extra/ hazard pay for those working during the CV outbreak

[skp]

What is your opinion on hazard pay?  I saw the US Postal workers union wants paid extra to work and so do the Ohio State Troopers.  Walmart and Giant Eagle (grocery store) are already paying their staff more.  I am a nurse directly dealing with Covid patients and am not getting any additional pay.   Who if anyone deserves "hazard pay"?

[terran]

I suppose an argument could be made that it depends on the expectation for the job. Police and firefighters kind of have "hazard" in the job description. Medical workers maybe too (at least in the medical sense, which is what we're dealing with here). Postal workers have the whole "neither snow, nor sleet, nor rain" thing, and they're paid pretty well for what they do already, but maybe this is a step beyond? Grocery store workers certainly don't have any expectation of being in danger during their jobs, so paying them more makes sense. I guess I just don't know, but I do think there are some jobs that it could be said have an expectation of danger built in.

[poetdereves]

I’m with Terran on this one. I’m a nurse as well and am not getting any hazard pay, but I also don’t expect to. I chose a job knowing I’d be around sick people, so the hazard was kind of implied. I actually feel worse for the average grocery clerk or delivery driver these days because they’re in contact with a lot more people than I am at the hospital and they will never know who could be very sick or not. At least as a nurse I am provided with (currently minimal) protective equipment and know for the most part which patients have various infectious diseases or not.

[skp]

I agree I don't expect hazard pay.  I was just a little irritated at the Postal Service. My mailman just puts the mail in the mail box and picks up any letter that I leave there. The CDC as usual says conflicting things.  The virus can live on paper for 4 days but can't be passed through the mail.
Adding.... My point wasn't that I thought I deserved Hazard pay.  When I read about the postal service, I was irritated , then I saw today the the Ohio patrollers union is requesting hazard pay, and thought who is next and who deserves it?  I wondered what fellow Mustachians thought

[poetdereves]

My wife and I watched our mail lady stop in front of our house and take a second to wash her hands with bleach. Most likely because hand sanitizer is nowhere to be found. I do feel bad for people in jobs where they feel they are at risk but probably don’t have any employment structure or health knowledge to distinguish between effective/unsafe practices. They probably head home and get their info off whatever news channel they watch, which isn’t helping.

[Sibley]

Personally, I think nurses and others working in the hospitals, etc who are not being given adequate PPE SHOULD get hazard pay. Just because you signed up to work with sick people doesn't mean you signed up to do so without adequate protection.

[chemistk]

My Company is giving everyone working in the plants (hourly and salaried, not including manager + higher roles) and everyone working in the sales/retail offices a 20% pay boost for at least this month. If any of them feel uncomfortable working, they're allowed to stay home without pay without incurring any absentee penalties.

There is/was a vocal group of manufacturing employees calling for the Company to shut down production across all plants, but obviously that's just not going to happen unless the Gov. steps in and orders a shutdown and since we're in food, that's almost certain to not happen.

[Cranky]

I really feel for the people working in grocery stores. The did not sign up for this.

[Hotstreak]

Most of these people can leave their jobs at any time if they don't like the safety situation.  Hazard pay will be offered by more companies if/when staffing becomes a problem.

[SKL-HOU]

Personally, I think nurses and others working in the hospitals, etc who are not being given adequate PPE SHOULD get hazard pay. Just because you signed up to work with sick people doesn't mean you signed up to do so without adequate protection.

My thoughts exactly. I don’t work in healthcare but I doubt anyone in healthcare signed up to be face to face with a disease with inadequate PPE day in and day out.

[George the Pet Goose]

This is an excellent Idea OP! We discussed this yesterday. Packaged up a nice gift bag full of coconut & vanilla soaps for the Postman. He seemed to really appreciate it. Added a note to tell him how much we appreciated him. Considering doing the same for our Sheriff.

[use2betrix]

I work in energy/oil & gas, which is already hazardous. People die and get severely injured, it’s the risk of the business.

I am paid well in reflection to my responsibilities and the risks involved. Unfortunately, many of the lower paid positions are higher risk, but that’s usually due to the amount of skill/knowledge involved.

Police, fire, military, medical, also choose their professions and understand the risks.

This does not apply to personnel working at places like grocery stores, who I think could be reasonably paid extra during this pandemic. Sure would be great if they added a “tips” option during this time.

[chaskavitch]

My company moved everyone they could to WFH, but that's only 25-30% of our employees.  We manufacture (and quality control test) generic pharmaceuticals, so everyone who is still at work is TRYING to distance, but's not easy on a manufacturing line.  They're paying all the hourly employees who aren't WFH an extra $2/hr, and POSSIBLY giving a bonus of some sort to salaried QC/Microbiology employees who still have to come in and work in the labs.  I'm 50% WFH, 50% lab work, so we'll see, but it's infinitely easier to keep myself spaced out in my cubicle or in my lab than on the manufacturing floor, so I'm cool if I personally don't get a bonus at all.

I will say, though, we already had 70% IPA spray bottles, presaturated IPA wipes, and hand sanitizer EVERYWHERE for normal surface sanitization during work related activities, so that's been extra convenient lately.

[the_fixer]

I would happily pay extra for my groceries to pay the employees hazard pay or get them PPE I know I would not want to be working in a grocery store or similar place.  If it weren’t for them being willing to risk getting sick life would really suck right now.

I am considered an essential employee in critical infrastructure and required to travel / interact with people in hands on no personal space possible situations and we have no company issued PPE at this point.

 :(

Extra money would make no difference to me, I would rather have PPE no amount of money is worth it to me we have already had one person in my team hospitalized with Covid, others have been positive but were ok and I have been quarantined 2x already.

It has made me think about quitting not sure what to do at this point trying to hold out.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[mr shankly]

I know this thread is a little old, but I'll chime in since our company just offered an interesting alternative to hazard pay.

I work in telecom, and our field techs have been concerned about going in to random people's houses to do work, without really knowing if the customer or others in the home might be carrying corona. (We had one guy to to a house where the person said, "Oh, I just came up to my vacation home because all my neighbors are sick.")

We had heard AT&T was giving (at least some) of their employees a flat 20% premium on all hours worked due to the virus situation. Some approached our company about this a few weeks ago, and got an answer recently.

What our company proposed is that if employees are concerned, they have been given the option to work from home, and company has provided laptops and monitors, etc, to make this possible.

For office employees that come in to work, they will work 4 days on, and have the 5th day off with pay. Field techs get the same thing, since obviously they can't work from home.

It's a creative alternative I guess. 20% less exposure to the virus for the same pay. Company doesn't pay out any extra salary or premium pay, and those that come in for 4 days will have an extra day off to ... stay at home...  :)

As it turns out, the majority of our office employees seem to be taking the WFH option. Since our office was already social-distanced (company immediately spread desks and office areas out and are enforcing social distancing in the building) it's interesting to me that more folks didn't go for the 4+1. But I think most employees were happy with the solution, and for the most part given a choice between the two options.

[Runrooster]

So I work in healthcare but not as a nurse/doctor.  I live with my aged parents who have asked me to stay home from work. I have held off, feeling like an essential worker keeping the healthcare mill working.  Barely above minimum wage, I did feel like we deserve hazard pay.  Fortunately they had reduced our hours which spread out workers quite a bit as well as making it possible to receive unemployment plus the extra $600/week federal unemployment.  This week we are back to 30 hours for work which we can probably do in 24 or 20.  It means more crowding among workers.  Less overall pay due to lack of federal unemployment. I'd feel less guilty taking time off, and I have about 3 weeks worth of leave.  Haven't made any decisions.  I'm guessing these extra hours are coming from the Payroll Protection Program, since that sets 30 hours as full time, which means my hours could go down again in 8 weeks (assuming we're still in lockdown then).