Workin' Man - Part XXX - State Deep State

Well, I get up at seven, yeah

And I go to work at nine
I got no time for livin'
Yes, I'm workin' all the time

It seems to me
I could live my life
A lot better than I think I am
I guess that's why they call me
They call me the workin' man

'Cause I get home at five o'clock
And I take myself out an ice cold beer
Always seem to be wondering'
Why there's nothin' goin' down here

I guess that's why they call me
They call me the workin' man

"Workin' Man" - Words & Music by Lee & Lifeson 

 My blizzard of job applications included four, if I remember correctly, positions in Nebraska State government. I received an email back from one of them, informing me that I was being considered, and was called in for an interview for a "Fiscal Compliance Analyst". The description was somewhat vague, but the requirements listed were all things that I had, including post-secondary coursework in accounting. One of the benefits that I took advantage of at B&R Stores was their tuition reimbursement program. They paid for a good portion of the two-year Associate Degree in Business with an Accounting Focus. I completed my degree during my first year as a store director at Russ's. This degree got me in the door at the Department of Revenue. When Revenue Human Resources called to schedule an interview I had completely forgotten even the vague job description, so I went into that interview unclear about what I was actually applying for. The interviewers, who I later found out were the Manager of the Incentives Group of the Audit Division and the Senior Auditor in that group, went through a list of generic questions, most of which I had asked people myself during the many job interviews I conducted in my management roles. I was asked how this position fit into my long range career plan. At fifty-seven years old, my career plan was anything but long term. I honestly told them that it didn't, but that I had read the job description (I had, even though I couldn't remember what was in it!) and I thought the requirements fit with my skill set. I then asked if the next question was going to be "Where do you see yourself in five years?" -- which it was! I told them that I hoped that I'd be in a job where I was valued and where I enjoyed going to work every day. I later found out that my age was a plus, since many younger people right out of college left after getting enough experience to move to a private accounting firm for a much higher salary. They figured at age fifty-seven I wasn't a job hopper. 

A week or so later I received a job offer and began my new career in early January 2016. 

The work group to which I was assigned handled tax incentives. Nebraska is one of many states that offer tax incentives to encourage businesses to locate in our state. In general, a company would agree to increase their employment and investment by a set amount and in return receive credits that could be used to offset income tax liability or receive refunds on sales taxes or state withholding tax. To utilize their credits a claim was submitted listing eligible sales tax transactions and claiming a refund on the amount of sales tax. Our group was made up of examiners and auditors. Examiner was the entry level position. An examiner did all the initial reviews of refund claims which were then checked over by auditors. Auditors also audited the businesses who applied to be on an incentive program. An auditor needed to have a Bachelors Degree in Accounting, so for an examiner to be promoted to an auditor position, they would need to receive a a degree; there were many examiners who remained in that position for 30 or 40 years. I often referred to the Audit Division separation between examiners and auditors as a caste system. (more on my perception of Revenue caste later).

When a taxpayer in an incentive program applied for a refund of sales tax, the examiners were the first to review the claims. The taxpayer would submit a listing of all the invoices for which they were claiming a refund of sales taxes, as well as pdf images of a percentages of those invoices. The examiner's job was to confirm several items on each invoice:

1. The invoice was for a transaction that took place at the taxpayer's business address ("at the project")
2. The tax on the invoice matched what was claimed
3. The vendor who charged the sales tax was licensed for sales tax in Nebraska
4. The transaction was properly paid tax, i.e. not an exempt transaction
5. Not previously paid on an earlier claim

There were other, more arcane things, to look for, but those were the basics. In retrospect, it should have been fairly simple to train a new examiner to review a sales tax refund claim. But for some reason new examiner training was designed to be as complicated as possible, with little information on how to actually review a claim. Training started out with a few days of generic training -- first with instruction on things like benefits, and moving on to audit-specific training. The problem was that the audit-specific training was very specific...it applied to auditors, not to examiners. I tried to absorb as much as I could but I'm glad I didn't try too hard, since it had nothing to do with me! 

The next phase of my training involved sitting in a conference room listening to a senior auditor go through a Power Point presentation. There was so much information that I was having trouble keeping up, or even understanding what the point of much of it was. It certainly gave me virtually no information on how to review a refund claim. Years later, when I became responsible for training, I referred to it as long on theory, but short on practice. It didn't help that the person who was supposed to be training us (another examiner started on the same day as I did) started out the training by admitting that she wasn't very good at training. After our completely useless training Jessica (my coworker who started when I did) and I attempted to review the claim that we were assigned. Since we had received no practical instruction regarding what we should be looking for, we agonized over every invoice. Attempts to get clarification elicited curt answers that were only partially helpful. Jessica was convinced that we were going to get fired because we didn't know what we were doing. I knew better. While a trainee is responsible to learn the job, the greater responsibility is on the shoulders of the trainer, who is tasked with ensuring that the new employee has the tools needed to do their assigned job. We were not given those tools. 

My own learning style is hands-on. I learn best by doing the work and learning from my mistakes and from feedback from my supervisors and trainers. Part of my process is paring away the information that I don't need and concentrating on what is important to get the job done. For example, the main incentive program consisted of six tiers. Each tier had different requirements and different benefits for meeting those requirements. With one minor exception a review of a refund claim could be completed without understanding the difference among the tiers, or even knowing what tier the taxpayer's project was. So I ignored this information. In fact, over nine years later, as I approached retirement, I still didn't know the details of the different tiers without looking them up and it didn't affect my ability to work claims, or eventually to approve and sign off on them. 

One challenge of working for the state didn't directly involve the work that I was doing, but the fact that it was extremely difficult to find a parking spot. There were two state owned garages, and several surface parking lots, but there was a waiting list for all of them. Most of the streets around the State Office Building had metered parking. When I started work parking was $2.00 an hour, soon to go up to $2.50 and eventually $3.00. For an 8½ hour day, a $17.00 per day expense ($340 for the month!) was not reasonable (private garages were $10.00 for the whole day) so while on the parking spot waiting list I had to scout around in the morning for a street without meters. After trying different spot at varying distances from the office I finally settled on a couple of streets that were pretty close. There was a couple of streets two blocks long running east-west, crossed by another street running a block north and a block south. At its closest it was two blocks from the office. I found if I arrived after 6:15 and before 6:45 there was plenty of available spots to park. The streets were full of apartments and apparently most of the residents left for work between 6:15 and 6:45! I parked there every day until I finally got a garage spot the week before we were all sent home in April 2020 due to the Covid pandemic.

Zipper Merge and the Left Lane

We've all been there. A lane is closing up ahead. Everyone moves over to the lane that's staying open. Except for that one asshole who stays in the lane that's closing, speeding to the front of the line, trying to merge in ahead of everyone else. Or maybe you've been  that asshole! Despite what the popular view might be, the "asshole" is following the law, and you can get ticketed if you refuse to let him in. Welcome to the bright future world of zipper merging. 

The zipper merging advocates suggest that utilizing all open lanes up to the point where one of them is no longer open, then taking turns merging into the remaining lane.  There are studies that indicate that this is more efficient -- that traffic actually moves faster when zipper merging. I have to wonder whether these studies took place under real-life conditions or were mathematical models, because I have never seen a video of this working smoothly. Sure, I've seen plenty of animations illustrating how it should work, but nothing showing real cars in real traffic smoothly zipper merging. 

I'll concede that there are certain scenarios where it theoretically should work better than everyone moving over as soon as the "lane closing" sign appears. One might be in bumper-to-bumper, slow moving traffic where every lane is already occupied. Trying to move over right away would require vehicles slowing down to create gaps in the traffic flow to allow people to merge early. This would slow down everything.  In this situation it's unlikely that one could move over very easily. But when the traffic got to the choke point, both lanes would need to slow down enough to allow alternate merging into the open lane. It's not clear to me that zipper merging would cause traffic to move faster, although it would prevent the traffic from extending back so far as to block exits, which is a benefit. You'd still need to deal with the human tendency to think of themselves first -- drivers would all need to follow the rules, but I'm not convinced, for the previously stated reasons, that traffic would move any faster.

Now if traffic is moving at, or close to, the speed limit, and and there are enough naturally occurring gaps between vehicles (as there should be -- 1 second for every 10mph) then it should make absolutely no difference when you move over to the open lane. In fact, if vehicles are sliding out of the lane that is closing when there is a natural break in the flow of traffic in the other lane, rather than waiting until the merge point, traffic should continue to move at the same rate. If everybody waits until one of the lanes disappears, both lanes are going to have to slow down to allow each lane to alternately move forward. The only way zipper merging works in this scenario is if (1) space between vehicles in the lane that is staying open is maintained and (2) drivers in the lane that is closing merge into the space left for them without slowing or stopping and (3) no one is a jerk. In my opinion the probability of "1" and "3" is 50-50 at best; the probability of "2" is going to be pretty low -- drivers are going to be naturally hesitant about pulling in front of another moving vehicle and hoping that they allowed enough space and time. The natural reaction will be to at least slightly slow down, causing a chain reaction, slowing everyone down. Then there's the question of why, in some scenarios, is anyone even in what is usually designated as the passing lane?

Rules about the left lane on multi-lane roads is another of the things that irritate me. In most states the far left lane is for actively passing slower vehicles only. The reasoning is that drivers should be free to drive at the speed limit -- if a vehicle is traveling below that speed, other drivers should have the option to safely get around them. It makes sense to me. But I hear a lot of complaining from drivers who are stuck behind someone in the passing lane not going fast enough. Technically, if you stay in the left lane while not actively passing slower traffic, it's a traffic offense that will earn you a ticket. What I see most though, are people griping that someone driving at the speed limit is preventing them from exceeding the speed limit! I even recently saw a video where a member of law enforcement proudly ticketed drivers "camped out" in the left lane at the speed limit, while ignoring people speeding around them.  Logically, if I am driving at the speed limit in the passing lane, why does anyone need to pass me? By passing someone driving at the speed limit they are exceeding the limit and breaking the law! I have no idea whether most highway patrolmen ticket people for hogging the left lane, but I know they'll nab you for speeding if they catch you. 

Personally I drive 5 mph over the speed limit on the interstate. Illegal, I know, but I'm gambling that the cops are going to let it slide and I've never received a ticket for driving between 1-5 mph over the limit. (It's a misconception that cops can't pull you over for going less than 5 mph over, but they usually won't) Some days the middle and right lanes are full of people who are driving slower, so rather than constantly changing lanes to pass car after car of slower vehicles I stay in the left lane for long stretches. In those situations I feel no obligation to enable someone who wants to break the law even more than I'm already breaking it. If someone comes roaring up behind me when I'm already doing 80 in a 75, they're just going to have to wait until there's a clear stretch of road in the middle lane for me to get over to. Chances are they're going to thread the needle through small gaps and pass me in the center lane or even way over on the right. Not my problem. Now, if I have an open middle lane, that's where I'll be.