LANL the union shop

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303695604575182333308913608.html

From today's Wall Street journal.

Federal contractors especially construction firms will have to be union shops.

What might this do to Bechtel, LANS, and the M&O of LANL?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703699204575017182296077118.html

Public Employee Unions Are Sinking California

Months after closing its last budget gap, the Golden State is $20 billion in the red.

In the hopes of being useful to friends and colleagues in Los Alamos, I will start to post links to relevant articles as I come across them. This one, from today's Wall Street Journal, says that there will be very strong pressure on California to reduce its pension payments to California retirees. California negotiated a deal with NNSA to give the legal responsibility of covering LANL retirees increased pension costs to NNSA if California would give a big pot of pension funds to LANS.

Given NNSA's fiscal problems and California's fiscal problems, this deal may be redone. The losers could include LANL retirees and the current LANS pension plan. There do not seem to be any other sources of money for the state of California.

The demise of LANL:The rest of the story

Doug has quit. Rightly so.

This blog may be used for substantive follow on postings.

Working at LANL now

The scene here has changed. The changes are good for certain folks and very bad for others.
Contact me if you want details.

Sorry for the delay. I have been off doing other things.

Shut down

This blog will be shut down and the comments stored away. I can't see a reason to work at LANL except for the paycheck.

Finding jobs

If you have a question about finding jobs, you can ask it in a comment here and I will answer.

Working at LANL

I do not see a reason for scientists to come to LANL at the moment. I have been told by those still working at LANL that there are many for whom working at LANL is not worthwhile at the moment. More notes later if the notes seem to be worth writing.

Jobs, jobs, jobs

I have not mentioned this in a while because I am busy on other things, but I am still getting hundreds of requests a week for people with the skills of LANL or LLNL folks.

Calcified world views

I am continually amazed at the number of people who will not do what is in their own interest because doing this thing violates their own view of how the world should or does work.

It reminds me of the story of the man, with flood waters rising all around him, refused all aid until he drowned.

A more local one would be a person in a canoe moving towards a waterfall refused to use a paddle, because in his view of the world, paddles were not allowed. So, he went over the falls and died.

Cheerier notes later.

Light bulbs

How many narcissists does it take to screw in a light bulb?

Just one.

The narcissist waits for the world to revolve around them.

Narcissists

There are a number of narcissists working at LANL (and other places).

I now understand them better than I did a week ago (I had a strong reason for learning more.)

One interesting part of this study is my starting to understand that narcissists can consider themselves to be honest and ethical. To themselves they are. Unfortunately for the rest of us, the narcissist's version of 'honest and ethical' is based on a set of rules that are not the rules the rest of us use.

So, dealing with narcissists is tricky, whether at LANL or elsewhere.

Ineffective politics

I just read a comment on the LLNL blog. The anonymous poster was writing a note to Congressman Tauscher. He or she told the Congressman that the Congressman was wrong in their handling of the LLNL contract and that the writer would vote for the Congressman's opponent in the next election.

Writing such a note is a good start but ineffective. If the Congressman won her seat with a 100,000 vote plurality, one vote does not make a difference. The change of thousands of votes would make a difference. So, to me, the writer would want to behave in a way that would change thousands of votes.

Unfortunately, I have not seen employess at LLNL or LANL be willing to work together for the common good or to prevent the common bad.

Bio risks

http://www.newscientist.com/blog/shortsharpscience/2008/02/sunshine-snuffed-out.html

The national biodefense program has done some good things and some sloppy things. Sloppy procedures put people living near the biodefense labs at risk, sometimes very serious risk.

The organization, the Sunshine Project, which protected the rest of us from these risks has now run out of money and will no longer protect us.

The Project only needed $53,000 a year to keep going but did not get it.

Surprises

One thing that continues to surprise me is the number of workers at LANL and LLNL who think that quick emails to legislators will have a measurable effect on national nuclear policy.

Quick emails have never changed policy before. Why would they change it now?

Anonymous bickering in comments, that I understand.

If you stay anonymous, you can't be held responsible or accountable to actions that don't work. And, you can blame whomever you please. So, anonymous bickering is a double win.

A thought

Bar Stool Economics

Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all
ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes,
it would go something like this:

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay $1.
The sixth would pay $3.
The seventh would pay $7.
The eighth would pay $12.
The ninth would pay $18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.

So, that's what they decided to do. The ten men drank in the bar every
day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the
owner threw them a curve. 'Since you are all such good customers, he
said, 'I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20. Drinks
for the ten now cost just $80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so
the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free.
But what about the other six men - the paying customers?How could they
divide the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his 'fair share?'

They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted
that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man
would each end up being paid to drink his beer. So, the bar owner
suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly
the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should
pay.

And so:

The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).
The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33%savings).
The seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28%savings).
The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).
The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).
The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four
continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men
began to compare their savings.

'I only got a dollar out of the $20,'declared the sixth man. He
pointed to the tenth man,' but he got $10!'

'Yeah, that's right,' exclaimed the fifth man. 'I only saved a dollar,
too. It's unfair that he got ten times more than I!'

'That's true!!' shouted the seventh man. 'Why should he get $10 back
when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!'

'Wait a minute,' yelled the first four men in unison. 'We didn't get
anything at all. The system exploits the poor!'

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

The next night the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine
sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the
bill, they discovered something important. They didn't have enough
money between all of them for even half of the bill!

And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how
our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the
most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for
being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they
might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat
friendlier.

David R. Kamerschen, Ph.D.
Professor of Economics, University of Georgia

Supplemental Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement

I have hard copy and electronic copy of the draft environmental impact statement for transforming the nuclear complex. I was sent this copy by NNSA and have been asked for comments.

In the past, when I have given comments about 80% of the comments have been followed.

Comments on this statement are beyond my abilities. I would like help, soon.

If you want to help, contact me.

A thorough job of evaluating the statement and making actionable comments will take you about 6 hours. A quick, targetted job will take less.

Thanks

The future of the Lab

OK, here is a topic. What ideas do all of us (whomever is reading the blog and Eric) have to help LANL diversity in a smart manner, such that we retain the good workforce we have now (that does not mean retain all, just halt attrition at the top level) and attract the workforce of tomorrow?

- GL

The text above was a question by GL as a comment under the post titled "Winston Churchill". I put it at the top so that it would be easier for people to find.

Please comment.

I moved it to the top again. There is starting to be a discussion in the comment section.
If we are going to do anything to avoid becoming solely a pit production facility, I think that the time to do it is now. In a few months, I think that the time will have passed.

There has been a request to move this to the top again so that more can find this post and join the discussion. To those new people, welcome.

A post from July 2007 and again from December 2007

Legal aspects 2

From a legal point of view, what is LANS?

Here are some answers that I have been told. (Yes, they are contradictory.)

1. A project related LLC that will disappear when the contract for managing the Lab disappears.
2. A way to protect the assets of the four companies from any legal assault.
3. A shell that can be breached easily in a suit to recover damages.
4. A semi governmental something or other operating under unclear legal rules. (Think Blackwater in Iraq)
5. A covert arm of NNSA.
6. A private company subject to all risks that might previously have been directed at UC.

Does anyone have solid suggestions?
The people who told me each of the above were very experienced in their fields and were sure that they were right.

Thanks,

Originally posted 12 October 2007

Legal aspects of TCP2 et al.

In the meeting last night, I was helped to go down a new train of thought.

Were the actions taken by NNSA/LANS etc. with respect to pensions, benefits, and transition not merely annoying but actually illegal under Federal law?

Anyone have an answer to this question?

Originally published 12 October 2007

What do you want?

If you have been laid off from LANL or are afraid that you soon will be laid off, what do you want?

Do you need to stay in New Mexico?
Do you need to use the job skills that you have built up?
What is the national demand, obvious or non obvious, for your skills?
Does it appear that you have to stay within DOE labs?
Do you need to make at least 30% of your old salary?
Do you need to keep your children in the same schools?
Do you need good schools nearby?
Do you need affordable shopping within 15 miles?
Do you need mountains to walk in or ski on?
Do you need high quality affordable healthcare?

These are some of the questions that most people need to answer in deciding what to do next.

Moved up from 7 December 2007

ERISA and you

I went to an interesting meeting yesterday.

In it a lawyer, Michael Mozes, was talking about some of the laws governing TCP1 and TCP2.

Michael is a trial lawyer in Albuquerque who specializes in ERISA law.

ERISA is a set of laws, documents, etc. that governs non governmental pension plans.

Michael made a few comments about what ERISA says is legal and what apparently happened here.

Stay tuned.

Originally posted 12 October 2007

No need to scroll

Yes, I know where there are lots of resources to help employees at LANL, Sandia, and Livermore get through this calamity.

These resources include job hunting and managing resources for a family better.

They also include a network of people - counselors, ministers, accountants, SelfHelp, etc. - who provide value.

Later

Once again I move this to the top.

Per request - My phone number is 505-662-3115. My email is eric.fairfield@gmail.com

I will do my best to help those who have recently voluntarily separated from a national lab (remember I am a former Lab employee and have been through this game myself) or those who would like to leave if there were somewhere good to go.

Moved up from 8 December 2007

The view from

A number of commenters on the future of LANL and other national labs seem to be myopic. They are mad that the future is not turning out the way that they want it to.

In part these commenters appear to refuse to see that the other players in this game are playing under different rules and for different rewards.

Here is one example.

The consortium that runs LANS gets about $60,000,000,000 in contracts from the U.S. government each year. This makes the consortium, in terms of income more than twice the size of the entire Department of Energy.

On this income, ignoring the University of California which is a more complicated case, the members of the consortium average 20% a year in gross profits and probably about 13% after government fines and other things. Thirteen percent is not a great return nor a bad return for a company.

So, on the sixty billion income, the consortium would be expected to make $7.8 billion in profit in an average year. If they make less profit than this, their investors take the investment money somewhere else.

LANL brings in about $2 billion dollars a year in income. At 13%, the expected profit on this income would be $260,000,000. Two hundred and sixty million dollars is 4.4 times bigger than the $58.8 million that they actually got. The fifty eight million represents a 3% profit not a 13% profit. If your bank only gave you a 3% return on a CD you would pick another bank.

So, the consortium should not have bid on running LANL if they were only going to get a 3% return and they knew that they were only getting a 3% return, which they did.

Hence, the bid was about something other than running LANL, such as building buildings and cleaning up environmental waste. Building and cleaning is what these companies do, not managing scientific research labs.

Does this make sense?

But, we didn't think that we needed a plan

I said that I would quit posting what I am finding, but this one
Privatization without a Plan
was too juicy. Governments are privatizing at many levels without thinking hard about what they are doing. OK, this has been going on for quite a while and has interesting budgeting.

Enjoy (or not)

Buy me lunch

I have a lot of other articles about Bechtel around the world. I will link to some of them as time permits.

I have to get back to my main work.

If someone wants to buy me lunch, anonymously of course, at Ruby K's in Los Alamos, I will post more articles.

Ciao

The big sieve

It seems that the Big Dig is springing leaks. This is after parts of the roof caved in on a car. There has been a penalty of $300,000,000 to Bechtel et al.

Yucka Mountain

Bechtel has closed Yucca Mountain and made deep layoffs

Here is the next step

Another shoe has dropped at Oak Ridge. Bechtel is outsourcing the pensions to the firm, Mercer, who did the analysis of what 'substantially equivalent' might mean.

Aha

The cat is out of the bag. There are buildings to destroy and things to cleanup. This process with cost the government $8,000,000,000 over 15 years and is basically being sole sourced by Bechtel to itself. This sure beats $70,000,000 at year in fees.

The numbers still do not work

The apparent budget shortfall is $100,000,000 to $300,000,000.

450 people have left. At an average of $130,000 cost per person (most are not expensive technical staff members), this amounts to $58,000,000 in apparent savings leaving $41,500,000 to $241,500,000 unaccounted for. Following Director Anastasio's comments that the 39 weeks of severance pay is the same as a person's salary from now until the end of the fiscal year (and ignoring complications of trying to follow where all the overhead costs really go), it is not clear whether there is any savings in expenditures at all.

Can someone explain the apparent smoke and mirrors to me?

Riff 2b

This one appears to be offtopic, but I do not think that it is.

I have been trying to understand the support of abused folk for their abusers. I have especially been trying to understand how this support manifests itself at the synapse level.

I found this article on Stockholm Syndrome.

Many of the conditions that induce Stockholm Syndrome appear to be conditions that have existed in the workforce of the Lab for years.

Riff 2a

The real version of answers to Riff 2 is long. Here is a first piece. I may do this RIF one question at a time. Be patient. Please comment.

Does the U.S. need national labs of any kind somewhere in the U.S.?

Yes, there are certain tasks in research and engineering that are needed for the country, that are not covered through normal agency activities, and that are not suitable for either academia or industry.

Yes, national labs are part of the political patronage system in which each congressional and Senatorial district has to get back something specific from the Federal government.

Riff 2

There is another point of view of the story below. In this point of view, the question is 'What should be done with National Labs and why is this action in the best interest of the country?'

That point of view is for another time.

A post Christmas riff

Introverts, Extroverts, Timing, Nocosomial Infections, National Security, Survivor-China, and the Amish

Introverts are not the same as extroverts. In social situations, introverts lose energy while extroverts gain energy. So, introverts avoid many of the conventional interactions that the 80% of the country that is extroverts enjoy. Introverts appear, to extroverts, to be aloof, haughty, and arrogant. From the introverts' point of view, they are doing the same thing that extroverts are doing--avoiding situations that drain energy. Extroverts, for the most part, do not do extensive analysis of a situation--extensive analysis is too energy draining.

Politicians are extroverts. They have to be. They live in a world of social interactions and are constantly in group settings. An introvert would not remain in such a life for more than a day.

Scientists are introverts. They have to be. They live in a world of few social interactions and deep thought. The deep thought is required if the introverts are able to solve the problems that they have been assigned.

Introverts and extroverts are needed for the health and security of the US. Extroverts get out and talk to people, in the US and abroad. They find the direction that the country should go. Introverts solve the hard problems that must be solved if the country is going to go in this direction.

Introverts and extroverts like to think that the other is not needed for the safe future of the country.

One claim at the moment is that nuclear weapons should never have been invented by introverts and used against the Japanese. If they were not invented or used, two scenarios seem likely. First, the US could have lost the second world war to the Japanese in which case, similar to Koreans, former US citizens would have become slaves and would be greeting each other with "Ohio gaziamas." Second, the US could have won the war but lost an extra 5,000,000 citizens in the process. In this scenario, lasers, cell phones, molecular biology, etc. would not have been developed by introverted Americans but by others and America might not be a superpower.

So introverts and extroverts are needed for a safe future for America. A remaining question is what roles each needs to play in getting to this safe future.

Deciding these roles gets us to nocosomial infections, Survivor-China, and the Amish. Nocosomial infections are bacterial infections arising from bacterial strains, for instance drug resistance, that can survive only in hospitals and not in the wild. The use of antibiotics in hospitals has given rise to these drug resistant bacterial strains and maintains them. In the wild, these drug resistant strains rapidly are outcompeted by strains that are not drug resistant and that grow faster. In Survivor-China or any of the Survivor series, at some point in the game, the players turn on the strongest player and evict him or her from the game. This strategy only works if there is a structure outside the game that protects the players. Otherwise eviction of the strongest player would be fatal to the health of the remaining players. The Amish, in the book 'Amish Grace,' show an amazing ability to forgive other members of their community who have done terrible things. In the book, the people forgiven were the family of a murderer. As in Survivor, this ability to forgive assumes an external support structure--laws, police, and courts--that will punish the wrongdoers whom the Amish forgave. So, in each case, a particular societal structure actually relies on the rules and support of a larger societal structure.

Back to introverts and extroverts and national security. If introverts are the people who will create the objects that are needed for the U.S.'s national security and the introverts need many years of training and work in order to create these objects--hence the word 'Timing' in the title--then extroverted closing of national labs is against the self interest of the extroverts. The introverts, arrogant and aloof as they might be perceived to be, protect the extroverts against themselves and against outsiders.

Sprechen sie Deutsche? or Russian or Arabic.

Holidays

For those readers who are off to adventures and family during the next two weeks.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays

Photo (c) Eric Fairfield 2007

Jobs and RIFs

I am currently helping a number of people across the country find new jobs, especially in light of the RIFs at national labs.

The best way to find out whether I can help you is to contact me directly.

The second best way is to read some of the posts here, some of the comments here, and other posts and comments at ScienceAtLANL where I am putting more details.

Cheers

Curiouser and curioser

In this morning's New Mexican there is an article stating that no further job cuts will be needed at LANL and Sandia in the immediate future. Senator Domenici stated that most of the cuts asked for by the House of Representatives have been restored by means of a little horse trading, no RRW and lots of plutonium pits made. In the Christian Science Monitor, there is an article suggesting that this budget compromise is mostly smoke and mirrors since there is not the money to pay for it.

If you try to track down the details of the compromise and what the compromise might mean for the future of Los Alamos, you find a nice article on Fox News , which leads to the actual 1,400 plus page compromise bill that was passed early this morning (House Rules Committee ). You also find that Republicans claim that they have not seen the bill before and have only 24 hours to digest and comment on the 1,400 pages.

I found no mention of this bill in the Washington Times, the Washington Post, the New York Times, or the LA Times.

You also find that a current member of the House Appropriations Committee (a difficult committee assignment to get) is Tom Udall. This is the committee that writes the checks to pay for things. Next year because he is leaving the House and running for the Senate, he will not be on this committee, and thus have no say in its spending. The loss of Udall's voice on Appropriations is unlikely to be good for New Mexico.

Can anyone make sense of all this complexity for me so that I can make a prediction for myself about what might happen to budgeting at LANL in the next few years? There are so many forces in budget bills that are beyond parochial New Mexican interests and so many deals that do not end up in newspaper articles that is difficult to predict what might happen next. Also, everything appears to happen at the last minute (60% of the House Rules committee meetings are marked Emergency). Does it really happen at the last minute in a state of panic?

Thanks in advance for any insights that someone can provide.

There are now versions of this story at CNN , NPR and the Washington Post. There is also an another article in the New Mexican suggesting that the Lab (probably both Livermore and Los Alamos) need to broaden their missions.

Here are some links to a breaking story from John Fleck about downsizing and redoing the labs, NNSA's complex transformation (you remember, the thing that they are not really doing now and are taking public input on), suggestions for changing LLNL, and suggestions for changing LANL.

Pictures

More than blogging, I have been doing science and taking pictures. Yesterday and today, there was snow and sunsets. Here are two pictures. (c) Eric Fairfield 2007

Weather report

Apparently, the situation at LANL and LLNL will be getting worse, from an employee's point of view, for at least a year.

Dang.

Job hunting skills

Over the weekend, I was asked about giving a seminar on effective job hunting, from resumes to landing the job.

If there are groups of 15 or more, I am willing to give this seminar.

I have given it before and gotten very good reviews.

Business practices by LANS

Now that the details of the RIF are becoming clear, another thing is also becoming clear.

LANS is doing the reduction in force in a much more professional and business savvy way than the blogorrhea of online comments would have us believe.

There is a sign of hope for the area. This means that, although lots of people will no longer work at the Lab, the Lab itself may survive and, possibly, prosper. It will be a very different Lab, sort of like IBM going from calculators to computers or RJReynolds going from being tobacco company to a food company.

Until recently, I thought that the whole area would collapse quickly. Maybe that will not happen.

Unintended consequences 2

Say that 750 people leave the Lab in the next month or so.

Where do these people live?
What happens to the housing market?
How many other people, deciding that they have a poor career path at LANL, leave?
Who would choose to work at LANL if they had another choice?
Why would someone, needing to spend ten years after their Ph.D. to master weapons, choose to work at LANL?
If the people laid off try hard to stay in Northern New Mexico for the rest of their lives and people outside Northern New Mexico do not want to come here to work on LANL projects, where does a viable workforce come from (foreigners would come but this raises another set of problems).

There appear to be a huge set of these unintended consequences.

The future of Los Alamos 3

Tuesday night, I listened to Director Anastasio talk about the RIF and about ongoing business at the Lab.

To me, the take home message was very clear.

LANS will balance each year's income and expenses. Given the current funding and Congress's continuing resolution, the only way to balance income and expenses for the year is to fire people. All other methods, such as laying off contractors, have already been tried and no longer offer a budget savings.

Once the budget is balanced, the budgeting is not finished. There needs to be a surplus in the budget so that unexpected expenses can be covered and so that items in dire need of repair, for instance many of the buildings, can be repaired.

All short term decisions appear to be driven by the need to balance the budget and to accomplish the mission deliverables to NNSA and other sponsors.

test chart on rifs

Here is an image of a chart from Excel. This is a test image.
It shows, second column, $19,000,000 saved on staff salaries.
It shows, columns 1 - $14,000,000, 4-$16,0000,0000, and 6 - $4,000,000, a total of $34,000,000 saved on personnel that seem to be categories of management.
It shows about $100,000, each, saved on laborers and scientific IT folks.

I do not yet know how to make the chart itself readable. Any suggestions?

To get this quality of chart, I had to export it from Excel as an MDI file, convert the MDI file to a TIFF file and then convert the TIFF file to a JPEG. I will try to get better quality. Until I do, there does not seem to be a purpose in posting pie charts.

I am willing to ship the jpeg to people who request it.

On a second chart (not shown), I found that the proposed RIFs are spread fairly evenly across employment categories (8.5% per category) except for General Administration and Laborers for whom the proposed cuts are about 14%.

There are still hundreds of millions of dollars in costs unaccounted for. So, I am waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Timing

If the time scale of politics is months and the time scale of many businesses is quarters of years but the time scale of a successful weapons lab is decades, what is surprising is not that we are having this clash of time scales (temporary politics killing off things that cannot be rebuilt within three Senatorial terms).

What is surprising is that the current scenario has not occurred before now.

Kudos

Senator Domenici had a letter printed in today's New Mexican.

http://www.santafenewmexican.com/Opinion/Commentary_Let_s_get_serious_about_the_LANL_debate

I liked the letter a lot. The letter is succinct and focused. It points out where there is smoke and mirrors and where there is fire.

I have quibbles about some facts but still like the letter and thank the Senator for having the courage to write it and publish it.

Total, targetted, and excluded

I down loaded the Lab's RIF analysis, put it into Excel, and have started to make charts and spreadsheet pages from it.

For instance, I have the percent of people targeted for layoff charted by skill set.

I may post some of these charts here later, once I figure out how to do it. ;-)

Fundamentally fragile and under assault

David Brook's column in today's New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/27/opinion/27brooks.html?hp

"Follow the Fundamentals"

suggests that many Americans and certainly American politicians view America as under assault and fundamentally fragile to that assault. I hear many people at LANL say the same thing about LANL.

I disagree.

I do not think that LANL is under this inexorable assault nor that it is fundamentally fragile. I think that the assualt can be thrown back. I think that LANL is more robust than it appears.

My only need is to have more people than just me have this positive view. Then I need those people to take some action to defend the battlements.

Just a thought.

Jobs

Lockheed Martin runs Sandia - 8,400 employees, 80 jobs lost.
UC - Bechtel runs LANL and Livermore - 20,000 employees; 2,000 jobs lost and counting

Eating your seed corn

In the book "Built to Last," companies that did well for at least fifty years changed their product line as needed to survive. 3M, for instance, routinely stops producing products, even good ones, to foster innovation and new products.

At least recently, the Lab seems to have been run a bit differently. The analogy is not of an innovative company trying to survive but of a buggy whip manufacturer bought out by a private equity firm. The object is to sell as many buggy whips and as many company buildings as possible as quickly as possible and then close the place down.

In the mean time, sell the tanning solution that makes the buggy whips pretty (think 'safety' and 'security') because this is all the customer wants to buy.

So you get short term income at that cost of eating your seed corn -- there will be no new crops because there is nothing to grow them from.

Playing to win

George Lakoff, of UC Berkeley, has written a number of books. The books are about choosing words and their meaning so that your side wins.

For instance, he told the Democrats that trying to win an argument against the Republicans on national security by using Republican terms and meanings was a losing battle. The Republicans knew how to win this fight better than the Democrats did. He suggested that the Democrats had to stay on message and use terms that were not Republican terms.

The apparent application to here is to stop talking to DOE, Congress, etc. about 'safety,' 'security,' 'pensions,' and 'entitlements' and go back to talking in different terms such as 'national security,' 'economic prosperity,' and 'long term national interest.'

Basically, this approach says to change the verbal game so that your side wins.

Restructuring needs

In yesterday's LA Monitor newspaper, there was an article about organizations that are banding together to help those who no longer work at LANL.

This banding together has been tried before in Northern New Mexico. There were a number of 'job fairs' for contractors who no longer worked at LANL.

I went to some of these fairs to see what was being offered.

There were many jobs at casinos. There were jobs doing hard labor. There were opportunities to take courses at community colleges. There were not any jobs being presented beyond Northern New Mexico.

The above is just some information that might save time for the laid off.

The new look

For years now, I used the same color scheme in these blogs that was used in the original LANL:The Real Story. I was assuming that there was a way to preserve and enhance the value of the Lab, especially the science at the Lab.

That assumption appears to be untrue.

So, now, the background design is of a house at the edge of a harbor. We are in the house, looking out to sea, getting our boat ready and planning the voyage. The voyage should be exciting. I am hoping for decent weather.

Sitemeter - The number and duration of visits is going up. Given the expected employer - employee nastiness that is likely to occur over the next few months, I chose to take down the sitemeters so that they could not be used to track who comes here or who comes to scienceatlanl.blogspot.com. I may put them up again later. Sitemeters are odd. There have been more than 200,000 visits to LANL:The Rest of the Story in the last few months; yet, no actions have taken place to alter the timing of the train wreck that is LANL.

This blog has general discussions. Science at LANL has specific science talk and references to available jobs.

To All

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

The rest of the story

It was announced by director Anastasio that about 750 people need to leave LANS in order to balance out the $100,000,000 shortfall in the budget.

These people were asked to leave voluntarily. (An idea that seems to defy common sense.)

The $100,000,000 number was not presented as having a basis in facts. Some local residents compared it to the $70,000,000 to be awarded in fees.

If you add up changes in the Lab's budget over the last year, you do not get $100,000,000 for the shortfall. Once you put in salary increases, gross receipts taxes, decreased funding, and fee, the total appears to be $500,000,000. This is equivalent to about 3,000 more jobs on top of the projected 750 that will be lost.

So, my question is: "What happened to the missing $400,000,000 and who are the unannounced 3,000 people who will have to leave in order to make up this budget deficit?"

Mood music

Today's mood music is:

"Deathly" or "Goodbye Stranger" - Aimee Mann
"Another Brick in the Wall" - Pink Floyd
Various - Rammstein
Various - Rocky Horror Picture Show

Stress and pain

Indicators of stress are rising in Los Alamos.

1. There are almost 400 houses on the market. Normal is 70.
2. Many more people are angry and rude in their dealings with others.
3. Many more people have stopped having dealings with others and have withdrawn.
4. The wait to get in to see a marriage counselor has risen from one week to 2 months.
5. The wait to see a veterinarian has dropped from two months to one week.

More later.

Do the math

1. LANL outsourced to potential campaign donors
2. LLNL outsourced to potential campaign donors.
3. President Bush raises more in campaign contributions than at this stage in 2005 - $63,000,000.
   

Forgiveness

Two days ago I found out about a new book.
One day ago I found that this book had been purchased by Mesa Public Library.
Last night I got the book out of the library.
This morning I am one third of the way through it.

The book is "Amish Grace" by Donald Kraybill, Steven Nolt, and David Weaver-Zercher.

It is about the Amish's deeply ingrained forgiveness of others who hurt them. The main thread of the story is about the Amish's behavior after the tragedy at Nickel Mine, PA.

A central belief of Amish life is

"For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses." Matthew 6:14-15

Read the book.

It is no longer morning. It is 5PM. I just finished the book. A little forgiveness seems that it would allow all of us to get through this mess with more grace and less bitterness.

Owners capitalism versus managers capitalism

Worried about your pension?

Read John Bogle or listen to him on Bill Moyer's journal. He says that pension funds and other places that hold your money are much more focused on keeping your money for themselves and not giving it to you than they were 40 years ago. Forty years ago, they were more focused on giving value to you the customer.

Then worry harder.

Two interesting sites

Mocking companies and government - the king has no clothes

http://www.theyesmen.org/

Wonder where your tax dollars are going in earmarks. This may help
"Taxpayers for Commonsense"

http://www.taxpayer.net/

Quotes from Abba Eban, Israeli Prime Minister

His ignorance is encyclopedic.

History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives.

It is our experience that political leaders do not always mean the opposite of what they say.

The multiperson prisoner's dilemma

It is easy to say "Big companies are evil. Division leaders are stupid. The people at DOE are the C students. Support staff is worthless. The county council consists of a bunch of idiots."

All these things have been said and have been believed by some.

All of these things, besides being untrue, are unproductive.

A more productive approach seems to be to assume that each person listed above is acting in what they perceive to be their own self interest. Each person is acting under what they perceive to be the rules governing their portion of the game.

This 'everyone is a rational player and is playing in different games' approach seems to be strongly predictive of what is happening and what is likely to happen.

Today's question - Why is it in the rational interest of anyone listed in the first paragraph to try to defend the people who talk to them in the ways that are listed in the first paragraph?

The phrase 'biting the hand that feeds you' comes to mind.

Moved up from 2 November 2007

Layoffs and new jobs

There are 3,000 people who are projected to be laid off at the weapons labs in the next few months.

Ignoring the thoughts about what this layoff will do to the current ability of the workforce to make milestones and ignoring the crushing effect that this layoff will have on the ability to attract younger workers, what will happen to those laid off.

Tradition says that they will be forgotten or ignored by those who still have jobs. The laid off will become "The Disappeared."

But what about each laid off person. What happens to them?

Most of the laid off are 45 or older. Most of the laid off have never written a competitive resume. Most have never applied for a job other than the one they just lost. Most have only done classified work and can't talk about it. Most want to stay in the locale in which they now live. They have not lived anywhere else in a long time.

There are two likely scenarios for the laid off. In the first scenario, the laid off retreat to their houses, husband their resources, drink heavily and hope that things will change for the better locally. This is the scenario that has occurred in many towns across the US.

The second scenario, after the grief and anger, is that, one by one, people pick up their lives and find rewarding new lives.

As Yogi Berra said, "When you come to a fork in the road, pick it up."

Cheers

Experimental research institute

More than 18 months ago I had some conversations about setting up an experimental research institute locally. I had some interested scientists and some interested funders.

I had a talk today about this same topic.

Is anyone interested in getting such an institute set up and going?

Is anyone more interested since Schoenbauer of NNSA, on Thursday, seemed to imply that all non NNSA work and all science were no longer part of LANL's 'mission.'

A book for today

"Amish Grace"

Consultant in chief

http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110010846

The article above is about Mitt Romney and about trying to govern based on data and goals, a refreshing approach.

Keep your head down, do your job

I realize that this has been said before, but "Keep your head down, do your job, ask no questions" behavior by LANL and LLNL staff is exactly the behavior that lets management get away with what they are accused of doing. Management knows that there will be no response.

For more insights, check out a post a couple of years ago that quotes an article about Bullies and Victims. The article talks about the dynamics between bullies and victims. It also talks about the surprising finding that bullies and victims are the same people.

In one setting a person is a bully. In a different setting, the same person becomes the victim. Bully and victim seem to be the only two personas that the person understands.

RIFs at LANL, LLNL or beyond

I have not said much about RIFs recently.

I have resisted the urge to post URLs about the latest rumor of the day.

To me, the reason to say little right now is that the RIFs are inevitable. There is no money to prevent them and Complex Transformation will drive the RIFs.

The only unanswered questions are:

1. How many people will be RIFed?
2. When will they be RIFed?
3. How will the survivors make deliverables on time?
4. Will the towns be livable after the RIFs?

The optimal strategy for surviving a RIF is individualistic and must be adopted by each motivated person. I am helping a few people with their own strategies at the moment.

The optimal strategy does not seem to depend strongly on the answers to the questions listed above.

My short answers to the questions currently are:

1. At least 5,000 across the DOE weapons labs.
2. In the next month
3. They won't
4. Probably not, at least for 5 to ten years.

Denouement - A better strategy for a standard company might be to leave the threat of a RIF in the air while quietly letting people go until budget goals are met. Then the company announces that there will be no RIF, for instance in time for Christmas. The actual number of people who no longer work for the company is the same as it would be if the RIF was announced, but the company gets to claim that they worked hard and avoided a RIF. From the individual employee's point of view, the results are the same and all of the questions above still apply.

Just a thought.

Sheeple

If I put down other people whether they work at LANL or not, call me on it. I will stop.

Putting down others is wrong on many levels, especially now.

Unintended consequences

If your job and career are safe for the next few years, but

1. Many of your friends are RIFed and move 1000 miles away,
2. Your house loses 50% of its value,
3. Your church now runs at a deficit and is fairly empty,
4. Downtown Los Alamos and Espanola loses half of its stores for lack of business,
5. The aquatic center closes,
6. The school system becomes much worse for lack of funding,
   
7. Los Alamos is viewed, from the outside, as a relic and a pit facility, but
8. The walking trails are less crowded.

Is Los Alamos or Northern New Mexico a place that you want to live?

Yippee

Finally, on LANL:The Rest of the Story, after years of avoidance 'avoiding the reality of the future of LANL' seems to be a topic that no longer has to be avoided.

(How often do you get to use the word 'avoid' legitimately three times in a sentence? ;-) )

Real estate values

There is a good article in today's New York Times about how people across the country are being affected by loss in the value of their homes.

The simple message is that they can no longer get loans from the bank.

The elephant and the mouse

The elephant - If LANS, as unit of Bechtel, is expected to make a 20% profit on its income ($2,200,000,000), this is about $400,000,000 in profit and if LANS is currently running about $300,000,000 in the red, where is the $700,000,000 difference going to come from? This difference is the salaries and benefits of thousands of staff.

The mouse - If you work at the Lab now, what is your best strategy to protect yourself, your career, and your family? How does this best strategy depend on your skill set, your age, your family situation, and whether you chose TCP1 or TCP2? What is the cost of not figuring out your best strategy and executing it? (Answer to the third question - about $500,000 per family, much of it in lost value of real estate)

Newspaper articles

Newspaper articles are the ephemera of the situation at LANL now, the husks left by a moving beast.

The reporters work hard and are doing as well as they can, but the important question seems to be 'What organism would generate the events that newspapers report?"

The analogy that seems apt is "If we could see the scat, the destruction, the feeding behavior, etc. of a herd of elephants, what could we say about the shape and functioning of the elephant or the herd if we could never actually see an elephant or a herd of elephants?"

Jobs everywhere

As usual, job openings will be mentioned on ScienceatLANL

www.scienceatlanl.blogspot.com

Odds

The odds of anything changing in a good direction for LANL seem to be at least 100 to 1 against.

A sobering perspective

In my calls around the country for business in the last week, I have found that the goings on at LANL do not even make a blip.

Not only does no one care, no one even knows about it.

A new blog name

We can have a competition for a new blog name.
I will buy lunch at Ruby K's for whomever has the best name.

Here are some starters

"Not working at LANL"
"Uses for old decrepit buildings"
"Why would any young person choose to come to LANL?"
"Tortilla making for nuclear physicists"

Make some suggestions

Complex transformation

As you can see from today's newspaper stories, a lot is going on, most of it bad.

We can have discussions and initial protective planning here if anyone wants to do it.

Exile

I just finished reading "Exile" by Richard North Patterson.

The book is very interesting. I brings real stories and real characters (OK, fictional characters that act like real people) to the ongoing Palestinian - Israeli struggle.

If I try to apply the lessons of this book to the ongoing events at LANL, I get the following insight.

There is no global conspiracy. There is no corporate hobglobin nor any DOE doppelganger.

Each person is acting in what they perceive to be their own self interest under the local rules of the system as they think that these rules exist.

What we see, and do not like, is the emergent behavior of this system when everyone is following their own perceived self interest.

What destroys the system (the multiperson prisoner's dilemma) is the fact that the self interest of a number of people is antithetical to the health of the overall system and that this self interest is sufficient to take the system apart. Essentially, we have the 'tragedy of the commons.'

Here is one of the apparent tragedies:

At a national level, it is in the interest of the Republican party to retain the presidency. To do this they need to raise campaign funds sufficient to beat the Democrats. One traditional way to do this is to award contracts to 'Republican' companies, not universities, that can contribute to campaigns. The cost of awarding the contract to 'Republican' companies is paid in tax payer dollars not in 'Republican dollars.' The campaign contributions come back in 'Republican dollars.'

From the point of view of national campaigns, Republicans keep the presidency at the cost of a few politically insignificant government jobs that used to defend against threats that no longer exist. At another level, the Republican presidential victory is being put on a credit card with the hopes that the bill will not need to be paid (there will never be a nuclear threat of any size).

The net effect is similar to:

"I made money selling land. My neighbor is mad at me. The land was in his yard."

Just a thought about forces far outside of Los Alamos that could be driving events within Los Alamos.

Meditations

A little humor might help.

Deep thoughts come from Yogis.

Here are some from Yogi Berra.

If you don't know where you're going, chances are you will end up somewhere else.

I really didn't say everything I said.

If you ask me a question I don't know, I'm not going to answer.

It ain't the heat; it's the humility.

It's deja-vu all over again.

You should always go to other people's funerals. Otherwise they won't come to yours.

You can't think and hit at the same time.

The other teams could make trouble for us if they win.

I knew I was going to take the wrong train, so I left early.

90% of the game is half mental.

It's not too far, it just seems like it is.

If you don't set goals, you can't regret not reaching them.

Slump? I ain't in no slump. I just ain't hitting.

The future ain't what it used to be.

If you come to a fork in the road, take it.

We made too many wrong mistakes.

We're lost, but we're making great time!

If people don't want to come to the ball park, how are you going to stop them?

I knew exactly where it was, I just couldn't find it.

I usually take a two hour nap, from one to four.

Steve McQueen looks good in this movie. He must have made it before he died.

You can observe a lot just by watching.

Once, Yogi's wife Carmen asked, "Yogi, you are from St. Louis, we live in New Jersey, and you played ball in New York. If you go before I do, where would you like me to have you buried?" To this, Yogi replied, "Surprise me."

Wallace talk - the essence

On a little more thought, the essence of the Terry Wallace talk seems to be

"Please fall on your sword for LANS (voluntarily leave) so that LANS does not officially have to fire you. If you try to fall on your sword but LANS thinks that you should stay, LANS will not let you leave."

Is this the essence of the statement?

If it is, why is it in an employee's interest to fall on their sword to make life easier for LANS?

Thanks

Jobs science et al.

The partial listings are at

scienceatlanl.blogspot.com

RIF

I guess that "No RIF, no plan for a RIF" statement is no longer in play.

Terry Wallace talk

The news is out and it is grim.

Lots of people to be let go in the next couple of weeks.

No furloughs.

Possible shutdown of the lab because there will no longer be the people employed there to do the work that is needed.

From the point of view of national security, I do not see what sense the current plan makes.

I will help people with their planning as I can and as they want.

As a person who left the lab when a project came apart in similar impulsive ways, I empathize with each impacted person and hope that those who are left are safe, at least for a few years.

New topics 3

If you have a topic that you would like to see here or one that you would like revisited, leave a comment, anonymous or not.

I will create an appropriate post.

Continuing resolution

OK. I was wrong about the results of the continuing resolution.

I do not understand the politics of why I was wrong, but I was still wrong.

We seem to have an extra six weeks, until right before Christmas.

*The last time that there was not a continuing resolution was 1977.

I do not know how a person is supposed to plan their life when their salary and even their job is held hostage for months. The rational response would seem to be to get another job.

A modified version of this post was originally made on 25 September 2007

The more things change the more they stay the same.

I have been looking at some of the older posts and moving them to the top of the list as appropriate.

It is odd that many of them still apply today.

Later,

Workers from LLNL

This blog welcomes comment and newsclippings from LLNL.

If the work load gets too onerous for me, I will ask for help.

I will not close down.

Cheers,

This post was moved from 15 Oct. 2007

The train wreck, part two

There have been a number of newspaper articles in the last few days about LANL, LLNL, and nuclear workers.

The interesting and sad part of these articles is that all of them are predictable.

The wreck is still going on. The articles are snap shots of the wreck in progress.

Quelle dommage

The January 2009 two step or Hot Potato for Adults

I was thinking about how DOE might handle the Quintana fine.

The first step was to hold hearings in Congress saying that LANS was bad.
The second step was to propose a fine of $3,000,000 to UC to say that UC was bad (and to gain free publicity implying that DOE was cracking down on LANL).
The third step was for NNSA to give a press release saying that underfunding to LANL and the 11th amendment of the Constitution are not sufficient reasons for UC to be held harmless in the Quintana affair.

Here are today's predictions of the next steps.

4. DOE spends not more than $4,000,000 between now and January 2009 with the stated goal of getting money from UC and LANS. DOE pays UC and LANS, per contract, for their side of this battle. No decision about the fine is made until we have a new president. Every one gets to deny responsibility for the result ("Didn't happen on my watch" "That previous administration was gutless" Blah, blah, blah). Political costs are small to all parties.

A related thought - If UC and LANS are worth fining $3,300,000 for one incident at LANL what is in store for their efforts at LLNL? Does this calculus change with a Democratic president?

Please comment.

This one was originally posted on 17 July 2007

Not on the train wreck

Whomever the heckler of me is on LANL:The Rest of the Story, he has started to cheer me up.

Today's heckle was that I should feel bad because I don't work at LANL and therefore am not on the crashing train.

As a put down this logic lacks something. LOL

Back to your regular programming.

The elephant in the living room

By my calculations, LANS is running in the red this year and will be farther in the red next year.

The consensus estimate for next year is $360,000,000. This is $30,000,000 a month or 100 staff members or 300 support staff a month for whom there will not be money to pay them.

In spite of section 3161, there will not be money to pay people.

What do you think will happen?
Will LANS get the money from one of their owners just to be nice to the government or will something else take place?

Follow the money.

Jobs

I am getting called continuously about job openings.

I am putting some of these listings on Science at LANL

Bully and Victim

There is an interesting thread surfacing at LANL and LLNL. This thread was elucidated quite a while ago by Hugh Gusterson.

The thread is that employees at both places continue to trust their future to managers and organizations that have betrayed them in the past. They trust these managers and organizations with at least half a million dollars per employee even though the employee knows that they will be betrayed.

It turns out that this seemingly contradictory behavior is well known in psychology. In the distant past, it may have been evolutionarily selected. Currently, it is very bad for the employees but is common.

Who knew?

This is brought to the top. It was originally posted on 25 July 2007.

My plan

Long ago I hedged my bets on the future of Los Alamos. In part, I tried to make accurate predictions of what this future might be.

At the moment, I am making businesses grow. These businesses may stay here. These businesses may move.

If you are interested in knowing what my hedges are or what the businesses are, let me know.

The future of Los Alamos 2

For readers who are interested, I still have years worth of experience that can help people through the current difficulties. This experience seems to fall into a few categories.

1. Helping people to find good jobs. I get requests from companies and headhunters all the time.
2. Quantitative predictions of the future of the lab and the county.
3. Financial skills that many scientists do not currently have.
4. Simple, caring support.

All that a person has to do to find out more is to contact me. I have stopped pushing the skills above. I have found out that what is required for an individual's success is their own motivation. I cannot provide this to others.

This post got overrun by others. It is from 4 October and generated some comments. I moved it up the list by changing the nominal posting date.

Disclaimer

Much of this information is listed somewhere below. Here is an executive summary.

1. There are a lot of people who will be hurt badly very soon, at LANL and LLNL.
2. I can provide help in scientific, financial, and job hunting areas to each of these people. I have done it already for hundreds at LANL and a few at LLNL.
3. I get calls from head hunters each week looking for talent.
4. I am only one person. Besides the information in item 2, I am working on getting a few companies farther off the ground. If you want to know whether I can help you, please contact me soon. I will be useful to as many people as I can.

Lets hope that we all get through this mess with the minimum damage to ourselves and our friends.

Later,

No web site

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19

Don't go look at this web site, sent to me by a friend.