Stupid (but sincere) Questions about the USA

[CutieMouse]

Who pays for such things? Certainly it can't be the school districts or schools themselves?

It was part of a $119 million dollar bond package - the stadium, a find arts auditorium, and school transportation.

 

[DVS]

Eight six seven, five three-oh naaaah-eeee-aaaayn~

LOL, that's it! I wonder how many people will call that number, now.

 

[seela]

It was part of a $119 million dollar bond package - the stadium, a find arts auditorium, and school transportation.

I tried googling, but I'm still not quite sure what bond package means in this context, sorry. Does the money come from the city?

Can schools there get funding from private sources?

 

[DVS]

It was part of a $119 million dollar bond package - the stadium, a find arts auditorium, and school transportation.

Ah, Texas and their football...you really can't separate them.

 

[IrisAlthea]

Sometimes I read things here and other places, that has to do with peoples work and employment and I get curious about employment protection and employment law in the US.
Is this something that differs from state to state?
Are these things mostly regulated by law or does it depend on what kind of contract you can achieve with your employer?

 

[Netzach]

Sometimes I read things here and other places, that has to do with peoples work and employment and I get curious about employment protection and employment law in the US.
Is this something that differs from state to state?
Are these things mostly regulated by law or does it depend on what kind of contract you can achieve with your employer?

Employment law differs wildly state to state. There are laws against such things as discrimination, but it is often very difficult to prove on an individual level - discrimination cases are usually won as class action suits involving years and years of the behavior.

Then you have such things as the "right to work" state - an anti union term which basically allows a person to be fired at any time for any reason. You can also quit at any time and for any reason, so supposedly it should protect people from unethical practices like owing a fee for "training" or something upon leaving a position.

 

[Netzach]

All the cheerleader chatter made me think of football. As in Texas. Because ye gods football. There's a high school football stadium near here that cost $60 MILLION dollars to build.

$60 MILLION

It's only 18 months old, and the sub contractor that poured the concrete didn't do such a good job... the whole thing has been closed "indefinitely" to have all the concourses ripped out and re-poured.

SIXTY MILLLLLLLLION

For kids to play football from the ages of 15-18.

How do girls teams fare in light of title 9 stuff? (supposedly girls sports have to benefit within a certain percentage of any boys teams investments, somehow I can't see this happening here.)

 

[seth6138]

Here comes the first question:

I believe the driver's license there includes a lot more information than the European version, such as weight, height and address. So my question is, do you have to get a new driver's license every time you move? What about if you gain or lose weight? Is there a limit, like if you gain or lose 50 pounds you have to update the info but with only 20 lbs you don't have to?[/QUOTE]

IN my state which is Pennsylvania we get a new license every 3 years. You need to get a new picture at the Bureau of Motor Vehicles and the information you place on the license is provided by you and not ever verified, except for eye color. They also ask you if you want to be a Organ Donor and if you say yes its on your ID.

 

[LWulf]

Employment law differs wildly state to state. There are laws against such things as discrimination, but it is often very difficult to prove on an individual level - discrimination cases are usually won as class action suits involving years and years of the behavior.

Then you have such things as the "right to work" state - an anti union term which basically allows a person to be fired at any time for any reason. You can also quit at any time and for any reason, so supposedly it should protect people from unethical practices like owing a fee for "training" or something upon leaving a position.

Correction. "Right to work" states are not anti-union. Unions still exist in "right to work" states, but unions don't have the hostile foothold in a company of a "right to work" state, like they do in "closed shop" states. In "closed shop" states, the union has superior rights (by way of a union security clause) over the company's management and employees' rights, which which mainly focus on superseding and denying the individual's rights to say "I want to work for an employer, but not be part of the union there, if any exists."

"A "right-to-work" law is a statute in the United States that prohibits union security agreements, or agreements between labor unions and employers, that govern the extent to which an established union can require employees' membership, payment of union dues, or fees as a condition of employment, either before or after hiring. Right-to-work laws do not, as the short phrase might suggest, aim to provide a general guarantee of employment to people seeking work, but rather are a government regulation of the contractual agreements between employers and labor unions that prevents them from excluding non-union workers, or requiring employees to pay a fee to unions that have negotiated the labor contract all the employees work under."
~a la wiki​

ALL government employees are extended "right to work" rights regardless of what state they work in.

 

[CutieMouse]

I tried googling, but I'm still not quite sure what bond package means in this context, sorry. Does the money come from the city?

Can schools there get funding from private sources?

Public school, paid for by property taxes [of homeowners who live in the district]. A bond package means the city took out a loan to pay for specific programs/ development.

 

[CutieMouse]

How do girls teams fare in light of title 9 stuff? (supposedly girls sports have to benefit within a certain percentage of any boys teams investments, somehow I can't see this happening here.)

Girls athletics benefits; football always seems to benefit more.

 

[Endless_Night]

< Employment law differs wildly state to state. There are laws against such things as discrimination, but it is often very difficult to prove on an individual level - discrimination cases are usually won as class action suits involving years and years of the behavior. >

Though this doesn’t mean discrimination laws don’t have a huge impact on the work environment. Large companies don't want to deal with even the possibility of a lawsuit. Human Resources have been known to cut employees loose at any hint of political incorrectness, real or imagined. And keep on undesirable employees simply to avoid potential trouble.

Case in point. An incompetent employee knew he was going to be fired. He quickly made a complaint to HR, accusing his male co-workers of making sexist remarks in front of the group’s two women. The women in question didn’t support his accusation, and denied there was any basis for the complaint.

HR retained the guy for nearly a year, in spite of having good reason to let him go. They didn’t want to give the impression they'd fired him because of the discrimination complaint, thus opening the way to a lawsuit, even though all involved knew it was merely a manipulative ploy.

I found this somewhat ironic as the employee making the complaint was, IMO, one of the most sleazily chauvinistic fellows I’d met in a long time.

 

[Netzach]

Though this doesn’t mean discrimination laws don’t have a huge impact on the work environment. Large companies don't want to deal with even the possibility of a lawsuit. Human Resources have been known to cut employees loose at any hint of political incorrectness, real or imagined. And keep on undesirable employees simply to avoid potential trouble.

Case in point. An incompetent employee knew he was going to be fired. He quickly made a complaint to HR, accusing his male co-workers of making sexist remarks in front of the group’s two women. The women in question didn’t support his accusation, and denied there was any basis for the complaint.

HR retained the guy for nearly a year, in spite of having good reason to let him go. They didn’t want to give the impression they'd fired him because of the discrimination complaint, thus opening the way to a lawsuit, even though all involved knew it was merely a manipulative ploy.

I found this somewhat ironic as the employee making the complaint was, IMO, one of the most sleazily chauvinistic fellows I’d met in a long time.

Seriously? I'm talking Walmart v. Dukes, and you're telling me "about a guy."

 

[midwestyankee]

Girls athletics benefits; football always seems to benefit more.

The book Friday Night Lights tells the story of one year in the football program of a high-profile football school in Texas. One detail that I still remember from having read it when it was first published: in this school, each department has a budget for educational materials such as books, which are loaned to the students for their studies. The football team's budget for white athletic tape (the sort used to tape up players' legs or arms to prevent or treat an athletic injury) was higher than the English department's budget for books. Tape beats Shakespeare in the world of Texas football.

 

[IrisAlthea]

Employment law differs wildly state to state. There are laws against such things as discrimination, but it is often very difficult to prove on an individual level - discrimination cases are usually won as class action suits involving years and years of the behavior.

Then you have such things as the "right to work" state - an anti union term which basically allows a person to be fired at any time for any reason. You can also quit at any time and for any reason, so supposedly it should protect people from unethical practices like owing a fee for "training" or something upon leaving a position.

Thank you, this does make it more clear. I think the term "right to work" has confused me.

The discrimination laws work like that here too.
Obvious cases of harassment and cases that can create precedent, you might have luck with but usually you have to have enough to establish a pattern of not hiring or something like that.

Once in a while there is an employer stupid enough to get recorded, asking a person applying for a job if they plan to have kids/ more kids.
Makes the rest smarter for a while.

 

[BiBunny]

The book Friday Night Lights tells the story of one year in the football program of a high-profile football school in Texas. One detail that I still remember from having read it when it was first published: in this school, each department has a budget for educational materials such as books, which are loaned to the students for their studies. The football team's budget for white athletic tape (the sort used to tape up players' legs or arms to prevent or treat an athletic injury) was higher than the English department's budget for books. Tape beats Shakespeare in the world of Texas football.

Not that I'm defending the idiotic cult of football in the South, but because people are so obsessed with it, football games make a lot of money for the schools, too.

 

[midwestyankee]

Not that I'm defending the idiotic cult of football in the South, but because people are so obsessed with it, football games make a lot of money for the schools, too.

Understood. But as the vast majority of that money comes from the ticket sales and various concessions that are patronized by the fans - most of whom are local - that same income is available to the school through other means that don't involve risking the long-term health of adolescents for the amusement and vicarious pleasure of a town full of adults.

 

[BiBunny]

Understood. But as the vast majority of that money comes from the ticket sales and various concessions that are patronized by the fans - most of whom are local - that same income is available to the school through other means that don't involve risking the long-term health of adolescents for the amusement and vicarious pleasure of a town full of adults.

Oh, no, I agree. I just know that nobody'll part with their money for a school play, but they'll spend it like it's going out of style on a goddamned football game. Because priorities!

 

[Endless_Night]

Seriously? I'm talking Walmart v. Dukes, and you're telling me "about a guy."

Puhleeze. Because headline news cases are the only representation of the workplace that count? Misuse of discrimination laws - even on an individual level - is just as reprehensible as discrimination itself, though no doubt less newsworthy.

And my “about a guy” example was merely one where I had personal knowledge.

Employment law differs wildly state to state. There are laws against such things as discrimination, but it is often very difficult to prove on an individual level - discrimination cases are usually won as class action suits involving years and years of the behavior.

This makes it sound as though class action suits are the only defense against discrimination. Hardly the case when most large companies are scrambling, and enforcing, politically correct environments - sometimes to a silly degree.

 

[seela]

Once in a while there is an employer stupid enough to get recorded, asking a person applying for a job if they plan to have kids/ more kids.
Makes the rest smarter for a while.

Ah, this happens here too. I've run into employers who have tried to dance around that question without really asking it.

I've learned to volunteer the information that I have no kids and have no plans to reproduce, when they ask me to tell something about myself. A 30-year-old woman is unfortunately not the prime candidate for a long term job. Because pregnancy. It's not fair to those who have kids and who want more kids, but I've definitely noticed, it takes me further in the hiring process. If there was a way to put it in the application in a way that doesn't sound douchy, I'd put it there already.

It's a double edged sword though, because some people don't feel comfortable with women who don't want kids. Makes us coldhearted bitches who can't be trusted.

 

[Que]

Public school, paid for by property taxes [of homeowners who live in the district]. A bond package means the city took out a loan to pay for specific programs/ development.

--a bit of a diversion (and it's going to be a bit long, sorry)

Property taxes in my state USED to fund the district you live in...the theory was, the rich have to pay much more in property taxes, but they didn't revolt because it meant that their neighborhood schools were better funded. Better funded schools made an area more desirable, property values went UP, taxes went up, schools got even more money...a nice win-win spiral.

There was a mechanism whereby some of the money was diverted to help struggling districts, and Lottery dollars were supposed to also help areas whose valuations were low and tax collections also low. Bear in mind that lower income areas have lower per area valuations and taxes but much higher densities...tax revenue from apartment buildings and commercial/industrial areas made the whole thinking kind of work. Some local corporations would sponsor a school, like that. In the 1960's, long before the concept of vouchers for private schools was floated, my grandfather (a non-Catholic) used to sponsor fund-raisers for the poorer of the two Catholic schools that was located near his downtown office in remembrance of my grandmother that died in the 1940's when she was head of the largest district in the state.

Lest you think it was completely us/them with strong racial divides etc, it was more a life-cycle of the neighborhood thing. Because it has such a sprawling metropolis, lower commute times become valuable and there is always an "up-and-coming" neighborhood.

As an example, The Willow District, and Palm Lane with cutesy 1920s to 1950s homes became really hot in the gay community. A lot of renovations were done by double-income-no-kids couples. The district had lower enrollment, small class sizes, and great funding levels. As you might imagine the area took off. Homes were often met with multiple bidders above asking price on day one. The issue for brokers was navigating financing and appraisals.

Long winded I know...but during the above time there wasn't a bond issue that didn't sail through with overwhelming support. Every once in a while a crooked administrator would send some graft to his brother-in-law but the rising property values always saved it.

The courts went with 100% egalitarianism. The district contributing the most revenue to the pool was doled out exactly the same per-pupil stipends as the most crime infested failing district. Graft in those areas increased even more, those failing schools improved not at all with extra funding.

The unintended consequences of not rewarding contributors:

Now, bond over-ride elections generally fail. Tax assessors are elected for their propensity to lag the market in valuation so that tax collections lag market forces. When real estate values crashed to 1/2 previous levels, Tax assessors were much more cooperative on valuation appeals...revenues plummeted....teachers resorted so spending part of their salaries for classroom supplies.

Now there is a silly thing that means districts that have parents that can understand basic tax law benefit...You can basically sign I think up to $2000 gift over to your individual school and receive a dollar-for dollar tax credit. SO even if your tax liability was zero, you get back $2000. No reason NOT to do it, but the poor districts struggle to get parents to sign up... the families with for example a non-tax-paying (maybe they are undocumented?) breadwinner cant do it, and frankly the administrators in those areas are not elected for their business savvy, rather their ties to community. It is an honorific and I think a lot of them have no idea about these things.

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

It's a double edged sword though, because some people don't feel comfortable with women who don't want kids. Makes us coldhearted bitches who can't be trusted.

Well then, double standards for women seems to be universally extant

 

[DVS]

Thank you, this does make it more clear. I think the term "right to work" has confused me.

The discrimination laws work like that here too.
Obvious cases of harassment and cases that can create precedent, you might have luck with but usually you have to have enough to establish a pattern of not hiring or something like that.

Once in a while there is an employer stupid enough to get recorded, asking a person applying for a job if they plan to have kids/ more kids.
Makes the rest smarter for a while.

A right to work state allows an employee to be hired into a union position, gain all of the union benefits, but not have to pay the union dues. An employment at will state allows the employer to fire a worker with no notice, at any time, for no reason, except for those conditions that are illegal under federal equal employment law such as race, sex and age, among others. The employer can also transfer an employee and raise or lower wages at any time. But, a worker can quit a job, without notice, for no reason at any time and refuse any agreement offered by the employer. It also means that an employer is free to hire the person they feel best fits the position. If they have two applicants with equal skills and education, they can hire the one they want, as long as they follow the conditions of federal law pertaining to equal employment. Those laws are pretty loose and are really in the employer's favor, when you never know for sure why you were not hired.

These two terms get confused but they mean two different things. An employment at will state has nothing to do with unions and a right to work state only comes into play when a new employee starts a job in a union business within a right to work state. There are also union shop states, agency shop states and fair share states. All of these vary slightly in how the new employee must pay the union or how the union would benefit through his wages. The right to work state is the only one that allows the worker to benefit from the union without paying anything for that benefit.

 

[Que]

I would add to the above that a right-to-work state has the effect of nearly completely suppressing the union, because as you point out, one doesn't HAVE to pay dues to get the benefit, so people don't sign-up.

My experience in my state- I was once a union per-apprentice iron-worker. I got to know union guys and what sort of jobs they went on and how they viewed things.

Basically, the only time the union guys were utilized was when (davis-bacon law?) union-scale wages were required in the always government projects. The thinking was, if you have to pay top dollar you might as well get actual union trained guys. Some of this stuff was dangerous (we had a fatality on my crew of less than a dozen) and the union guys who often rotated from state to state as work was available were very experienced and very competent.

In theory anyone could have worked on our crew, but as a practical matter other than us newbies that had to give out tribute to the union, they wouldn't trust and would not work with "scabs."...or for what they termed "scab companies" when between union-scale work.

So, generally, I doubt at least in the heavy construction, blue-collar type fields that anyone joins a union shop and goes very long without joining up if that is their path. But it definitely has the effect of pretty much eliminating unions in the private sector contracts.

The highly skilled, or dangerous stuff is usually going to be union because no one is going to take the risks training people for that. Your high-rise acrobats, your crane operators, a lot of electricians and AC guys are IBEW.

But service workers, clerks and the like? Non-existant unless the company straddles several states and has a company-wide union contract.

 

[DVS]

Puhleeze. Because headline news cases are the only representation of the workplace that count? Misuse of discrimination laws - even on an individual level - is just as reprehensible as discrimination itself, though no doubt less newsworthy.

And my “about a guy” example was merely one where I had personal knowledge.



This makes it sound as though class action suits are the only defense against discrimination. Hardly the case when most large companies are scrambling, and enforcing, politically correct environments - sometimes to a silly degree.

Employers have ways of discriminating without the applicant's knowledge. It's quite easy, in fact. You fill out their application and while they can't ask you your age, you are usually required to fill out where you went to high school and the year you graduated. Sure, you don't have to fill that part out, but you should, if you want to be considered for the job.

Also, federal regulations force them to ask you your nationality. You are always given the option of not saying, but if you don't, it's also not likely you will be considered for the job. Basically, you follow their application completely, or you are wasting your time by even applying. And federal law requires federal agencies to hire and promote all forms of minorities whenever possible. But, the private sector are just required to use "good faith" efforts. And once they have your application in hand, they can discriminate all they want to, as long as nobody in the HR department spills the beans.

I've received many rejection emails from HR departments. They all say the same thing, but are sure to make you sound like you were the perfect applicant, if the one they hired wasn't slightly better than perfect.

"Thank you for your application for the position of 'low life laborer' with XYZ company. We have considered your application and the results of the interview in detail. We have also taken great care to compare your expectations and profile with those of other applicants and the requirements of the position itself. Although we very much value your skills and qualifications, we have now decided to exclude your application from the next step in the selection process as we believe that other applicants match our needs more closely."

"Thank you for giving us the opportunity to review your qualifications for a position with ZZZ and your interest in working for the institute. Unfortunately, after carefully reviewing your qualifications and background against the current candidate pool for the position, we are unable to move forward with your application."

These could mean anything from a legitimate exclusion to an illegal discrimination. You never find out, because everything relating to employment or an employee is private. That's to keep any personal information private, but it can also help a whole lot when they just don't want to hire you, too.

And if some of you will remember, I was fired for being a racist a few years ago, just because an employee that I supervised filed a complaint with the EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission), which is basically the federal department of labor. Even though they knew it was a false claim, the company I worked for was afraid to decide against the minority employee who filed a claim against me. So, after a fake investigation, they fired me, because I was a white Anglo Saxon male, with no minority status. And because my state is an employment at will state, it was legal for them to fire me for no reason at all.

So, discrimination goes both ways. Sometimes a minority status actually gives you superiority over someone who has no minority status in the eyes of the federal labor laws. And there are those who will use that to their advantage, when they want to get rid of a supervisor they don't care for.