Stupid is as a Stupid does

Alright so I was having a conversation with someone in management yesterday. She said that she doesn't understand why the benefits aren't better at her company....namely health care and vacation time. Health Care is obvious. It is extremely expensive, and the company can only pay so much of it. It is rising at a rate that handily outpaces inflation....

But I did get into the argument on "I don't see why they can't just give us an extra week vacation, it doesn't cost them anything." This was a manager saying this. I tried logic, but she wouldn't listen, so I decided to get my closure by posting to this blog.

Giving everyone an extra week would be VERY costly. For every 50 people you would have to hire someone new. (she didnt believe this at all, but its simple math, there are 50 working weeks in the year, so if you have 50 people out for one week, then you are a year short of labor). Its simple simple logic. Well we're a company of 30,000 people. We would need to hire 600 more people. Multiply that by the average pay and you are easily looking at a cost of $20 to 30 Million a year. Not to mention training 600 new people at a company that spends ALOT of money on training.

So by giving everyone an extra weeks vacation it will cost the firm $20-30 Million a year...or as this manager would say..."nothing"

Logic would hurt her if she understood it!

(She also said the top guys should spread their wealth to the associates. So I chirped in, "so we're a communist company now"....she had no idea what that meant.)