Employment

Can Millionaires Cure Health Care Crisis

February 11, 2018 By Twila Van Leer

Does a record for amassing money and running successful businesses automatically qualify a trio of multi-millionaires to come up with successful solutions to the medical mess America has fallen into?

Jeff Bezos, Warren Buffet and Jamie Dimon think they can. They have announced that they are creating a new company to address health care costs for their U.S. employees. They think their solutions might work for other companies as well.

Their announcement recently sent shivers through people who are heavily invested in established health insurers and triggered a sell-off in their stocks.

Their particulars haven’t been published, but there are clues to what they might suggest based on their handling of their own businesses.

Buffett has Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway; Bezos runs one of the country’s biggest retailers in Amazon; and Dimon heads JP Morgan Chase. Together, the three have a market worth of $1.62 trillion. They have used unique and daring methods to put themselves at the top of the earnings heap and are noted for inventive ways to meet challenges.

Buffet may have the most experience in the insurance world. Berkshire Hathaway owns several insurers, including GEICO. While that may not translate immediately into health insurance, Buffet at least knows how the market works. He is as long-time critic of America’s health care costs, calling them a “tapeworm” that harms the growth of the economy.

Dimon, as head of the largest U.S. bank in terms of both assets and deposits, also has an understanding of how money works. JP Morgan Chase got a big tax cut under the new national tax plan.

Bezos has cut a wide swath with his innovative approaches to online marketing. Now the richest man in the world, he has used some imaginative approaches to marketing, being willing to cut prices a little to attract customers. Amazon has built itself on that sort of thinking,

The trio said their project will focus on technology to provide simple, transparent care, avoiding the morass that complicates current health care and multiplies costs.

Though only time will tell if they are onto something good, some analysts who are familiar with their past performances say there is a good chance they can pull it off. Jeffries & Co. analyst Brian Tanquilut predicts that the new company will do such things as negotiating directly with health care providers such as hospitals and health care providers, bypassing the companies that act as middleman between patient and provider. That would reduce costs in medical and pharmaceutical chains, he said.

If nothing else the millionaire consortium on health care will shake up the industry and possibly induce new approaches in the market.

Some Companies to Share Tax Windfalls With Employees

January 1, 2018 By Twila Van Leer

Companies Share Tax Windfalls With Companies — The expectation is that the tax revisions will lead to higher profits, bigger dividend payments and share buybacks.

Some major American companies are announcing that they want to share the tax benefits they will get under the revised plan recently passed by Congress along with their employees. Analyses of the new tax plan show that the largest taxpayers, which include the companies, will reap the greatest relief, while middle- and lower-class taxpayers will see little effect.

AT&T, Comcast, Wells Fargo and Boeing are among the companies that have announced their intention to find ways to share the benefit with their employees.

Skeptics say such moves amount to public relations gestures, token steps to take the sting out of what they see as the inequitable rearrangement of tax brackets. The amount of money the companies will pass along to employees is a drop in the bucket in comparison to what they will acquire under the new law, they say.

The stock market reflects that sentiment. It has risen since the law passed, based on the premise that the savings will go to investors rather than to workers. The expectation is that the tax revisions will lead to higher profits, bigger dividend payments and share buybacks.

The revised tax plan reduced the corporate rate from 35 percent to 21 percent. It also created a provision that would exclude many foreign profits from taxation, another break for many of the large companies.

AT&T announced that it will pay a $1,000 bonus to each of its 200,000 workers once the law becomes effective. President Trump praised the action. But the token of generosity came when the Justice Department is suing to block a proposed merger between AT&T and Time Warner. Trump has declared that such merger of the communications giants would be bad for the country. The president said AT&T’s gesture is an indication that the $1.5 trillion tax cut will trickle down to the middle classes.

It is anticipated that other companies may jump on the bandwagon, coming up with ideas about how they can share the windfall they will reap from the new tax laws. Comcast already has announced it will follow AT&T’s lead in offering $1,000 bonuses to more than 100,000 employees. Wells Fargo has taken a different approach, raising its minimum wage to $15 per hour. The banking firm also will donate $400 million to charitable and community organizations.

Boeing’s plan is to put $300 million into enhanced job training, facility upgrades and charitable efforts.

But overall, such schemes to share the windfall with employees will remain “the exception, not the rule,” according to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

As the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a liberal watchdog organization noted, many of the large corporations have been holding large cash holdings for years that could have gone to workers. Boeing, for example, had $8.8 billion at the end of 2016. The company could have made a goodwill effort for employees at any time, the institute said.

Another indication that the large corporations recognize the huge benefit they will realize is the announcement of share buybacks amounting to $83.7 billion, Schumer’s office reported.

Bezos Surpasses $100 Billion in Wealth

December 8, 2017 By Twila Van Leer

Jeff Bezos Surpasses 100 Billion — The surge in Amazon transactions that put Bezos in the $100 billion-plus spot shot the company’s stock up 60 percent, to a record $1,213.4 per share.

Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon and Amazon’s largest shareholder captured the title of Richest Man in the World. When Bezos reached the $100 Billion in wealth, the moment was noted by Forbes Real-Time Billionaire Rankings. The exact time when the total ticked up to $100 billion was 1 p.m. Eastern Time on Friday, November 24, 2017. He was able to continue his $100 billion figure for 5 days – through November 28.

His riches are a reflection of his long term devotion to building Amazon into the biggest “Everything Ecommerce Store” on the planet. Even his selection of the name of Amazon – the largest river in the world – reflects his goals and aspirations.

Bill Gates, Bezos’ competition in the race to see who can amass the greatest fortune based on the world’s technology mania, once enjoyed a few hours in the $100 billionaire’s spotlight. His personal wealth reached that pinnacle in 1999, but it was very short-lived. Gates today lists his personal wealth at $89 billion-plus. That doesn’t include the $35 billion he has donated to his charitable foundation.

The surge in Amazon transactions that put Bezos in the $100 billion-plus spot shot the company’s stock up 60 percent, to a record $1,213.4 per share. Amazon experienced a similar phenomenon in July, when a surge added $10 billion to the bottom line in one day.

Bezos, now 53, has capitalized on his successful wedding of technology and retail sales. He created an ecommerce phenomenon that seems to have no end. It is due to his unique genius that this holiday season is expected to end with record-breaking online purchasing.

Planning For A Career

November 26, 2017 By Twila Van Leer

Career-planning isn’t something you do once and never again. Over a lifetime of work, things change and it’s to your advantage to capitalize as your options are altered. Today, the average worker will change careers (not jobs) many times over his or her lifetime.

Planning next steps puts you in charge, which is liberating and fulfilling. It involves setting goals and making plans for transitioning into a new career. The following tips can help you in the process:

Make attention to career planning an annual activity, not an afterthought. Schedule a retreat to allow you to focus on that priority, a weekend if not more if a change appears imminent. Minimize distractions and carefully think about what you want to accomplish with a change.

Map out your desired career path. Don’t dwell on the past, except to reflect on your experience as a guide to what you want next. If it is just a tweak or if you plan a whole new objective, build on the past. Being fully aware of where you have been will help you map out where to go next.

Let your analysis include your likes and dislikes, needs and wants. If your experience has been less than satisfactory or the current career has become stale, plan on major change. A two-column list of likes and dislikes about your work will help you see the trend. Look at your motivations. What was important to you in your first post-college job may look quite different now. Your goals and objectives may have changed.

Consider the things you like to do when you are not working. Pastimes and hobbies are more important to some than to others. An all-consuming career can leave little time for them. Is your hobby conducive to a business? Some people make a good living out of what began as a hobby. (For instance, Paul Gauguin, the famous French painter, was a successful businessman who gave up that career in favor of painting, an activity he preferred.)

Remember that change is a fact of life. Think about your major likes and dislikes and see how they apply to a career. What do you expect from a career? Simply working until you can retire can be very unsatisfactory.

Take note of past accomplishments. Creating a powerful resume is easier if you don’t shortchange yourself. A realistic record of what you did in your current career can be useful in planning what to do next. Analyze how many of the skills you now possess can be successfully transferred to another job. For instance, a news reporter may not recognize the ability to edit, research, investigation, multi-tasking, meeting deadlines and managing time and information. Breaking the job down into a bunch of skill sets may help you see what might make a good career move.

Make both long-term and short-term goals if you think a career shift would be advisable. A new career path may require additional training and education. Taking advantage of opportunities to add to your skills list is always a good idea, whether a career change is imminent or not. It may take some planning to supplement your training if your decision takes you in a whole new direction. Look within your present company, local universities or colleges and online training opportunities to achieve your goals. Plan your finances to cover additional education if necessary.

Researching career opportunities might give you a sense of direction. Don’t be afraid to look beyond your current field, especially if you are feeling stale or unfulfilled.

Career planning can have multiple benefits, from goal setting to job changes, that lead to a more successful life. You’ll find yourself better prepared, whether there is a job shift involved or not , and the benefits will flow over into all aspects of your life.

Pay Equity 200 Years Away?

November 22, 2017 By Twila Van Leer

Two trends in the job market suggest that the gap in paycheck bottom lines based on gender won’t be going away any time soon.

The estimate, based on current conditions, say that it will take at least 217 years for equity to become the norm.
That outlook comes from the World Economic Forum. The forum gathers statistical data from 144 countries in the world with input from the International Labor Organization, the United Nations and World Health Organization

As one indicator that wage equity is not an immediate likelihood, the forum reports that fewer women are currently entering the workforce. That reduces the competitive pressure on employers to give male and female workers the same salaries.

Although the international agencies report that women are doing as well as men in health and education matters, the effort to promote pay equity continues to fall short. Salaries are, in fact, becoming less equal.

Women make less than men in the same field, the agencies report, but that is only one aspect of the problem overall. Women are more likely than their male counterparts to do work at home gratis. Women tend to work in fields that offer lower average pay. They are much less likely to rise to the top ranks in any of the fields.

Iceland leads the world in gender equality when it comes to pay, the forum reported. Western European countries also are making strides toward equity.

Gender equality is both a moral and economic factor, according to Saadia Zahidi, head of education, gender and work for the World Economic Forum. She said the countries that are seeing wage gaps gradually closing recognize that there are dividends for a country’s overall economy in parity policies.

The United States, although it scores high overall, still has big gaps in workforce participation and wages, the forum reported. The group estimates that the U.S. could add $1.75 trillion to its economy by promoting pay parity. Globally, the estimated economic benefit would reach $5.3 trillion by 2025 if disparity were reduced by just 25 percent.