become more and more uncomfortable about what we are electing to do. Who is it we decide to let go? It is, for the most part, the front line employee, the lower paid employee, the employee who has the least resources to take to another job, sometimes, or the employee who does, in fact, deliver the services to our patients (now known as "customers"). I hear the stories of the clerical person who is a single mother of 3 children with no child support. I know she lives paycheck to paycheck. What will she do when her 60 days are up and she is no longer on our payroll? What will she do for health insurance for herself and her children? What will she do to pay the rent, the car insurance, for food? What will she do for retirement 30 or 40 years from now?
We have a woman in my office suite who has always worked for us, never anywhere else. I often joke that she must have relatives in every single department because her whole family works for us. Every time I need something she will say, "let me call my sister /cousin /uncle /daughter /husband." And, lo and behold, she gets an answer. And she is not unusual. Our medical center is the largest employer in the
city. What about these families who may have a number of people laid off?
How is it we have come to think of layoffs a just one more management tool, similar to re-engineering a process, using a new computer, or analyzing our balance sheet?
It is not just health care that is doing this, either. I hear it and see it in every industry. We are treating employees like one more supply. We don't need as many people? We don't need the work one does anymore? Lay them off, we say. In fact, our supplies are either kept in inventory or are sold. Employees we lay off.
In another cubbyhole of my life, I have joined an investment club. We are wandering around trying to learn how to invest, what to analyze, how to read the stock market quotes, etc. We are looking at how profitable these potential investments will be. The stock market has never been higher. It almost seems it is impervious to any of the problems we have domestically and internationally.
Why?
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