There was a rubric for qualified scores. Software X power user? +8%. Experience in position Y? +1% per year. Bachelor’s degree in the following fields? +20% The premise was "make everything internally clear and we can internally promote, set career progressions and encourage people to remain loyal. This was a huge company that tried to absolve themselves of any accusation of racism/misogyny/ageism by saying “no, we apply the exact metric to everyone”.

I didn’t personally rewrite my job description. I was able to demonstrate other programs and processes were able to achieve the same/better results, and would do so quicker/cheaper/more easily. This was really easy because the job was stuck in the past. Shit like “I can upload a csv to import this data” was basically witchcraft, as the current description called for typing thousands of lines by hand (and rewarded this experience with +2% qualification for every year of data entry experience). Suddenly the two week long job that required ten years of experience was done in thirty minutes.

I convinced them the -35% hit I took on my qualifications because I’d never used done ancient software could be swapped out with a +40% qualification in excel, for example, so my supervisor rewrote the job to include these advancements.

Started a job in July I was 60% qualified for. By December I had made enough changes to the job description (by adding things I was able to do that prior people couldn’t), my manager decided to reclassify my job. New title, new description, new salary pay band. Manager hands me an envelope with my new title, description, and rate of pay. I say "thanks, but we just created a job that I’m 95% qualified for. I expect to be in the 95% qualified section of the new pay band, but this rate is for the 60% qualified. We go back and forth for three months. With 1 hour notice he calls me into a phone meeting with his boss where I can state my case for a proper raise to reflect my new duties.

Big boss says “we don’t negotiate raises, you were hired at 60% qualified, you’ll stay there, and get 1-3% raises annually based on merit. If you want a raise, find another job.” I did.

Last I heard my job was filled by one of my subordinates who was maybe 30% qualified. The good news is the job was kind of a joke, so I’m glad one of my old reports was getting a huge raise to do essentially her same job, because even my boss didn’t understand the changes I made, and they were instantly forgotten when I left.

I can fathom no world where you’d want to trade away a multi billion dollar brand for a new brand you literally can’t SEO. What, you think your brand is gonna be more impressive that the generic variable, and a part of the alphabet?

“Follow me on Twitter” becomes “follow me on X”? “You should tweet that” becomes “you should X that”? The little blue bird on every shop window, website, and business card becomes a stylized letter that, hopefully, doesn’t look so threatening on the next iteration?

It’s a textbook case of brand destruction. I almost regret never making a Twitter in the first place, just so I could quit today, or at any of the hundred days in the past year where it got inexplicably worse without reason.

I use edge for my work accounts on my work computers. It’s nice to have passwords auto fill and everything integrated through my windows sign on, and be “air gapped” from my personal stuff. I find experience to be basically identical to my home surfing on other chromium-based browsers.

I’ll answer for me, and 70% of Americans:

1. It was the only plan offered by my employer. Vision and dental insurance are typically optional extras, but medical is mandatory. Some jobs provide a choice between one or two different insurances, or a good/better/best plan. My wife (who is on a different plan than me, because she works elsewhere and neither of our jobs covers family members at a reasonable discount) selected the “better” option because she takes a few prescriptions and it works out to be cheaper long term.
2. N/A (but the answer is the affordable care act)
3. Insurance providers have a website where you can search for “in network doctors” by specialty. When I joined my current network, there were exactly two primary care doctors within 20 minutes of my home. Vision (which is separate insurance, generally) is often much easier to find. Dental (which again is separate insurance, often) is usually even harder to find a provider, in my experience. At my last job I could pay $200/month for insurance accepted by a dentist in my town, or $12/mo for dental insurance where the nearest dentist was over two hours away.
4. I would prefer the entire system was scrapped and replaced with government healthcare at low to no cost, including prescriptions, dental, vision, and mental health.