurance company was billed to you. You would receive something in the mail explaining what they didn’t pay for, how much they didn’t pay, and what you owe. If you disagreed with their decision to not cover something, you’d make a fuss – be a thorn in their side. Now, they simply take what they don’t pay out of the health savings account you gave them access to when you signed up for one. (All the while, advertising it as a convenience to you.) The idea is to make it easier for them to get their money, and harder for you to get yours.
- They don’t volunteer any information. ”Paperless statements” is a good way for them to avoid advertising to you that they didn’t cover something. Insurers are able to keep your “Explanation of Benefits” (which they are now required by law to provide you with) hidden on their website by making the default setting “paperless” and placing it a few clicks away from where you see transactions. You can see that they only paid part of a claim. If you want to know why, you have to go hunt for it.
- Debit cards are a rarity. The debit cards were nice, and when health savings administrators were small companies with competition, these cards were a good way to compete on customer service. Now that they’re run by huge insurance companies without much competition, and customer service is no longer a big motivation, these cards are becoming a rarity. The new motivation is to make it more difficult for you to make withdrawals, not less. The more difficult and complicated they make it for you to get your money out, the more likely some of it will sill be there on January 1st when it becomes theirs.
- Surly customer service in December. Contact customer service in December and you will be disappointed or even bullied. I have no doubt there are incentives for customer service people to behave in ways that helps you leave money in your account versus getting it back. My customer service person spoke to me in a way that said follow-up questions would not be welcome. December is also a great time to shorten hours and close up shop for many days. The more uncooperative and uncommunicative a health savings account administrator is in December, the harder it is for you to get every last drop of your money out of your account.
What you can do about it:
Make sure your preferences are set up on the website so you’re getting paper statements and your Explanation of Benefits in the mail each time so you can keep track of what they’re paying and what they’re not.
Find and turn off the “automatic payment” setting so the insurance company has to bill you for whatever they don’t cover. You’ll have to pay the bills and then FAX in the claim to get the money out of your health savings account, but at least you’ll be aware of what you’re paying for.
Be persistent and don’t allow yourself to be bullied in December when when a little bit of uncooperativeness on their part makes them a lot of money.
And if your employer had your interests at heart at all when it made whatever deal it did with the gargantuan health insurance company, there’s a good chance that part of the deal was to allow you a “grace period” to get your money out of your account. You may have until sometime in March or April. This will not be advertised by the administrator (they’d rather you didn’t know). You will likely only be able to find out if you have this grace period and what the date is through your employer.
Buy something you don’t need. Go get a checkup. Have a cholesterol test done. Purchase extra prescription medication. Ask the doctor to write you a prescription for vitamins or some other over-the-counter product (You are no longer allowed to purchase over-the-counter products on your HSA unless you have a prescription for it from your doctor.). Spend it on anything, as long as you’re getting it, and your administrator doesn’t get to keep your money.
Put less money in next year. Better you run out and lose a little bit of that tax savings than to put in too much and basically throw money away at the end of the year for nothing in return.
Finally, if you feel your HSA administrator is corrupt and up to no good, you can find your own next year. This is a system supported by the federal government and you don’t have to use the service your employer or health insurance provider prefers.
Question 9 for the reformed HR pro
What happened to benefits? Remember Christmas bonuses? Remember when employers matched 401K contributions at 100%? Remember when sick time and vacation time were separate things? I’ve expended barrels of ink talking about benefit erosion. I used to think it was just because employers were cheap and, now with higher unemployment, they simply don’t have to give as much. But is it worse than that? Is there something more sinister at play? Are they trying to change employment culture so that benefits are a thing of the past? Where do our benefits go and will they ever come back?
- Answers over at Progressive Underpants.
Radical Idea #4 : Allow businesses to deduct payroll
Stop allowing businesses to write off investments. Allowing businesses to take a deduction when they purchase machines, robots and technology is costing Americans jobs.
Businesses will still purchase these items because they increase efficiency and production; stop giving companies a tax incentive to buy something they already need.
Instead, allow businesses to deduct their payroll costs. This would encourage them to hire someone to do a job rather than purchasing a machine to do it. It would encourage businesses to pay higher wages and keep jobs in America (assuming we don’t allow them to deduct what they outsource). It would discourage the laying off of workers as a first resort during economic downturns. It would cause employers to place a greater value on their employees.
No business should have to pay taxes on the Americans they employ.
Read more Radical Ideas.
Question 8 for the reformed HR pro
I’ve long felt that corporate behavior gets progressively worse as businesses see what other businesses are getting away with and try it for themselves. But how proactive is it? Is it simply, “I heard of a policy another business had where….” or are there actual conventions and consulting firms that help this information get around?
- Answers over at Progressive Underpants.
Question 7 for the reformed HR pro
I’ve noticed over the years that non-compete agreements have gone from simple protections designed to keep departing employees from taking customers with them, to what’s become elaborate masterpieces of legalese that prevent a departing employee from working in the same industry within a distance of a hundred miles or for up to a year and a half or both. I believe it’s a tactic for keeping salaries down because the employer won’t have to compete with another who might pay their people a little better. My question is, if an employer was really interested in me, could I take their non-compete and start drawing lines through the parts I didn’t like before I signed it? I guess what I’m saying is, are these non-compete/employee agreements negotiable?
- Answers over at Progressive Underpants.
Question 6 for the reformed HR pro
I just listened to an interesting podcast about corporate “thought conformity” (a phrase I’d never heard before, but I now love). The point of the podcast was that managers and higher-ups actually prefer independent thinkers who challenge the status quo instead of conformists and yes-men. While on a personal, visceral level, I’m sure it’s true that human beings prefer other human beings who think for themselves, but how does that comport with being a “team player”?
- Answers over at Progressive Underpants.
Coke’s Polar Bear Scam
I’ve been seeing a corporate charitable giving marketing scam becoming more and more popular with companies right before my eyes.
It used to be that a company would do “giving” marketing campaigns that said something like “Ten cents for every bottle sold will be donated to X charity!” And it was a good way to get people to buy their products because consumers were buying something with the 
knowledge that part of their money was going to charity.
But, lately, companies have taken that concept and turned it on its head. I first noticed it when Dawn claimed to be donating money to clean up oil spills but, upon close inspection of the bottle, they were only doing it if you typed the code from the bottle into their web page. How many people do you suppose did that? But I’m sure they benefited from being the only bottle of dish detergent on the shelf with pictures of baby seals on it and claims of helping wildlife.
Companies are no longer simply donate money like they used to. Oh, sure, they make it look that way with fancy packaging that SAYS they are, but it rarely happens automatically. Now, YOU have to do something to activate that donation.
Or worse.
Sometimes they’re not donating at all, but merely providing an avenue for YOU to donate.
Presumably, this is all so the company gains the benefit of appearing to be charitable while actually giving much, much less than they would if they were simply giving proceeds from each unit sold. (What percentage of people who bought that Dawn bottle went to the website to activate that donation?)
So, here comes Coke this year, all dressed up like they’re donating money from each can sold to save the polar bears. But they’re actually dressed up to ask YOU to donate. Oh, golly-gee, isn’t that swell? A multi-billion dollar corporation is making it easier for US to donate! How nice of them! Oh, sure, they’ll match your donation*, but only if you go first! It must be nice for them to be able to bask in the PR of appearing to be so much more generous than they actually are.
So, I have an idea for all you multi-billion dollar companies out there: Why don’t you actually do something really charitable with some of that money instead of creating sophisticated marketing campaigns to get other people to do the donating for you while you lap up the PR of appearing altruistic. I’ll do my charitable giving and you do yours. And when you can start doing yours again without attaching disclaimers and caveats, maybe I’ll start buying your products because of it.
*But they stop after a million people do it, so it’s entirely possible that Coke’s CUSTOMERS will, in fact, donate more money than the Coca-Cola company actually does.
GOP truth is stranger than Muppet fiction
I made this tweet the night I saw The Muppets as a gag:
Oh, it’s too bad (but so funny) that it turned out to be true:
