Surviving Capitalism, part ??

neo_mao

neo_mao

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oof stories like this are far too commonplace and one of the big nightmares of corporate America. Hope you land on your feet soon buddy with something better...that sounded like a terrible place to work and ultimately would have hurt you in other ways even if you were still there.

Also your former "friend" is a piece of shit.
 
skate323k137

skate323k137

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promking said:
My wife is disabled, she has a rare autoimmune disease, well technically diseases now. I get it.
I had my wife on my family plan with Trinet, and ADP... They both raised my rates so high and said ( someone is sick on your plan )... They couldn't drop me.. But they did raise my rates so high it wasn't even feasible.
I have her on the marketplace now for the past 7 years, and we've had good luck. Granted I pay like $850 dollars a month for her plan.... Which is $1300 deductible and $9500 out of pocket max... But one dose of her IVIG infusions cost over 100k. So we meet the out of pocket maximum by Feb every year.
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Yea it's autoimmune on the wife's side, which in America statistically takes 5 doctors over 5 years to get diagnosed right. Like you can look that up, it's insane. My sentiment is definitely along th lines of one of my trademark quotes regarding life and trauma; "I am sorry you understand." On a high deductible plan we out of pocket maxed by March some years.

neo_mao said:
oof stories like this are far too commonplace and one of the big nightmares of corporate America. Hope you land on your feet soon buddy with something better...that sounded like a terrible place to work and ultimately would have hurt you in other ways even if you were still there.

Also your former "friend" is a piece of shit.
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For real; health care aside I could be self employed but it has always been one of the last major hurdles, that and insurance/bonding etc.

It's sad but yea, he's a POS. I helped him get out from under an abusive boss when we worked together in web hosting. For him to throw me under one is insane.
 
sirlynxalot

sirlynxalot

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Ugh I'm sorry to hear this. If you were a w2 employee rather than a contractor, do you get a severance since they terminated you rather than you quitting? Would your employer before this one take you back -that might be a path of least resistance to get the money coming in sooner than later if you still have some good contacts there?

At my large corporate employer, we've had a number of people leave for other opportunities and then come back in a year or two because things were shitty at the new place. Hell, my employer laid off a guy (just as part of annual layoffs, not like he did anything highly unusual or objectionable) and then rehired him a year later in a different department/new role.
 
skate323k137

skate323k137

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Neodogg said:
so...if he got a WFH job with a European company...how would insurance work?
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It was. Well, the main company is European, and those guys get plenty of vacation. The North American / US branch preached that culture and created a false sense of security, then acted like any other US corp.

I would love working remote for a European company that actually acted like it.
 
skate323k137

skate323k137

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sirlynxalot said:
Ugh I'm sorry to hear this. If you were a w2 employee rather than a contractor, do you get a severance since they terminated you rather than you quitting?
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I have to sue for it, and can't threaten to until June. I did get qualified for unemployment despite their protest I was terminated for misconduct/performance, because under MI law you cannot do that without a real PIP. Part of why I knew my boss was so shady with borderline meetings that a court might consider a performance discussion. Unemployment did not buy it, and sided with me in writing that I was not purposely "not meeting expectations" and was not given a PIP or proper guidance. This qualifies me for unemployment, and helps my discrimination case, but again I can't start that until June. Realistically I'll sue for a few months pay and insurance as severance, but also, probably intentional emotional suffering at this point too. There's been plenty of that to say the least, between HR yelling at me and an RN lying to me.
 
skate323k137

skate323k137

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I actually had a promising interview today. It will be a lifestyle change (read, some reduction in income) if I take it, but not an unwelcome one. The hourly is decent, the work is something I'm really knowledgeable in, and it's a defined goal. The hiring managers history looks much better than my last one, it looks like he understands tech and worked his way up based on his titles and job history.

The hitch is, it's no overtime and I'd end up taking a ~30% pay cut at the max hourly, which to be fair they are offering for my experience. This actually would not be the first time I took a 30-40 percent cut in income to get overtime out of my life. And the last time, it got me off the road and ladder (from cable installer to linux admin). I wasn't doing a ton of OT at my last job, but it felt like it with the toxic environment, worse than 50-60 hour weeks doing cable. And my wife had to point out I was taking less and less breaks, and working later and later toward the end with this job anyway.

When it comes to the new offer, which I am very hopeful for, the pay is actually fair for the task at hand. The fact that it's less than my old salary is simply a fact of the matter and nothing negative about the offer; I'll look at the positive of knowing I don't have OT. That's not too difficult :)
 
skate323k137

skate323k137

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Neodogg said:
Great news! You have to start somewhere, hope it works out.
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Edit:

Big facts. We're doing our best to rebuild, and I can't thank you dudes enough for the support.

A job I can mentally handle and leave bandwidth for the family will be important, especially since we have taken so many consecutive hits. I budgeted for all the emergencies I could, and we are still in this. In 5 years we have:

- Replaced a nice furnace that died due to the first owner removing literally 80 percent of the cold air intakes by volume (pcbs fried). It was well in its serviceable life but died in the middle of winter at a cost of 60 percent of a new one and more days to repair. We got the new furnace.

- Replaced the hot water heater with a new one, upward vented like the old, because it was definitely leaking and dead.

- Fixed at least 3 gas leaks

- Got quoted impossibly low on the roof, and still did it actually right. The last homeowner, with legality literally depending on what year he had it done, added a 3rd layer of shingles on the roof. The bottom layer was trimmed back to look like 2 (legal). Its not legal to go past 2 layers anymore because the plywood is Swiss cheese at that point from the number of nails. Add a full layer of lumber.

- While the roof was being done, literally during, we had to bring the chimney up to code, because the last owner raw dogged a natural gas exhaust pipe into the chimney from the basement. The chimney had to be entirely lined, or we could get a different style water heater. Guess who just paid off his new 50 gallon water heater. No other answers for hot water / not dying from monoxode, and passing an inspection is good too.

- Had to install gutters and waterproof the basement

With any luck at all this was a lot more like a 10 year plan but when your roof is leaking, that's about as literal as it gets for cashing in the rainy day fund. We found that leak returning from the one vacation out of state we managed in years.

Thanks to someone here for offering to pay a small bill, it definitely made a big difference in our spirit over here. I know a lot of people are having tough times right now so the help is appreciated. I've still got some real short term problems to solve, but it's definitely taking stuff a day at a time.
 
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skate323k137

skate323k137

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Trudging forward. Mixed feelings all around, but still very hopeful for the opportunity at hand.

At a certain point I had to rid what was left of my pride and ask for help, and it's helped. I suppose I should not refuse it; If and only if you are actually in a position to help me out a little bit, I took the sign of 'make a donation link' from the universe in my paypal and made one. it doesn't look like I have to pay fees on it, it's just helping us get by till June.

https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=A6XA4ZMVNREEY
 
100proof

100proof

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Pulling for ya, bruv. I'm not a religious person or even someone who believes in karma but the way you treat others does tend to reverberate. Whether it's cranky old farts on Web 1.0 forums buying you dinner or getting jobs from networking/good recommendations/etc., not being a piece of shit does tend to get rewarded in one way or another.
 
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