
Whole Foods to cut health-care benefits for 1,900 part-time employees in 2020 - us0r
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/12/whole-foods-to-cut-healthcare-for-1900-part-time-employees-in-2020.html
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StudentStuff
Amazon is deadset on abusing their workers as much as possible to make a buck.

Wether its the intern turning a spec into code, then getting verbally lashed
for 3 hours for not "being creative", or demanding 50+ hour weeks out of
engineers on Amazon's Payments team.

No one should be so scared that they work an extra 12hrs on Saturday and
another 6 on Sunday, but that seems to be SOP for certain employees in some
departments of Amazon :c

~~~
natalyarostova
Yeah I need to find a new team or company. I just did a 12 hour day, while
sick. Never ending deadlines and high turnover... to be fair, my team used to
be really fun. Things just changed.

~~~
pojzon
Not things. Management or "vision".. bleh

~~~
fuzz4lyfe
If you are around my age (25 - 30) this is the only time in your working life
unemployment was at a level that is in your favor. Use that leverage and use
it fast.

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rayiner
> “In order to better meet the needs of our business and create a more
> equitable and efficient scheduling model, we are moving to a single-tier
> part-time structure,” a company spokesperson said in an email. “We are
> providing Team Members with resources to find alternative healthcare
> coverage options, or to explore full-time, healthcare-eligible positions
> starting at 30 hours per week. All Whole Foods Market Team Members continue
> to receive employment benefits including a 20% in-store discount.”

How can you write this stuff with a straight face.

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masonic
The Obamacare subsidies drive this.

Let's say a given employees health insurance coverage costs Amazon $5,000 a
year to provide. If the employee was to purchase the same level of coverage on
his or her own from a subsidized exchange, let's say it costs the employee
$3,000 in out-of-pocket premiums. Amazon could then pay the employee less
overall while apportioning $4,000 more to wages, and thereby both Amazon and
the employee benefit... at the expense of other taxpayers, of course.

~~~
disabled
True, but the ACA is likely going away next summer, either partially or
completely. This is based on the 9 or so rare cases where the Solicitor
General did not act as defendants on a court case at the Supreme Court level.
[See the table on pages 58-60. Note: there are better ways to represent the
data in the table.]:
[https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2...](https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2298&context=facpubs)

Do not get excited about the first 2 cases in the table being "clearly
unconstitutional". Because to diehard conservatives (which is how the court is
currently balanced), the healthcare law is "blatantly unconstitutional".

Not only that, this summer, at the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals level (the
level right below the Supreme Court), the Department of Justice did an
unprecedented move, historically, and joined the side of the plaintiffs.
According to legal experts, the court case at this level could not have gone
any worse for the defendants of the ACA.

The Republicans are doing this on purpose, as the final decision will come
months before an election.

I have a rare disease and I require an extremely expensive orphan drug, so I
know I am likely going to be in a bind within the next year. It is extremely
upsetting to me, which is why I mention it. But, I am a dual national (I
naturalized due to my health issues) of another developed country with
universal healthcare, so I can always leave the US. I have basically given up
the prospect of the US being my "home", even though it always has been. I
basically feel unwelcome here, but it is merely my perception.

~~~
weaksauce
sorry to hear that... this is what i don't get about republicans. they could
go for m4a or something similar and brand it as a win for entrepreneurship but
i guess they are too beholden to the huge corporations that donate to their
campaigns, pacs, and super pacs to ever go against that. the number of people
that are stuck in deadend jobs just for the somewhat more affordable
healthcare is too high.

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kerng
It will be interesting to see how this changes interactions between Amazon
employees and impacted Whole Foods workers in downtown Seattle.

For their warehouses most employees are shielded away but with Whole Foods
it's different. Amazon employees go there every day in the thousands. So, I'd
imagine some kind of compassionate move by employees will occur in Seattle.

Or employees just stop going to avoid the awkwardness, and use delivery... we
will see.

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thatfrenchguy
This employer-gives-you-healthcare madness really needs to stop.

~~~
lolsal
Employers providing healthcare is a part of the compensation package though,
right? Couldn't people buy insurance by themselves if they wanted?

~~~
Clubber
Yes, but I have a healthy family and the shittiest, pay nothing insurance
would cost $1700 a month and growing. That's more than I pay for my mortgage.
So it's true I could buy insurance if I wanted, but it's financially crippling
and you get almost nothing for it.

It's a complete and utter scam.

Bernie Sanders recently asked people on Twitter what their most absurd medical
bills were and the response was enlightening as to the current health care
status in the US:

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/2019/09/17/bernie-
sand...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucelee/2019/09/17/bernie-sanders-what-
was-your-most-absurd-medical-bill-here-is-the-response/#46bc5a691696)

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raymondh
If health care cost continue growing faster than inflation, we will see many
more articles like this.

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dmode
First "gig" economy and now this ? We need universal healthcare, like
yesterday. Let's not be bonded to corporations to take care of our health.

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sundayedition
The 20% employee discount must certainly help. That almost evens out the
markup on all their products over regular grocery store prices.

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lancelot20
This is just terrible system. They barely make anything and yet no benefits.
Sometime it is best just to stay unemployed and let the government take care
of them.

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throwaway2048
This is the part that is so screwed up about there not being a universal
public option in the USA.

A universal public option already exists!, you just have to quit your job, and
sell your house, and with a chronic condition remain completely destitute for
the rest of your life.

How does that situation benefit anyone? Why not just let people work, have a
life, and contribute to society, rather than demanding they remain poor for
the grave sin of having medical issues.

~~~
minniser
I have a strange gut condition in which my doctor agrees with me that having a
job that pays me would be very good for my health, possibly allowing me to
actually heal, but I cannot lose my health insurance because without my
medication I cannot digest any food.

The physical problems all began during depression from losing my job, and
symptoms often subside when I do volunteer work or help family members with
things and just feel useful. But it has been 2 years and I have not found
another job that will give me health insurance. I can get freelance work
sometimes so that is helpful and hopeful, but I actually have to be very
careful not to make so much that I lose health insurance. This makes me very
useless and unable to contribute to my family who has helped me out so much in
this time. It is a constant misery, yet I am a tremendously able worker who
loves to work, even very long hours.

I am not sure how legal it is for me to even have health insurance, but I have
no shame either way. That would be laughable to worry about for anybody in my
situation.

Working hard in American has never been materially appreciated in my
experiences. This country is completely broken. You only want dishonest people
who say and act in ways ways that make you feel happy. No respect for human
dignity. Everything is salesmanship, and value is a measure of abstract
emotional signaling. What should we expect? It is hardly ironic. It’s what
this society has been asking for as long as I have been alive.

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skinnymuch
I assume you know this. Have an LLC in a trusted person’s name and ask to be
paid via that and use the LLC tax ID when freelancing.

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eee_honda
What is the net benefit of classifying as an employee of this LLC?

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BubRoss
What's crazy is the benefits cut was supposed to be here last Sunday but
Amazon hid the fact that it was coming from a warehouse in China.

