This just highlights the absurdity of having your employer responsible for your health insurance and managing your taxes for you.

These should be handled by the government, equally for all.

Moving some function to the government doesn’t eliminate the need for it. Something would still need to tell the government what you’re paid unless you’re advocating for anarchy or communism.

Also, part of that etc is doing payroll so there’s some reason for you to show up at work every day.

> These should be handled by the government, equally for all.

This is certainly possible, but it's called communism.

No. Private insurance could still be an option.

> HR on the surface seems unimportant, but you’d notice if the company stopped having health insurance or sending your taxes to the IRS etc etc.

That's not why companies have HR; sure, it's a nice side-effect, but it's not the reason for HR.

HR exists primarily to protect the company from the employees.

I emailed HR and asked what to do to best ask for leave in case of a future event (serious illness with a family member, I just wanted to be one step ahead and make sure I did everything right even in the state of grief).

HR wouldn't tell me what would be the best and most correct course of action, the only thing that they said was that it was my responsibility as an employee to find out. Well, what did they think I was doing.

Side effect seems like an odd way to describe what’s going on when these functions are required for a company to operate.

Companies don’t survive if nobody is paid to show up every day or if they keep paying every single ex employee that ever worked for the company. It’s harder to attract new employees if you don’t offer competitive salaries or benefits. HR is a tiny part of most companies, but without that work being done the company would absolutely fail.

Similarly a specific ratio of flight attendants to passengers are required by the FAA in case of an emergency. Airlines use them for other stuff but they wouldn’t have nearly as many if the job was just passing out food.

> HR on the surface seems unimportant, but you’d notice if the company stopped having health insurance or sending your taxes to the IRS etc etc.

Interesting on how the very example you give for "oh this job isn't really bullshit" ultimately ends up being useless for the business itself, and exists only as a result of regulation.

No, health insurance being provided by employers, or tax withholding aren't useful things for anyone, except for the state who now offloads its costs onto private businesses.

Only result of regulation, that statement invalidates probably a majority of modern work, and like every legal professional.

i agree.