This is the one part of the contract that I am genuinely pleased with. Treating new hires like crap is shameful, and I'm glad we have moved beyond that.

When I got out of the Nav in 2000, I didn't even know what health insurance was; to this day I have no idea what, if any, coverage my first two jobs had. Shame on me for being an ignoramus; luckily I was able to go on my wife's policy when I got hired at Cal. Many other guys in my new hire class were not so lucky and had to pay hundreds of dollars a month for COBRA.

Again, I'm glad our future new hires won't have to worry about this. New guys should be concentrating on learning the ropes, not worrying about how they're gonna pay the bills and feed their families.