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PaperclipPerfector  6hr ago (text post)   209 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for May 29, 2026

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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Mildly entertaining exercise: Rendition of a random UN Security Council resolution into HTML, with dozens of bullet points added in order to improve intelligibility

Interesting Gallup article on "span of control" (the number of subordinates per manager)

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there is roughly one manager for every 11.5 employees. Gallup data show a similar pattern: The average number of people reporting to managers has increased from 10.9 in 2024 to 12.1 in 2025. This is a nearly-50-% increase in team size [from 8.2] since Gallup first measured in 2013.

At the same time, the median team size has held steady at about five to six employees per manager or leader. In other words, a minority of very large teams is pulling the average up, while most managers still lead relatively small teams. Gallup data show that 37 % of managers or leaders oversee fewer than five people, while roughly two-thirds (66 %) manage fewer than 10. About one in five managers (22 %) has 10 to 24 direct reports, and only 13 % oversee 25 or more employees.

Team size is only as effective as the engagement behind it. Highly engaged teams of 12 or more workers who are supported by effective management—double the current median of six workers per team—can thrive, while poorly managed teams struggle even when small.

There is no information on the number of managers per subordinate.

There has recently been some discussion of partition actions: a property is owned in common by several people, but one of the owners wants to sell his share. One of this website's illustrious lawyer denizens has mentioned how he (1) hates division of property between heirs because it results in huge complications over time, and therefore (2) prefers primogeniture. Do you have any opinions or experiences on this topic?

In the 1970s, my grandfather in the US Virgin Islands (a wretched hive of scum, villainy, and hurricanes) died young. After a probate process that for some reason took eight years (I am in possession of the "final adjudication and decree of distribution" but none of the other court documents, so I don't know the details), his house was split between his heirs—1/3 to his wife (my grandmother), and 1/9 to each of his six children (two by a previous wife and four (including my mother) by my grandmother). As the decades rolled by, all of these seven heirs ceased living in the property. Ironically, at present the property's only inhabitant is a non-heir—the son of my grandmother by a previous husband. He is a layabout and has allowed the property (assessed at market value of 95 k$; Zillow does not produce Zestimates in this backwater) to fall into disrepair.

I am hoping that, after my grandmother dies, I will be able to convince my mother to start a partition action in order to convert her share of this albatross into cash. The USVI has enacted the Uniform Partition of Heirs' Property Act, so if my mother were to start a partition action her siblings (including the half-brother, since he would have finally become a part-owner) would have a chance to buy her out before any forced sale of the entire property. But she expects that they would be either uninterested in, or incapable of, buying her out. Also, there is a possible complication: My grandfather's two children by his first wife (already adult and moved out when he died) allegedly gave their shares to my grandmother (out of charity—my grandfather had no life insurance, so his death threw my grandmother into poverty), but if this property transfer occurred it apparently was never officially recorded. I look forward to the hullabaloo.

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