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22 Eargesplitten posted:The break room here has a calendar from the company's health insurance company with codes for various injuries. This month it's "activities involving frisbee." All the ACA did was make it illegal to not pay whatever the insurance companies cost. With my wife, when I was hunting for private insurance, they would routinely just hang up on me when I told them she had a pre-existing condition, so it doesn't even protect that.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:20
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RFC2324 posted:All the ACA did was make it illegal to not pay whatever the insurance companies cost. With my wife, when I was hunting for private insurance, they would routinely just hang up on me when I told them she had a pre-existing condition, so it doesn't even protect that. My wife's condition is such that there is a way to fix at least some of the issue. Unfortunately, no insurance we can find is willing to pay for the surgery, because it's risky enough that, should the doctor move his hand the wrong way, she could be paralyzed and need expensive life long care. They will cover her pain and management meds now, but they won't pay for this surgery until she's into her late 50s so that if there's a mistake, they either luck out and she dies or they don't have to pay for quality of life for very long. It is technically illegal to deny based on the preexisting condition....but I guess if they hang up on you, you never applied? There's got to be some technicality they are swinging along those lines.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:29
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Unfortunately the blue dogs and Republicans ensured that the PPACA couldn't make any big progress. Even having a public option(which honestly would be pretty terrifying to be on given that you would be on it with the understanding that as soon as the GOP has enough power all funding is being stripped) was taken off the table pretty much immediately. We had a chance for real reform for the healthcare system, there just wasn't the political will to get it.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:29
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Khisanth Magus posted:there just wasn't FTFY
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Jul 12, 2016 20:31
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Khisanth Magus posted:Unfortunately the blue dogs and Republicans ensured that the PPACA couldn't make any big progress. Even having a public option(which honestly would be pretty terrifying to be on given that you would be on it with the understanding that as soon as the GOP has enough power all funding is being stripped) was taken off the table pretty much immediately. We had a chance for real reform for the healthcare system, there just wasn't the political will to get it. The Ds had enough political clout to pass this, which means they could have passed anything they wanted, including the option for Single Payer. Which means they wanted this mess. All of the Rs, to their very limited credit, refused to vote for it. (Honestly, had the vociferous populous backlash laced with death threats not started, I'd bet around a third of the Rs would have voted for it.) As for the Rs, that they haven't even tried to do the ridiculous "vote to repeal" like they did, what 50 times, in the House since they've gained a majority in both chambers tells you that they aren't going to do anything useful to the ACA assuming Trump is elected and they retain both houses. Both parties rail and complain about any legislation passed while the other party holds power, but they never actually do anything about it after they are passed. MF_James posted:FTFY I would take this as a sad truth. There wasn't enough profit in it for them or their cronies, though there seems to be no will to pull the legislation, now so I'm betting some "donations" hit that right people.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:37
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Dick Trauma posted:No care, delayed care, poor quality care... take your pick or a lovely melange of all three. All healthcare systems are worthless unless you can afford private care. Counterpoint: I'm Canadian and I went to the hospital a few weeks ago because I had extreme abdominal pain, fever, and nausea, which made me concerned about appendicitis. Within an hour of going into the ER I had a bed. Numerous blood tests, a CAT scan, some sweet pain meds, and an overnight stay later it turned out that I probably had some sort of infection, but not appendicitis and it cleared up on its own. Total cost to me: $0. Public health care is loving great.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:38
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McGavin posted:Counterpoint: I'm Canadian and I went to the hospital a few weeks ago because I had extreme abdominal pain, fever, and nausea, which made me concerned about appendicitis. Within an hour of going into the ER I had a bed. Numerous blood tests, a CAT scan, some sweet pain meds, and an overnight stay later it turned out that I probably had some sort of infection, but not appendicitis and it cleared up on its own. Total cost to me: $0. That same option exists and has existed for 40 years south of the border. If you go to the ER, you are required to receive treatment for anything with an immediate need. If you don't pay, the government pays for you.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:40
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Arsten posted:My wife's condition is such that there is a way to fix at least some of the issue. Unfortunately, no insurance we can find is willing to pay for the surgery, because it's risky enough that, should the doctor move his hand the wrong way, she could be paralyzed and need expensive life long care. They will cover her pain and management meds now, but they won't pay for this surgery until she's into her late 50s so that if there's a mistake, they either luck out and she dies or they don't have to pay for quality of life for very long. My wife can be fixed, temporarily. She needs a custom surgery job done on her intestines, which has been ruled as cosmetic here in TX. She will need this every 5-10 years for the rest of her life, if I understand correctly(they basically install fake intestines which wear out after a while)
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Jul 12, 2016 20:43
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McGavin posted:Counterpoint: I'm Canadian and I went to the hospital a few weeks ago because I had extreme abdominal pain, fever, and nausea, which made me concerned about appendicitis. Within an hour of going into the ER I had a bed. Numerous blood tests, a CAT scan, some sweet pain meds, and an overnight stay later it turned out that I probably had some sort of infection, but not appendicitis and it cleared up on its own. Total cost to me: $0. Yep. 2 grandparents with cancer, uncle with cancer, dad with CPD, and a sister who passed from leukemia (before I was born). Total cost to the family? Whatever gas and hotels cost. That's it. Are there horror stories? Absolutely. But at least I don't have friends and family going broke from a broken ankle.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:45
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Arsten posted:That same option exists and has existed for 40 years south of the border. If you go to the ER, you are required to receive treatment for anything with an immediate need. If you don't pay, the government pays for you. And your credit is then ruined. Because you got sick or hurt.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:49
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Arsten posted:That same option exists and has existed for 40 years south of the border. If you go to the ER, you are required to receive treatment for anything with an immediate need. If you don't pay, the government pays for you. Actually, if you don't pay, they send debt collectors after you. Maybe the distinction is if they can bill it to insurance, they will try to collect the rest. I'm still paying off a hospital bill that went to a collection agency because the hospital presumably sent the bill to the wrong location. Thankfully they took the debt back from the agency when I told them I hadn't heard anything about the bill in the 8 months between the visit and the letter from the debt collector.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:49
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RFC2324 posted:My wife can be fixed, temporarily. She needs a custom surgery job done on her intestines, which has been ruled as cosmetic here in TX. She will need this every 5-10 years for the rest of her life, if I understand correctly(they basically install fake intestines which wear out after a while) Mesh replacement intestines are cosmetic? You should let your wife know those aren't to be worn on the outside.  Siochain posted:Yep. 2 grandparents with cancer, uncle with cancer, dad with CPD, and a sister who passed from leukemia (before I was born). Total cost to the family? Whatever gas and hotels cost. That's it. Are there horror stories? Absolutely. But at least I don't have friends and family going broke from a broken ankle. It's generally the in-patient services that drive a person to ruin, although there are several test kits that run into the several thousand dollars because they are patented and new.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:50
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Fun fact that many people don't seem to realize: Your distinctions of Republican and Democrat (when speaking of political figures) are useless at best. Both political parties talk a lot about this and that, but they do the SAME EXACT poo poo that the other does once in office. The only thing that matters is money. Also, don't pay medical bills right away. Wait until at least the 3rd bill, then call and see if they will work with you. This is info I've received from my brother that worked in medical billing ~4 years ago. MF_James fucked around with this message at 20:54 on Jul 12, 2016 |
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Jul 12, 2016 20:52
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BaseballPCHiker posted:And your credit is then ruined. Because you got sick or hurt. 22 Eargesplitten posted:Actually, if you don't pay, they send debt collectors after you. Yes, they try to collect (with or without insurance). But if you are being hung out to dry by medical debt, what are you looking to do with your credit? The only time medical debts will hurt you in the credit department is when you are buying a home. Car and credit card/etc stuff tend to overlook those. At the same time, if they submit for government reimbursement (which is some time frame after the service, I think 12 months, but that may be off), they can't continue to list it on your credit report.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:54
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Arsten posted:The Ds had enough political clout to pass this, which means they could have passed anything they wanted, including the option for Single Payer. Which means they wanted this mess. All of the Rs, to their very limited credit, refused to vote for it. (Honestly, had the vociferous populous backlash laced with death threats not started, I'd bet around a third of the Rs would have voted for it.) The Ds had exactly a supermajority needed to get it past the GOP filibuster on 2 conditions. 1: They prop up a dying Senator Kennedy in his seat long enough to vote, and 2: They get all of the Blue Dogs to vote for it, who while not as insane as the GOP were still conservatives. They had approximately 10 days of supermajority throughout the entire congress session before Senator Kennedy died. Would we have gotten single payer if the blue dogs had been liberal or at least moderate? Probably not. But the law could have been a lot more comprehensive and had things like a public option.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:58
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MF_James posted:Fun fact that many people don't seem to realize: Your distinctions of Republican and Democrat (when speaking of political figures) are useless at best. MF_James posted:Also, don't pay medical bills right away. Wait until at least the 3rd bill, then call and see if they will work with you. This is info I've received from my brother that worked in medical billing ~4 years ago. I would qualify this: If you are dealing with a bill larger than $1,000 do this. If you are dealing with, say, your doctors' $200 visit fee, call them immediately after the bill arrives and commit to what you can pay, even if it's $20 a month. It will keep you in medical services while not getting you put out for credit issues.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:58
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Can we at least get an exciting derail? This is boring.
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Jul 12, 2016 20:59
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Khisanth Magus posted:The Ds had exactly a supermajority needed to get it past the GOP filibuster on 2 conditions. 1: They prop up a dying Senator Kennedy in his seat long enough to vote, and 2: They get all of the Blue Dogs to vote for it, who while not as insane as the GOP were still conservatives. They had approximately 10 days of supermajority throughout the entire congress session before Senator Kennedy died. Would we have gotten single payer if the blue dogs had been liberal or at least moderate? Probably not. But the law could have been a lot more comprehensive and had things like a public option. See, had they actually wanted to do insurance or health care reform, they could have because people wouldn't have been up at arms about it and they would have had Rs on board. There are probably a hundred ways they could have made the insurance and health care markets better without the ACA. They had ten days to pass this specific piece of garbage legislation that was written by and for the insurance industry. They law didn't need to be more comprehensive. The law needed to address actual issues with the insurance and health care markets instead of introducing a whole new mandate structure.
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Jul 12, 2016 21:03
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gently caress me. I'm going to go and hug some NHS nurses now.
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Jul 12, 2016 21:29
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Sickening posted:Can we at least get an exciting derail? This is boring. Let us recount our worst I.T. work-related injuries, or the worst ones we've seen others sustain! Out of an abundance of caution I've avoided hurting myself badly. I've had some close calls though. During my brief time at COMPUTER CITY a customer wanted a 15" NEC Multisync. The supervisor said they were kept way up on the high shelves. He pulled over one of those wheeled staircases and went to the very top. I have vertigo so I don't like ladders or flimsy stairs. He says "I'll get the monitor and pass it down to you." I climb up after him and stand ready. I'm thinking "I'm incredibly scrawny and these boxes are large and heavy. How is this going to end well for me?" He grabs the box, and starts to pass it down to me but almost immediately starts losing his grip on it. I reach up and between him dropping it and my weedy arms the box comes right down on top of my head and I could feel my neck acting as a shock absorber. I don't know how I managed to hang onto that stupid monitor but I wrestled it down to the floor and then spent the next few minutes staggering around trying to determine if I'd permanently hosed my neck.
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Jul 12, 2016 21:33
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Dick Trauma posted:Let us recount our worst I.T. work-related injuries, or the worst ones we've seen others sustain! A few weeks ago I broke my tibia/fibula using a scooter to cross our giant building to get to a telecom closet. Turns out the janitor staff mopped the floors at 1am and didn't out up any signs, because no one works at 1am!
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Jul 12, 2016 21:48
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We got a new Exagrid and I'm at another site, Co-worker calls saying its in. I tell him to wait since I know the drat thing is heavy and says empty all drives have 2 people lift it. I get there and he's hosed his back up good trying to rack unit over 100lbs. It waited a few days out of rack until I could get someone else to help me. for clarity this is about post IT injuries not something that just happened. pixaal fucked around with this message at 21:59 on Jul 12, 2016 |
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Jul 12, 2016 21:54
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I get funny looks when I tell my PM about needing (at least) two people for kit that needs racking. gently caress you, there's 70+ years of me needing this back, I am not loving it up for you.
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Jul 12, 2016 21:58
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Thanks Ants posted:I get funny looks when I tell my PM about needing (at least) two people for kit that needs racking. gently caress you, there's 70+ years of me needing this back, I am not loving it up for you. Solo-installing UPSes was one of the many, many things I hated having to regularly do at my old job.
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Jul 12, 2016 21:59
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 See if something like this has been published by your government http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/indg383.pdf
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Jul 12, 2016 21:59
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Thanks Ants posted:I get funny looks when I tell my PM about needing (at least) two people for kit that needs racking. gently caress you, there's 70+ years of me needing this back, I am not loving it up for you. Happens at least once a month around here. Some dept will order furniture and they will cheap out on the delivery and opt out for people to actually install it. Its always some version of this.  can you come help us move this _____ we just ordered? It is really heavy. I am not really up for lifting heavy thing today. Sorry. It will only take a minute. We would really appreciate it. Why didn't you pay to have it delivered and moved? This is a company. I don't think it makes sense to have people move it themselves. It costs too much. Again sorry, but no. (walks out shocked that a man has nerve to decline to lift things for them)
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Jul 12, 2016 22:05
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Dick Trauma posted:Let us recount our worst I.T. work-related injuries, or the worst ones we've seen others sustain! I accidentally triggered a fire suppression system while in an under-construction server room. I was helping bolt down racks when one of the pylons fell, hit a control panel on the wall and shattered it. When we went to pull the pylon out and see what we had damaged, the control panel sparked, the red flasher came on, and some aerosol started spraying in. The guy with me, freaked out and bolted for the door but missed the handle and slammed into the steel at a full sprint, giving him a concussion. I came right behind him and dragged his staggering body through the door. It hurt to breathe for several days and a taste I can't even begin to describe didn't fade for at least a month. Because of me, they started putting plexiglass over their exposed control panels!
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Jul 12, 2016 22:21
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I dropped a rack-mounted UPS on my big toe. I'm really lucky that didn't break it, it still hurts when I think about it. The server closet was literally a closet. The rack was maybe 6" from the door, which was too narrow to get the rack through. The best part was the UPS they sent required a four-post rack and they had a 2 post. I ended up having to just set it on the bottom of the rack after it snapped the mounts. They had a tower style UPS before that. That is what happens when the people ordering the parts have never seen the client site. Maybe I should have reported it and had them order a better UPS, but I didn't feel like starting another job at 6PM in a location 3 hours from home, especially when that would have meant lifting another 100+ pound device by myself or coordinating with another tech to get them out there too. Getting into weightlifting and parkour as a teenager were the two best decisions I ever made for my body. E: I ended up getting appendicitis two days later, so I wouldn't gotten stuck with it anyway. 22 Eargesplitten fucked around with this message at 22:26 on Jul 12, 2016 |
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Jul 12, 2016 22:23
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22 Eargesplitten posted:I dropped a rack-mounted UPS on my big toe. I'm really lucky that didn't break it, it still hurts when I think about it. The server closet was literally a closet. The rack was maybe 6" from the door, which was too narrow to get the rack through. The best part was the UPS they sent required a four-post rack and they had a 2 post. I ended up having to just set it on the bottom of the rack after it snapped the mounts. They had a tower style UPS before that. That is what happens when the people ordering the parts have never seen the client site. Do a large amount of sysadmins come up from the ranks of DC tech? Seems like most people here have way more experience with server hardware than I do, having come from helpdesk type work, and never having been allowed to touch hardware even once I moved to admin.
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Jul 12, 2016 22:34
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RFC2324 posted:Do a large amount of sysadmins come up from the ranks of DC tech? Seems like most people here have way more experience with server hardware than I do, having come from helpdesk type work, and never having been allowed to touch hardware even once I moved to admin. It really depends on where you trained up. I happened to be new at the time that everything in IT was "the same" and so 5 guys were hired to handle everything from help desk to snuff films.
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Jul 12, 2016 22:36
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I started as a field tech, so 99% if what I did was hardware.
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Jul 12, 2016 22:38
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I actually kind of really enjoy working with server racks and equipment therein, as long as I'm not the one having to mount them
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Jul 12, 2016 22:39
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RFC2324 posted:Do a large amount of sysadmins come up from the ranks of DC tech? Seems like most people here have way more experience with server hardware than I do, having come from helpdesk type work, and never having been allowed to touch hardware even once I moved to admin. When you work for smaller organizations there is no such thing as "Not touching the hardware". You'll find a lot of people floating around these threads do everything from fix the loving printer, to doing full blown physical to virtual migrations that include racking all of the servers/storage. I started out as helpdesk for a webhosting company, moved my way into a sysadmin position, stayed in various sys/network admin jobs, came to my current company for a major raze and suddenly I'm doing all the same poo poo I did before AND I have to fix someones workstation which is waaaay out of my wheelhouse. Fortunately we've hired a guy. He can have that poo poo.
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Jul 12, 2016 22:40
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Inspector_666 posted:I actually kind of really enjoy working with server racks and equipment therein, as long as I'm not the one having to mount them I actually feel like I missed quite a bit having no server hardware experience outside of my home lab, since it leaves me disconnected from what hardware is actually good vs just good on paper. I would actually probably look for a DC tech position, if it wasn't going to be a step back career wise. It sounds like a fun way to spend a year or 2.
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Jul 12, 2016 22:43
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Experience touching the hardware is good, otherwise you might think based purely on performance and management that Aerohive APs are good. But if you've ever had to mount them to anything that isn't a drop ceiling t-bar you would soon realise they are in fact complete poo poo.
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Jul 12, 2016 22:46
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Long ago, I was hauling out some computer poo poo (box full of floppies/peripherals, with a big ol' CRT sitting on top) out of the public library one evening, after a local user-group meeting. Welp, since it was January and there was a very slight downward slope to the concrete walkway, that means it had frosted over already... and since I was wearing my old beater combat boots, the soles were awfully slick, and I was pretty much horizontal when I hit the ground. Head hit wasn't too bad - until that goddamn monitor bounced off my sternum and slammed into my chin (opening a bone-deep split in my chin, under my beard) and *slamming* my skull back into the concrete. Concussion for about three days, yay, and, as I found out later, it cracked a couple wisdom teeth. Monitor and other poo poo come through OK, though! 
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Jul 12, 2016 22:47
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Thanks Ants posted:Experience touching the hardware is good, otherwise you might think based purely on performance and management that Aerohive APs are good. But if you've ever had to mount them to anything that isn't a drop ceiling t-bar you would soon realise they are in fact complete poo poo. Ability to touch hardware + root access is a security risk, so in large companies like I have always worked for admins were explicitly forbidden the data center floor(most of them didn't even have access to the building).
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Jul 12, 2016 22:53
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Inspector_666 posted:I actually kind of really enjoy working with server racks and equipment therein, as long as I'm not the one having to mount them Racking poo poo ~15 years ago was terrible. Prior to that it was mostly sliding pizza boxes onto static shelves. Then in the early 2000's rails started showing up and every single manufacturer had a completely different system and rail length with random quality. Some of them were just two bits of metal that slid against each other. Others had bearings that would explode all over the floor if they got torqued a little bit. Others were just L brackets that the server rested on. Then you had over engineered takes like Dell where stuff snapped into the rack just fine, but it also came with a ridiculous cable guide arm that I'm sure seemed like a good idea on paper, but in practice it made everything an even more cluttered mess than the explosion of wires that most racks contain. For a sizable purchase (10+ racks) It was legitimately a 1-2 week job to get everything sorted out. Then about 6 years ago a standard started to reveal itself and while the specifics still differ a bit between brands, for the most part everything just snaps in and you get it all right on the first try. Smooth bearings that have some durability, auto-adjusting for depth, and no more cursed cage nuts.
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Jul 12, 2016 22:53
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Dick Trauma posted:Let us recount our worst I.T. work-related injuries, or the worst ones we've seen others sustain! In my early days working at a small mom and pop PC repair store, I managed to electrocute myself on a PC's AT switch. I was trying to carefully reposition tenuously situated, but connected & powered, parts of a PC another tech set up on a work bench and then left to run overnight. It was probably a hard drive or something similar that was stood on end and tipped a bit overnight. The old AT switches required actual force to actuate on/off and carried real current, unlike modern ATX switches. Stuff was set up in such a fashion that turning off the AT switch would likely cause something to tip and short/fry a part when metal/PCB met metal/PCB. All power came direct from wall plugs and I guess flipping the breaker wasn't an option because I didn't do it. Was probably still too scared to just unplug a computer while it was booted into the OS at the time. Didn't repeat that mistake again.
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Jul 12, 2016 23:05
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I have bled into so many computers. I'm an expert in jamming the corners of RAM chips and expansion cards into my thumbs, and pranging my knuckles and fingertips on the sharp traces on the back of circuit boards. Internal case edges are great for slicing you, with the best ones when you've dragged part of your body along one for several inches before you realized it was cutting into you.
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Jul 12, 2016 23:40
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