Coronavirus/Economy/Stock Market

[Coronita]

So……Here’s something funny that happened at work. We had to furlow some people at work for 1/day per week back in end of March, or reduce their hours by 8hours/week, just because some of our customers postponed their purchasing decision for about 3 months, and because our senior execs wanted to be careful about a prolonged economic downturn.

Originally a bunch of people that were furlowed for one day/week were all upset…But after folks started putting their heads together, all the sudden they were happy to be furlowed that 1 day/week.

Why? Simple… People were paid more by current UI benefits than they made if they worked that 5th day, even engineers and product managers. Let me explain.

Right now for CA employees, there are two unemployment benefits
1. California Benefit: Up to $450/week for reduced hours. This portion is capped, based on how much your income was reduced by

2. Federal Benefit: $600/week for reduced hours. This is a lump sum payment, and it doesn’t matter if your earnings were reduced by $10000/week , $1000/wk, or $10/week. You get $600/week for any reduced earnings.

So in CA, a person is eligible for $1050/week, $600 is guaranteed, $450 is capped by your reduction in weekly income.

Fast forward to engineers/product managers/etc that were furlowed for 1 day…. Engineers/product managers/etc don’t typically make $1050 per day. But they typically make more than $450/day. So they get the entire state benefit (that would have been salaried capped)…And they also get the $600 lump sum federal benefit.

So basically, for those folks that were furlowed for 1 day, they were paid $1050 by both federal/state UI benefits, more than they earned if they worked that day as an engineer or product manager. Lol.

The problem is, now that we got a lot of customers that suddenly want our product in June/July, all those furlowed people don’t want to get unfurlowed. They’d rather keep working with a 4/day work week until the 39 week UI benefits ends….I’m now hearing: “pick me, pick me. I want to get furlowed 1 day per week” ….If we need to do more 1-day furlows, I’m definitely volunteering…..I’ll take a 4 day work week while getting paid like a 5 day work week, any day.

So for some, not only did they not have an income reduction due to Coronavirus, they actually had an earnings increase due to Coronavirus.. Viva La United States of France… Lol.

[The-Shoveler]

Probably why Musk has to threatened to take UI benefits to get people back to work LOL.

Yea I think it will be extremely hard to get most furloughed to go back to work for the next few months.

Or to hire low wage employees.

[teaboy]

[quote=Coronita]So……Here’s something funny that happened at work. We had to furlow some people at work for 1/day per week back in end of March, or reduce their hours by 8hours/week[/quote]

Question.. are those employees exempt or hourly? If they’re exempt, why did your company have to cut their hours at all?

I’m exempt and my total pay was reduced by my company by 7%, without any formal reduction in my hours.

tb

[The-Shoveler]

You got to wonder if when the police etc… come in and force a shop to shut down, if they know that they are kind of shooting a hole in their own wallet.

[FlyerInHi]

[quote=The-Shoveler]really LOL, No it means they will move from their downtown condo to the burbs.[/quote]

Redfin’s CEO said that the searches are for smaller town like Boise, Madison or Charleston
People staying home don’t see the benefits of living in large expensive metros. He said to expect an exodus. That would be really bad for places like Seattle or San Diego.

We will see.

[Coronita]

[quote=teaboy][quote=Coronita]So……Here’s something funny that happened at work. We had to furlow some people at work for 1/day per week back in end of March, or reduce their hours by 8hours/week[/quote]

Question.. are those employees exempt or hourly? If they’re exempt, why did your company have to cut their hours at all?

I’m exempt and my total pay was reduced by my company by 7%, without any formal reduction in my hours.

tb[/quote]

It was done to both exempt and non exempt employees. For several of exempt employees, the hours were reduced to 32 hours/4 day work weeks, and consequently reducing pay by 20% (1 day of pay). SMT didn’t feel it was fair just to cut their pay and still continue to expect people to work the same hours (Me, in particular objected to this idea along with many others in the leadership team. Yes team, you’re welcome)… So we went to a 4 day work week in CA and in out of state offices for some of us. And 32 hours is the minimum to maintain a full-time status that would qualify for all the employee benefits medical/dental/vision/life/disability/etcetceetc for exempt employees without having to change the employee benefits. We thought this was the fairest way to handle things. And plus a few of us thought the state+federal government would eventually throw folks a bone and make up for the income shortfalls.

By actually reducing hours and pay, it would qualify the employer/employee under the the CA “Worksharing” program that our company applied and was approved for.

https://www.edd.ca.gov/unemployment/Work_Sharing_Program.htm

It was done to preempt a cash flow issue if more customers deferred their purchases or deferred paying us, some of which indicated they were skipping March – May (some that now have come back and said things will resume in June/July)….I guess our senior management team figured it was better to dump the problem onto the state/federal UI benefit program. And it turns out, at least for our CA employees, everyone seem to be getting more back from the state+federal UI insurance then if they were to be working the 5th day. Almost everyone is getting the full $1050/week, because the extra $600 from the federal government is not capped by income reduction, it’s all or nothing… So they are coming out ahead each week about $300-500 per week, because very few engineers and product managers make $1050/day, lol

So… Go from a 5 day to 4 day work week, get paid more for the 5th furlow day than work…And June/July timeframe, resume business as usual when PO’s start coming in (or if not, extend the furlow day until they do)…from an employee’s perspective, what is there to complain about again??? Nothing….. Lol

The only real problem is now that we got customer orders coming in and customers paying again, we actually need some people back right away, and trying to ask people volunteer to come back is getting slow traction… I don’t blame people.

It’s kinda funny. It’s not like we were trying to game the system. But sometimes, the system’s game just plays out in unexpected ways. Some people aren’t just doing as well, they actually are doing better , lol.

[Coronita]

Lol, so things get even weirder….Just in from todays SMT meeting….Since everyone has more or less been working from home/remotely since March, and generally things have worked out ok for us….SMT decided to further save money. We’re not renewing our commercial lease here in SD… We’re going to be 100% remote for the rest of this year. The rational is, we’ve done fine working from home, and maintaining an office in SD is expensive, and since god knows when the lockdown will end, we’re just paying rent for unused office when everyone is working from home. Our lease ends in May, and we pulled the plug on renewing.

Like I said, commericial RE is going to have big problem. REITs might be in trouble..

[svelte]

[quote=Coronita]Lol, so things get even weirder….Just in from todays SMT meeting….Since everyone has more or less been working from home/remotely since March, and generally things have worked out ok for us….SMT decided to further save money. We’re not renewing our commercial lease here in SD… We’re going to be 100% remote for the rest of this year. [/quote]

Wow.

But it does make sense.

However, probably the BIGGEST reason to do the above is not to save rent money – it is to minimize liability of COVID running rampant at the office. From what I’ve read companies aren’t too worried about being sued by their employees because there are limitations on that…what they are worried about is the employee getting it at the office and transmitting it to someone else who is not an employee who then in turn sues the company.

[Coronita]

[quote=svelte][quote=Coronita]Lol, so things get even weirder….Just in from todays SMT meeting….Since everyone has more or less been working from home/remotely since March, and generally things have worked out ok for us….SMT decided to further save money. We’re not renewing our commercial lease here in SD… We’re going to be 100% remote for the rest of this year. [/quote]

Wow.

But it does make sense.

However, probably the BIGGEST reason to do the above is not to save rent money – it is to minimize liability of COVID running rampant at the office. From what I’ve read companies aren’t too worried about being sued by their employees because there are limitations on that…what they are worried about is the employee getting it at the office and transmitting it to someone else who is not an employee who then in turn sues the company.[/quote]

Maybe.. I think our lease is around $15k/month. So maybe it’s a little of both. It’s not exactly the most expensive expense. There’s also a bunch of incidentals, like running a corporate network, utilities, office perks, keeping an office manager. It adds up. I think we’re going to be taking office furniture home and the office computer(s). I call shotgun on the foosball table and the beanbags

[scaredyclassic]

[quote=Coronita][quote=svelte][quote=Coronita]Lol, so things get even weirder….Just in from todays SMT meeting….Since everyone has more or less been working from home/remotely since March, and generally things have worked out ok for us….SMT decided to further save money. We’re not renewing our commercial lease here in SD… We’re going to be 100% remote for the rest of this year. [/quote]

Wow.

But it does make sense.

However, probably the BIGGEST reason to do the above is not to save rent money – it is to minimize liability of COVID running rampant at the office. From what I’ve read companies aren’t too worried about being sued by their employees because there are limitations on that…what they are worried about is the employee getting it at the office and transmitting it to someone else who is not an employee who then in turn sues the company.[/quote]

Maybe.. I think our lease is around $15k/month. So maybe it’s a little of both. It’s not exactly the most expensive expense. There’s also a bunch of incidentals, like running a corporate network, utilities, office perks, keeping an office manager. It adds up. I think we’re going to be taking office furniture home and the office computer(s). I call shotgun on the foosball table and the beanbags[/quote]

Very interesting.

Reminds me of that moment when everyone suddenly got rid of their landline

[Coronita]

Hey, so if I now dedicate an entire room to a home office, and since it’s now a workplace requirement to have a home office, I should be able to have some deductible home office expenses now, right?

Furniture, utilities (electricity, internet, cell phone), part of the cost of the home, for dedicating a home office room itself right?

https://www.hrblock.com/tax-center/filing/home-office-deductions-coronavirus/

You qualify for a home office deduction if you:

1. Use part of your home regularly and exclusively for work
2. Conduct the majority of business from your home office
3. Prove your home office is for the convenience of your employer
4. Refrain from renting any space of your home to your employer for work- related services.

Yes, yes, yes, and yes.

Lol. More covid financial benefits…

[The-Shoveler]

Permanent WFH comes up in every meeting we have.

Twitter and Dell have already made this policy.

[Coronita]

I just put in my request to my boss to see if I could be furlowed on Friday or Monday to save the company money. He didn’t understand why. I explained it to him. He still didn’t believe it. I explained it to him again. He then submitted my request to SMt and requested to be furlowed himself one day. His argument is not every SMT needs to be working 5 days. We will see what happens. I wouldn’t be surprised if every SMT ends up furlowing themselves for one day. There’s roughly 5-6 SMTs in CA, and they could alternate their furlow day so there is at is only 1 less SMT each day…. That’s around a $6000/week cost savings right there. For a big company, this isn’t a lot. For a small company, these small cost savings add up and could make a big difference if a customer continues to defer purchases or payments. No lease + 6000/month cost savings with very little hit to productivity at just one office location.
.. I’m such a troublemaker.

I do need to spend some time looking for replacement work…someone who would hire me exactly 1 day per week, paying me what I make for that 1 day/week for work.. um, ok I’ll try and ask. Wish me luck. lol. For the rest of my time during that furlow day, I’ll be restoring my cars. I have a $1050 budget for it, more than I originally had.lol.

Hey, SMT did ask people for ways to save the company money…This is one way. I’m a problem solver, and they paid me to think of solutions when problems arise.

Weren’t we taking about on another thread about taking a mortgage forbearance to save cash?

This is even better. Paid more to not work….To conserve company cash while not impacting workers…$4200/month of pay for not working for up to 39 weeks, assuming it doesn’t get extended which it most likely will.

Maybe some have it right. Maybe others should pay more taxes so some of us can get paid more for not working..Maybe I’ll vote for Harris after all, lol.

[outtamojo]

Amazing what you can get in an election year.

[FlyerInHi]

[quote=The-Shoveler]Permanent WFH comes up in every meeting we have.

Twitter and Dell have already made this policy.[/quote]

That’s going to be excellent for the digital nomad lifestyle. I like it.

[Author]

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