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In My Opinion: IUE-CWA - Taking the Lead for Millions of Workers
The recent two-day national strike by our IUE-CWA members sent General Electric a strong signal that we will fight to protect our health care - and it also elevated America's health care crisis to national prominence.
Our walkout had Peter Jennings and Tom Brokaw talking about rising medical costs and the squeeze on workers on the evening news, it produced coverage in hundreds of publications, and prompted a major profile of Vice President Ed Fire in the Sunday New York Times.
It wasn't just a brief strike, even against a high profile company such as GE, that caused all the attention. Our strike gave the media a news hook for an issue that resonates across the land. The message was clear - IUE-CWA members were fighting not just for themselves but for millions of other working families.
Employment-based health coverage is the backbone of our medical delivery system, and it's under enormous strain. Even during the economic boom years of the '90s, some 40 million Americans - 80 percent of them in families with at least one worker - had no coverage. That number is growing now, jumping by another 1.4 million uninsured in 2001, the last year for which there are figures (and not counting the tens of thousands laid off last year).
The reason: With health care costs now rising again by double-digits, employers - especially those without unions – are shifting premium costs to the point that fewer workers can afford them.
Shifting health care costs to workers may seem to be a short-term solution for a business looking to keep its costs down and profits up, but it's no answer for our society - it's the cause of the problem. About one-third of the cost of health coverage goes to subsidize the uninsured, many of whom use hospital emergency rooms as their sole source of medical care. Adding to the number of people forced to drop health coverage just sends costs even higher for everyone.
Let alone the moral issue: Squeezing a worker out of the insured health system condemns that worker and his family to a 25 percent higher risk of dying, according to the Institute of Medicine. Uninsured Americans with colon or breast cancer are twice as likely to die as those with private coverage. They are much more likely to die of trauma injuries, such as from car crashes, and less likely to be admitted to hospitals for needed treatment.
Unions are on the front lines of this crisis, not only in resisting and spotlighting the destructive profits-over-people policy of big business, but in pushing for responsible solutions to cost containment.
In 1989 bargaining with the major telecom companies, CWA proposed - actually insisted on - joint committees and managed care programs to curb rising costs. We didn't want to keep confronting concession demands every three years, we wanted to help these employers get their costs down long-term while maintaining a high quality of care for our members. At AT&T, we created the first national managed care program in the nation. Over the years, we've helped save these employers many millions of dollars.
Today, rising costs are again a huge problem, with employer insurance premiums rising nearly 13 percent for 2001. CWA remains willing and eager to work with employers and find creative ways to help contain costs while maintaining quality care for both active and retired workers.
But we also call on our employers to join with us in pushing for a national solution to this crisis.
When the Clinton administration tried to reform our wasteful health delivery system and require that all larger employers provide some minimum standard of health coverage, our major employers stood on the sidelines - even though this would have saved them enormous sums - while the powerful insurance lobby scuttled the reform program.
These employers also have been silent on the issue of providing real prescription drug benefits for seniors under Medicare, which would benefit them as well.
If our employers are content to pay the extra one-third of their health care premiums to subsidize other irresponsible employers who don't take care of their workers, and support - rather than fix - a broken system, then they can't expect our members to reach into their pockets and help pay the tab.
CWA is working with a coalition of business, labor and medical providers, the National Coalition for Health Care, to develop comprehensive reform of our health delivery system. And fortunately, we are now beginning to see bipartisan recognition in Congress that reforms are needed to address the growing numbers of uninsured Americans.
We invite CWA employers to join us, to step up and start becoming part of the solution rather than the problem.
Our walkout had Peter Jennings and Tom Brokaw talking about rising medical costs and the squeeze on workers on the evening news, it produced coverage in hundreds of publications, and prompted a major profile of Vice President Ed Fire in the Sunday New York Times.
It wasn't just a brief strike, even against a high profile company such as GE, that caused all the attention. Our strike gave the media a news hook for an issue that resonates across the land. The message was clear - IUE-CWA members were fighting not just for themselves but for millions of other working families.
Employment-based health coverage is the backbone of our medical delivery system, and it's under enormous strain. Even during the economic boom years of the '90s, some 40 million Americans - 80 percent of them in families with at least one worker - had no coverage. That number is growing now, jumping by another 1.4 million uninsured in 2001, the last year for which there are figures (and not counting the tens of thousands laid off last year).
The reason: With health care costs now rising again by double-digits, employers - especially those without unions – are shifting premium costs to the point that fewer workers can afford them.
Shifting health care costs to workers may seem to be a short-term solution for a business looking to keep its costs down and profits up, but it's no answer for our society - it's the cause of the problem. About one-third of the cost of health coverage goes to subsidize the uninsured, many of whom use hospital emergency rooms as their sole source of medical care. Adding to the number of people forced to drop health coverage just sends costs even higher for everyone.
Let alone the moral issue: Squeezing a worker out of the insured health system condemns that worker and his family to a 25 percent higher risk of dying, according to the Institute of Medicine. Uninsured Americans with colon or breast cancer are twice as likely to die as those with private coverage. They are much more likely to die of trauma injuries, such as from car crashes, and less likely to be admitted to hospitals for needed treatment.
Unions are on the front lines of this crisis, not only in resisting and spotlighting the destructive profits-over-people policy of big business, but in pushing for responsible solutions to cost containment.
In 1989 bargaining with the major telecom companies, CWA proposed - actually insisted on - joint committees and managed care programs to curb rising costs. We didn't want to keep confronting concession demands every three years, we wanted to help these employers get their costs down long-term while maintaining a high quality of care for our members. At AT&T, we created the first national managed care program in the nation. Over the years, we've helped save these employers many millions of dollars.
Today, rising costs are again a huge problem, with employer insurance premiums rising nearly 13 percent for 2001. CWA remains willing and eager to work with employers and find creative ways to help contain costs while maintaining quality care for both active and retired workers.
But we also call on our employers to join with us in pushing for a national solution to this crisis.
When the Clinton administration tried to reform our wasteful health delivery system and require that all larger employers provide some minimum standard of health coverage, our major employers stood on the sidelines - even though this would have saved them enormous sums - while the powerful insurance lobby scuttled the reform program.
These employers also have been silent on the issue of providing real prescription drug benefits for seniors under Medicare, which would benefit them as well.
If our employers are content to pay the extra one-third of their health care premiums to subsidize other irresponsible employers who don't take care of their workers, and support - rather than fix - a broken system, then they can't expect our members to reach into their pockets and help pay the tab.
CWA is working with a coalition of business, labor and medical providers, the National Coalition for Health Care, to develop comprehensive reform of our health delivery system. And fortunately, we are now beginning to see bipartisan recognition in Congress that reforms are needed to address the growing numbers of uninsured Americans.
We invite CWA employers to join us, to step up and start becoming part of the solution rather than the problem.