Author: Rex Nipper

I don’t know if any of you have ever been out of work for any length of time, but let me tell you, that it sucks. You have many types of people out there, and you get to meet all of them when you’re looking for work. Some of the questions I get on interviews are just downright moronic. I mean, there are the general HR violations like “How old are you?” “Are you married?” “Do you have children?” “Do you believe in Jesus Christ?” Yes…I had that one. My answer: “Ah…a fellow Jew…of course I believe in him!” But these really don’t bother me as much as the general employment questions.

The other day I had an interview with a guy which basically ended up being an oral SAT exam. It had nothing to do with the job. He just wanted to know if I could regurgitate meaningless information. He would also ask me rediculous questions to see if I would try to answer them. He asked me “Have you ever developed a PMI?” What he wanted to know is if I knew what PMI stood for. It stands for Project Management Institute. You don’t develop it, you belong to it. The problem with this questioning style is it only proves that when you work for this person the only thing you can expect is obfuscation.  You will never get a direct answer from them.  Still…I need a job.  I will just keep it to myself that I think this guy is an idiot.  I can deal with any moron if the pay’s right.

When I moved back to Colorado after leaving ISU, I was amazed at the idiots I met in HR, and during interviews. I had a phone interview once with a woman at a company where she prefaced every question with “I’m being intentionally vague here.” And then she would get frustrated when I couldn’t provide a direct answer. At the end of the interview she asked me what I wanted in a manager. I said, “Someone who’s direct.” Needless to say, I didn’t get the job.

I had an interview six months ago with United Health Care. This was classic. They had been trying to fill this job for six months prior to meeting me. I had never had this happen before. My first and only interview was in a room with 17 people, and another three people on a speaker phone. I will openly admit that I love an audience. However, at that time, I was one of five people they were going to be interviewing for a management job. The only thing that kept popping into my head was the amount of time being wasted interviewing just me…and they had four more to interview. My first order of business would have been to end that type of interview process. Oh…and just in case you think this process might work, they’re still interviewing for the same position after…ONE YEAR! Something tells me they need a different system.

I have always thought HR should move back to a benefits role, and leave the job interviewing to the person that needs to fill the spot. When you ask someone that doesn’t work in the field to find a right fit for you, it never works. You can ask for a list of wants from someone, but if you don’t work in the field, you can’t understand that some skills are transferable. You drive a Ford? Sorry…we can’t hire you. We only have Chevys.

This doesn’t even get into the questions that some say interviewers should ask. These are the questions like “Tell me what is your greatest weakness?’ “Have you ever had to deal with a difficult situation?” Why do I have a problem with these questions? Because your answer has little to do with the information you provide. They just want to see how you handle the question. Your response is of little weight. It’s an oral personality test which tells someone nothing.

I also hate the personality tests. I have taken so many that I can now, with pretty good accuracy, provide the outcome I want from the test. Case and point…I can take a personality test which will indicate that I would make a great cold call salesman. I can tell you that I SUCK as a cold call salesman. An accurate review of any personality profile I’ve taken shows me to be quite introverted. However, I know how to answer the questions to get the outcome I want.

A close friend of mine holds multiple degrees in Psychology, Sociology and Statistics, and had developed personality tests for over a decade, providing research for the University of Colorado, IBM, Verizon. and many other private organizations. She is UBER SMART! She will tell you that these tests really don’t provide much insight by themselves. There are too many external factors which impact the test taker to provide adequate responses. Also, as she says, “an HR generalist is in no way, what so ever, even remotely, qualified to interperet results from such a test.” She had a lot more to say about that, but you get the point.

I, myself, have interviewed people for years in my career. I have found out one thing. If you want to really see if you can work with someone, then take them to lunch. Have a meal with them. Move away from the work place. Make it casual. Finding a co-worker is like finding a date. If they’re mean to the waiter, and nice to you, they’re not a nice person. This will tell you more than anything. If you like the person, you can work with them. Everything else can be taught. You can’t teach tact. You can’t teach civility. You can’t teach kindness this late in life. If they’re an asshole, then you can’t work with them. It’s that simple. I mean there are exceptions. Many idiots are nice people, but you can weed that out in a resume, and with a reference check. Or as I like to do, through untraditional channels like former co-workers, managers, etc. It’s a small world folks…someone knows someone, who knows you.

I will admit, I can be hard headed, stuborn, and sometimes abrupt. However, anyone who has ever worked with me will tell you that I’m fun, loyal, and a blast to work with (Michaela). I also will defend, and have defended, my people to the detriment to my own career.

How do you determine that in a personality test?

Rex

Oh, the healthcare debate. I just love listening to people talk that have absolutely no idea of the topic on which they speak. Since I haven’t been working, I spend my time watching CSPAN. I then go for comedy relief by watching FOX News, Glenn Beck, and the talking heads on the Sunday morning shows. It makes me wonder if they even listen to what they are saying. It truly is fascinating.

Before I go on however, I must provide full disclosure. I worked directly for the health insurance industry for 12 years (10 for Blue Cross Blue Shield, and 2 for Principal Healthcare). I have done research on health insurance issues for the State of Iowa, provided market research, and contracting services for several other companies. All in all I have over 20 years in the industry. Also, I am totally and completely for a national health insurance plan. I think we need to dismantle health insurance companies entirely, at least in their current form. And let’s be factual here. We’re not talking about healthcare in any way, shape, or form. The argument is health insurance, not healthcare. I have yet to see anyone, ANYONE, mention the actual cost for any health service, of any type. So where is this healthcare debate? I say if we are going to have one, then let’s have one. But really what we are discussing is health insurance, and the coverage of that insurance. If we were talking about healthcare reform, then we would be asking why when I go to the doctor without coverage it costs me $150.00 for a tetanus shot, but if I have insurance, they only pay $10.00 (It shouldn’t surprise anyone that the clinic makes a healthy profit even with the $10.00 option).

To begin with, proponents on the Hill have already lost the debate on the subject. They really should have gone after the health insurance companies, and coined it health insurance reform, and not healthcare reform. I guess they thought insurance companies wouldn’t notice. No one likes their premium payment. It’s no wonder however that people go bat shit stupid when you bring up the healthcare. Had they gone after the real culprit, instead of wimping out and talking about healthcare reform, then we wouldn’t be in this pickle. We would have reform. But legislators were more afraid of the health insurance lobby, than the AMA. So…there you go.

Opponents on the other hand are eyeball deep in the health insurance lobby. They know where they get their money, that’s for sure.

How we got here:

In the 19th century we had accident plans which basically covered you for injuries. If you had general health problems, you just paid the fee and went. By the 1920s hospitals started pre-paid plans which enabled you to get services in case you became ill. The fees were small, but if you went into the hospital, with say the flu, you didn’t have to come up with the cash all at once. By the 1950s companies started really sprouting up to take over the pre-paid plans, and just took premium payments as fees to cover accidents and illness.

In the 1970s, and maybe before, something happened. Insurance companies found that they were paying higher, and higher costs. Most, if not all the problems, stemmed from subscribers (plan holders) and care givers providing false and misleading information for coverage costs. Policyholders would have multiple policies and profited when they went to the doctor. Providers would hike costs, and add services so they could get a little more off the top.

Insurance companies, whose primary goals are to make money for their investors, found they needed to implement cost saving procedures to ensure their money was actually going to the care givers. Said providers were also losing money. Rather than being paid, the checks were going to the policyholders, and they weren’t getting a nickel. So over the course of a few years, they came up with a plan. Insurance companies would contact providers directly. And if providers agreed, payments would be made directly to them, at a lesser cost, but they would be guaranteed payment. At the time it was a great idea. Providers loved it since they no longer had to hunt down the people that owed them money. Insurance companies loved it because they could get a better handle on costs, and policyholders loved it since they didn’t have to deal with the hassle of paying the doctor. The people that didn’t love it were the ones ripping everyone off. But we don’t give a shit about them.

However, during that late 1970s and early 1980s, costs started rising again. Providers didn’t like the fact that their payments were being cut. So to combat this, they found ways around the system to ensure their payments were higher. Physicians and hospitals double-billed for services, or performed unneeded surgeries (True fact: in the 1970s it is estimated that 80 to 90 percent of all tonsillectomies, appendectomies, and hysterectomies were medically unnecessary). Today it is estimated that the total number of unnecessary medical procedures is around 60%.

To combat this, insurance companies started putting safeguards in place to ensure their money was being well spent. They created Managed Care, a nice way of saying that if you go into the hospital, and if I’m writing the check, I get to see, 1. If you are actually in the hospital, and 2. If what the insurance company is paying for is actually happening.

Providers didn’t like this one bit, but they like money better, so by 1985 we were off to the races. Each side, insurer, and provider, started battling it out to see who could make the most money. In the meantime, quality of care started to waiver, which brought in the lawyers for all sides. After that, it was Katie Block the Doors! In 1985, a 44 year old male could get a healthcare policy with no deductible for around $125.00 a month. You can’t get that policy today, but according to underwriters at Blue Cross of Iowa, the cost would be anywhere between $4000.00 and $6000.00 per month for the same coverage. With inflation at that rate, our current health insurance system is not sustainable.

The current plan.

From what I can gather, the current plan only puts some limitations on insurance companies from denying coverage. In addition, it forces people to pay for coverage who would otherwise not buy it. It’s nice in theory, but even I have a problem with forcing people to buy coverage. I think a public option that everyone will have needs to be on the table, and if you want more than the public option, you can buy your own coverage. Is this new? No. Medicare part A is hospital coverage, and everyone over 65 has it. If you want physician coverage for office visits you have to buy it. If you want drug coverage, you have to buy it. I have no problem with that. Provide a base, and then let others buy what they want after that.

Scare Tactics

Death panels. I love the death panel tactic. The bill states that if you are going to have a procedure that it will be reviewed for medical necessity. What gets played in the press and on conservative blogs is Death Panels. As if this review process is something new. Actually, as this article has shown, these reviews have been in place since the mid 1980s by EVERY INSURANCE COMPANY BAR NONE! The real scenario is not that we’re going to let grandpa die, but more that we’re not going to give grandpa a knee replacement if he lost both his legs in the war. That’s it. A more realistic example is that prostate cancer is a slow moving cancer…very slow. If you are 80 years old, and are diagnosed with a lesser form of prostate cancer, chances are you will die of old age long before the cancer becomes a problem. Why put you through chemo, surgery, and radiation therapy, which will definitely kill you, if there is no need? You might as well be happy, even if you pee a little slower.

Unrealistic documentation. I heard this when Managed Care started in the 80s. “Physicians now, and all of a sudden, have to start making notes to justify what they were doing.” This argument is bullshit! Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. Any medical student will tell you that providing quality care depends highly in part on how good you are at keeping medical records. If you don’t keep track, you might just cut off the left leg of the person who should lose the right leg. It’s happened…more than once. Not only that, what if your doctor croaks? I would hope someone could read my medical record and know that I’m a type B blood type and not a type A. You can’t ask the dead guy. Also, medical review is performed by hospitals as well. If the documentation isn’t there, then the least of their worries is the insurance company. Physicians lose jobs for sloppy record keeping. Currently, when procedures are denied, it is often due to poor documentation. More often than not, the provider will add the needed documentation to prove medical necessity. It’s a bogus argument.

Coverage will cost more. No…it won’t. There are so many hidden costs with healthcare that it’s hard to cover them all. A huge part of what we pay is in direct relation to others not paying for services they receive. Let me simplify it. If you have ten people in a group, and the coverage for the group is $1000.00 a month, that’s $100.00 per person. Now let’s change the field a little bit. Let’s say that only six people can pay, but everyone gets covered. That means that six people will now have to pay $167.00 to cover the cost for everyone. This is what is happening today. We have a group of billions, and 40% of them aren’t paying. If everyone pays, it’s cheaper for everyone.

The real flaws.

Hidden costs come from legal fees, cost overruns, people not paying, etc. Just look at lawsuits. If you compare the legitimate suits from the not so legitimate, and numbers are about 1 to 100. Just in case you are wondering, the specialty most likely to be sued for malpractice is orthopedics. Obstetrics is about third or fourth on the list the last I checked. Most of the experts thought obstetrics would be first. However, let’s just say that we were having babies for millions of years before we had doctors.

Having babies brings up a great flaw in healthcare. If it’s in the room, you pay for it. This is not true for any other service. If you take your car to have the brakes fixed, you don’t have to pay for the transmission flusher in the garage. So why, if all the doctor did is hand daddy the scissors to cut the umbilical cord, did you have to pay for all those other machines and people in the room? It looks to me that all the doctor did was sat on his ass. Mom did most of the work, and dad just smiled like an idiot when his kid came out. The doctor didn’t even cut the damn cord!

In other services you have to have an estimate before services are provided. Medical professionals don’t have to live by this. If you go in for a physical, all of a sudden you have bills from everyone in the office, and every lab that exists in the community. All you wanted was a physical, but all of a sudden you have bills from people you have never met, and for services you never agreed upon. This really should be illegal, but guess what…it’s not. “Are you really comparing a mechanic to a physician,” you ask? Yes. I am. Too often doctors are thought of as god-like creatures by others, and in many cases by themselves. They are schooled professionals, no more, or no less than any other professional. Show me one that walks on water, and I might change my mind.

None of what is on the table now will prevent insurance companies from limiting coverage. Just because you cannot be denied coverage does not mean that an insurance company cannot put a waiting period on a pre-existing condition. If you have an illness, and are given six months to live, what’s the point in having coverage if you have a waiting period? Believe me, companies will find ways around this issue. Also, even if they do close that loop hole, it won’t prevent companies from saying that they will only cover say 500.00 for a specific procedure. This is true today. You may think you have a plan that has a two million dollar limit, but they will still only cover up to 10,000 for a kidney transplant. Insurance companies will find ways around anything. Even today you have to add up all the coverage limits to actually get to the two million mark.

We have the best healthcare in the world, why screw that up? Actually…no…we don’t. We rank 37th in the world. Also, the United States has the highest infant mortality rate in the world. We are dead last in ensuring our children live. The chief cause: lack of health care and health education. You are almost 100% more likely to have a healthy baby, if you have prenatal care and education.

Abortions, abortions, abortions. I don’t care whether you are pro life, or pro choice. Personally, I think everyone is pro life. I won’t debate the issue here. I agree that the government shouldn’t pay for them. It’s not in the plan, nor was it going to be. However, I still see stories on it just to get people riled up.

Illegal aliens. Anyone who knows me knows that I think the illegal alien argument is a joke. If they are paying taxes, then they get services. If they are breaking laws, they go home. Nuf said.

Taxing Cadillac plans. Ok, this is ridiculous. They need to just smack the moron that came up with this. I think there is no such animal, but even if there was, it’s a bad idea. The argument I heard today was that “if they have a tax, then maybe they will spend less on coverage.” WTF? The point is to ensure people have the best coverage, not punish them for having it. The cost should be spread equally. I’m sorry if this sounds socialist. I don’t care. I see no reason why the guy who works at the 7-11 should have crappy coverage while the guy who works at Goldman Sachs gets great coverage. Look at it this way. Why should the 3 year old child of one person die because they don’t have coverage, and another live? If saving them both is socialism, then mail me my little red book please!

Not necessarily the news.

If you watch the talk shows, or listen to the AM radio, you will hear all kinds of horror scenarios, and “experts,” on health insurance. I will tell you that 99% of these experts are only experts because they got on TV or the radio. Sara Palin is not a health insurance expert. Joe the plumber is not a health insurance expert. Even Jon Stewart is not a health insurance expert, although I am a fan.

But guess what? I am an expert. But I guarantee you that none of them would ever put a microphone in front of me. No one wants the facts. Facts never sell ad space.

In one day…Computer won’t connect to Internet, office phone offline (SIP phone connected to Internet so goes with computer not working). Cell phone stops working. Go to Verizon to find out I have to pay for phone only six months old. Bike breaks. Drive hour to shop to get parts. Shop gives me wrong parts, drive an hour back to shop to get right parts. Go out to mow yard. Mower wont’ start. Charge battery. Belt to blade deck breaks. Chain on toilet breaks. Replace chain and handle breaks. Go to Home Depot for parts. Decide day crappy, so go to see movie. Old woman yaks up lung butter all during moving…most likey has Swine Flu and I’ll die in the next week. Finally get online. Log into client’s office and IT department removed my account. Still have week left in contract. They reformatted computer so eight months work lost. Have to recreate it by Friday. IT department sends me e-mail to the account that was closed, wondering why I dont’ answer. OK…so maybe I’m not in hell, just a repeating version of a Dilbert cartoon. Either way…it blows.

I was in Moab Utah this week where I saw something I found amusing. I actually saw two guys doing their mission for the Mormon Church in Moab. Isn’t that like a priest looking for converts in the Vatican?

Speaking of the Vatican, can someone tell me where the Pope gets off telling people in Africa not to use condoms? He gave a speech saying that condom use causes the AIDS problem. I actually do understand his logic, but it is flawed logic. These people are not going to stop having sex. So at least provide some way for them to keep from killing each other.

Speaking stupid statements, did anyone hear the former Vice President speak this week about Barak Obama? Can someone tell Darth Vader to go away? There’s something wrong with a man and an administration that creates a nightmare and then attempts to blame it on the next guy.

And speaking of the nightmare, I have had about enough of Republicans on the Hill going after the new administration about spending money. It was their spending and lack of oversight that got us into this situation in the first place. Those people spent more money on more boondoggles than any group in history. Their hypocrisy knows no bounds. It’s amazing. Does that mean that I think Democrats are any better? No, but at least they are trying something rather than the Republicans who do nothing.

I remember watching films in high school, about the depression when bankers would go out and kill themselves over the money they lost. I thought, what an idiotic thing to do. It’s only money. Now that I’m in that situation I understand why they were jumping off buildings. You work your entire adult life to accomplish something and then find that someone else takes control of your life and screws it all up. You think that all will be fine, then you figure out that no amount of praying, begging, or even cussing God will get you anywhere.

The truth is that banks won’t work with you. Employers won’t hire you if you have financial problems. You can’t get health insurance, car insurance, life insurance, or find a place to rent. The talking heads blame it on you. It is your fault. It’s not the banks fault, or your former employer’s fault who laid you off when they moved your job overseas. It’s your fault. If you were a better person, you would not be in this situation.

Three years ago I had no debt except my house and $250,000 in investments and savings. My employer decided that they could save a nickel if they moved the entire company…that’s the entire company…to Ireland. You see…the Irish government picks up 60% of the salaries for IT workers. This program, oddly enough, is funded by my own United States government to promote High tech jobs in developing countries. Evidently Belfast is developing. And the Irish work for pennies on the dollar, it didn’t matter that their work in this area is worth the same. I’m not saying the Irish aren’t hard workers. I’m saying that there is no way you can move a company to another country based entirely on the bottom line. It doesn’t work.

So for the last three years I have been doing contract work for different companies. Their are no jobs where I live. I would imagine that 100,000 jobs have left the community. Intel, Hewlet Packard, Agelant, Verizon, and many others have abandoned Colorado Springs. Verizon (who was once WorldCom) employed thousands, and now barely has 800 workers. So there are no jobs to be had. When I explained this to my creditors, I was asked why I didn’t prepare. Prepare? I made it three years unemployed, how prepared did they want me to be? Then when they asked why I didn’t just sell my house. That’s when I had enough.

OK…here’s why numb nut: In the last three years my house has declined in value to less than I paid for it eight years ago. I live in a small community west of Colorado Springs with over 1000 homes in foreclosure. I can buy four times the house for what I owe right now. I can’t sell a property that is worth less than I owe. I tried that; you won’t let me. Since that is the case, and there is no work I have had to live on savings. Because of companies like AIG, and Goldman Sachs the value of my investments declined 60 percent. In addition each time I took money out of my retirment I was dinged by the company for ten percent of the investment. You see, for IRAs and 401ks the companies that caused your financial ruin get to take another 10% of any funds you remove for letting them destroy your nest egg. So to paraphrase King Henry, I was screwed by the banks, employers, and the government all at once and at the same time. And to top it off, since I had been actually paying my bills, I qualify for no assitance what so ever.

So…when people tout that I, and others, are only in this situation because we didn’t prepare, I get a little irritated. I didn’t create this. I prepared. I saved. Still I am now about to lose everything I worked for.

And I now understand why people jump off buildings.