Yeah the job mobility angle of tying health insurance (and retirement accounts etc) to employers is something that doesn’t get enough discussion. It’s almost like the system is designed to keep employer’s thumb on the workers 🤔
The other angle is that it a much greater burden on small businesses to provide benefits than megacorps, so it is inherently anti small business
I’ve gotten around the “you must work for The Company for 3 years to be fully vested in your retirement” rule. The trick is to be laid off–generally, when you leave in a layoff they instantly vest your account. It’s worked for me twice so far.
Well, both times they were voluntary layoffs. The first company was going to lay off something ridiculous, like a third of the workforce, with overseas employees part of the denominator but not the numerator. The first round was voluntary and offered the best severance package, so that’s what I took. I was the newest employee in my group, so I figured the writing was on the wall.
The second time, my company’s (company A) contract wasn’t renewed. The company that did get the contract (B) offered to hire all the employees that were currently doing the work away from A. Otherwise the employee would be laid off from A.
I accepted the (crappy, effectively 30% pay cut) offer from B, got a better offer from C, then went back to B and said “thanks, but no thanks” about 2 months before the contract ended and the new one with B started. This meant that from A’s point of view A laid me off, which gave me a month of severance per A’s policy.
I’ve been complaining about this for years. My career is in the arts so we rely on my husband’s job for insurance. But what if something happened to him? My job doesn’t even offer insurance; even when I worked for a bigger nonprofit that did, it was crap insurance and expensive to boot because the company wasn’t big enough to get competitive rates.
I mean, it’s not designed for any of these things, but they’re"happy" little coincidences resulting from companies trying to skirt wage maximum laws during WWII.
Yeah the job mobility angle of tying health insurance (and retirement accounts etc) to employers is something that doesn’t get enough discussion. It’s almost like the system is designed to keep employer’s thumb on the workers 🤔
The other angle is that it a much greater burden on small businesses to provide benefits than megacorps, so it is inherently anti small business
I’ve gotten around the “you must work for The Company for 3 years to be fully vested in your retirement” rule. The trick is to be laid off–generally, when you leave in a layoff they instantly vest your account. It’s worked for me twice so far.
Still at the whim of the business, of course
Naturally.
How does one get “laid off” on purpose?
Well, both times they were voluntary layoffs. The first company was going to lay off something ridiculous, like a third of the workforce, with overseas employees part of the denominator but not the numerator. The first round was voluntary and offered the best severance package, so that’s what I took. I was the newest employee in my group, so I figured the writing was on the wall.
The second time, my company’s (company A) contract wasn’t renewed. The company that did get the contract (B) offered to hire all the employees that were currently doing the work away from A. Otherwise the employee would be laid off from A.
I accepted the (crappy, effectively 30% pay cut) offer from B, got a better offer from C, then went back to B and said “thanks, but no thanks” about 2 months before the contract ended and the new one with B started. This meant that from A’s point of view A laid me off, which gave me a month of severance per A’s policy.
I’ve been complaining about this for years. My career is in the arts so we rely on my husband’s job for insurance. But what if something happened to him? My job doesn’t even offer insurance; even when I worked for a bigger nonprofit that did, it was crap insurance and expensive to boot because the company wasn’t big enough to get competitive rates.
I mean, it’s not designed for any of these things, but they’re"happy" little coincidences resulting from companies trying to skirt wage maximum laws during WWII.
Was designed that way, simply evolved. But now that insurance is tied to employment, employers will never let that change.