Courtyard House: Starting as a mediocre engineer

In handling safety accidents, the interests of the families are given priority in principle. If an agreement can be reached beforehand, the punishment will be mitigated accordingly.

That's why those few hours were set aside earlier to allow Manager Liu to comfort the family members.

But to everyone's surprise, this silly bird didn't do anything at all.

Zhuang Zhongchen quickly pulled Manager Liu aside: "Don't you know how to calm the family members down?"

But Manager Liu seemed particularly aggrieved: "I really don't know! There have been cases of people having illnesses in the bathhouse before, some even died. But they were always sent directly to the hospital! I've never encountered anything like this before, how could someone fall and die?"

Zhuang Zhongchen finally understood. Safety accidents in bathhouses were indeed quite rare. Many people might fall and get injured, but that usually just meant being taken to the hospital for emergency treatment. But to fall and die instantly, requiring the entire police and labor bureau to be mobilized? Manager Liu and his team had never encountered anything like it.

Faced with such a clueless person, Zhuang Zhongchen was also quite helpless. He kindly reminded her, "Manager Liu, I'll give you two more hours. I'll go and inspect the site. Now you know what to do, right?"

"No, no, Leader Zhuang. Please, please, could you please give me some pointers?"

"According to national policy, compensation is 20 months' basic salary. If that's lower than the city's average wage, it will be calculated based on the average wage. What was the deceased's income?"

"He's been retired at home for a long time, hasn't he?"

"That's the city's average wage. Last year it was 24.7 yuan, so the compensation would be 500 yuan."

"That's not right, Leader Zhuang. We're innocent! He fell down on his own!"

"Did you keep the bathhouse floors clean? Did you clean them promptly? The report is in black and white, it's just that you stepped in a soap shovel? There are so many other people bathing nearby who can testify. This is irrefutable evidence, what are you trying to prove wrongly?"

"Yes, yes. Alright then, 500 yuan it is!"

"Wait a minute. Generally speaking, the compensation should be 50% to 100% more than the national regulations, otherwise it will be difficult to appease the family members, and that would be bullying honest people."

"Huh? More?"

"Hey! You need to be more flexible. Give an extra 100 yuan for funeral expenses, send a wreath, and offer your condolences in person. Show some sincerity first. It would be best to also help the family get a job, wouldn't that be enough?"

"Oh, I see." Manager Liu suddenly realized. "Thanks, Manager Zhuang."

"You're welcome. You can go ahead and get busy!"

"Yes, yes."

Actually, this is considered quite good in accident compensation.

Like Jia Dongxu, whose basic salary was 33 yuan, his compensation was 660 yuan. Even though Uncle Yi Zhonghai pulled every string, he only received a total of 800 yuan in compensation, plus a job for Qin Huairu.

Therefore, here, Zhuang Zhongchen not only alleviated the aftereffects on Manager Liu and his colleagues, but also secretly helped the deceased's family. The dead are gone; let's focus on caring for the living!

You know what, Manager Liu truly lives up to his reputation as a manager in the service industry. Once he figured things out, he quickly reached an agreement with the family. Of course, the main reason was still that job opening.

Once Manager Liu and his family had all signed off, Zhuang Zhongchen's work was considered complete. The next step was to organize the materials and submit them to his superiors for confirmation of the penalty standards. However, such penalties were generally not severe, usually just a fine for the Qianmen Bathhouse.

Anyway, this kind of fine is just a formality; at most, Manager Liu and his team will have some bonuses deducted. They won't hold anyone accountable. It's a lenient approach...

"Hey, Xiao Zhuang, what are these cigarettes and bath tickets?"

"Sister Tao, don't ask anything, it's just ordinary social interaction."

"I understand, I understand. You guys who do fieldwork are really great."

"Actually, there are tough times too. The key is to do your job well, otherwise you'll get punished."

"Uh-huh."

This time it was alright! Although no new tasks were triggered, Manager Liu was quite sensible.

……

Back at his workplace, Zhuang Zhongchen still had some finishing touches to complete.

The main purpose is to summarize the lessons learned from the accident and, ideally, offer some reasonable suggestions. This will then be distributed to all enterprises and institutions in Beijing as the latest safety education material.

In other words, once a safety accident occurs, all enterprises and institutions should learn from the experience.

However, at this moment, Zhuang Zhongchen suddenly became depressed.

Since it's about preventing slipping, it should be easy to solve. It's simply a matter of using non-slip shoes, non-slip floor tiles, non-slip mats...

But in the early 60s, this was simply impossible!

Currently, the public bathhouses use wooden clogs. Although they have anti-slip stripes, over time the clogs will wear down and lose their anti-slip effect.

Anti-slip floor tiles are also impossible to produce; there's simply no domestic production capacity for them. Wooden flooring is generally used, and it's just as easy to wear down.

As for anti-slip mats? PVC? Silicone? Magic glue?

Holy crap! This request is way too high, I can't possibly do it!

Currently, China's annual plastic production is around 5 tons. By the time of the Industrial Cthulhu Era, annual production will have reached an astonishing 8000 million tons?

So, some of the very common anti-slip materials that were available later on simply don't exist now? Then why bother making one?

Stroking his chin, Zhuang Zhongchen pondered for a while. Since there were no anti-slip materials like plastic, could he create a... monkey-print anti-slip mat? In other words, a counterfeit or substandard product?

In that instant, Zhuang Zhongchen felt as if he had entered a new world. He suddenly realized that he had a huge misconception.

Before his transmigration, Zhuang Zhongchen had visited many countries, some of which were still industrial wastelands. In these countries, Zhuang Zhongchen observed a very interesting phenomenon—there were absolutely no counterfeit or substandard products.

It's not that people in these countries are highly educated or respect intellectual property rights. Rather, it's that the production cost of counterfeit and substandard goods is actually higher than that of genuine imported products?

To give a simple example: how about mixing several chemicals with water to create the worst kind of laundry detergent? That should be easy, right? But why does it cost more than imported brand-name laundry detergent?

This is ridiculous. So don't underestimate counterfeiting or knockoffs. They also require a certain level of industrial capacity, something most countries in the world simply can't do!

However, in this era, instead of focusing solely on cutting-edge technology, counterfeit and shoddy goods became the most suitable option for our national conditions. Counterfeit and shoddy goods from the Industrial Cthulhu era, if placed today, would definitely be considered high-tech!

Furthermore, shouldn't a mediocre engineer be expected to produce mediocre work?

Thinking of this, Zhuang Zhongchen immediately had an idea: since there was no anti-slip material, let's use other materials as substitutes...

Before long, Zhuang Zhongchen finished all the finishing work. He gave a few instructions to his colleagues and decided to leave work early. Taking advantage of the early hour, he hurriedly headed towards his street.