Hello, Medicare For All?

    I found the MSM accounts of the deeper cuts at General Motors (5,000 more workers to lose their jobs on top of the 25,000 UAW members who already faced the axe) pretty woeful, primarily because the stories typically refer only in passing to the role health care costs play in the demise of GM and other large companies. Sure, there are the issues of poor management and poor engineering; I'm not dismissing those as important factors (and, as an aside, it is annoying that The New York Times waits until virtually the end of its long front-page story to quote UAW President Ron Gettelfinger).

    But, staring you right in the face are the billions of dollars in health care costs that GM carries on its balance sheets. It is still startling to me that companies like GM, looking straight into the financial abyss, can't shake off an ideological straight-jacket that prevents it from shouting loudly, "we need to extend Medicare to every person in America."

    As I've argued here many times and most recently in a TomPaine.com column, the issue of universal health care--EXTEND MEDICARE TO ALL--is not just a moral question but one that is deeply about economic competitiveness. Even with the rise of the multi-national corporation, which care not a bit about national identity, most corporations still have a home-base of operations. And where that home base provides health insurance as a matter of national right, those companies have a competitive advantage over their counterparts...well. mostly their American counterparts because we seem to be the only significant economic player on the planet that can't shuck off the nonsense about the "free-market" and solve our health care crisis in the only way it can be solved: EXTEND MEDICARE TO ALL.

    Over at The Wall Street Journal, its piece predicts that "GM's announcement positions Mr. Wagoner and the UAW for a tough round of bargaining in 2007, when the UAW's contract with GM expires." I think that's right. I think it will be a nasty fight but, though I have no idea where the negotiations will go, I will say this: however the deal gets done, to make sure UAW members and others don't get caught in this vise again, a piece of the deal has got to be a requirement that GM lead the fight for Medicare For All within a very specific, short time frame.

   

Comments

[Adam Terando]

The ideological straight-jacket is tighter than you think. Even though it makes complete economic sense to pressure the government to take this monkey off their backs, they won't do it.
Why?
First, they don't want to risk the wrath of the republican party (e.g. repubs might say, "Ok, you want universal health care, how about we get rid of our dependence on foreign oil and agree to raise CAFE standards?" or "Ok, you think this is better for competition to have universal health care? Well how about we make it a true competetive marketplace and get rid of the duties we put on foreign imports?").

Second, how many of GM's execs have ties to the health care industry? Do any of GM's board members also sit on health care boards?

Third, they will not be a traitor to their class. Why would they help out the working class and the UAW when it could result in an income tax hike on their wealth AND, at the rate we're going their strangling the unions so they won't have to pay health insurance anyway. Or at least they can institute a wal-mart like health-care plan.

Just like you can't trust BushCo to run government when they don't BELIEVE in government, you can't trust multinational neo-liberal GM to support a government program to get rid of health care costs. And if the company goes down the executives will still be rich, so who cares?

[D Flinchum]

"And if the company goes down the executives will still be rich, so who cares?"

Exactly! One of the really obscene things that I remember from Jack Welch's messy divorce revelations is that the monthly allowance that his retirement gave him for "fresh cut flowers" was bigger than a lot of working stiffs' monthly retirement check! The elites seem to think that they - and only they - merit a decent retirement, health care, good education for the kids ( and grandkids), and affordable housing.

[Jill]

Yes, yes, yes. Here's something folks can do right now. Congress created the Citizens Health Care Working Group to "hear what people think and then send to the President and Congress a citizens' roadmap about how to make health care work for all Americans." Congress appropriated funding for a huge national survey, a series of community meetings and other forums for people to voice their opinions and ideas.

The UFCW is spreading the word and hope that thousands of working people will take the time to share your views on the official web survey. We need a unified voice that very clearly tells lawmakers that we demand a system that works for everyone. You can reach the survey through www.ufcw4healthcare.org

[Andrew Pollack]

You're so right about Medicare for all.
One quibble: when I saw the 5,000 on top of 25,000 formula this morning in the print Times I was taken aback because the web times the night before and all other web stories I saw said 30,000. I still don't know where they came up with this 25,000 previously announced stuff; seems like a way to say "big deal, they knew most of them were coming." Of course far more insidious was their typical story about the workers' resignation to their fate.

[Blue Cross of California]

Medicare for all would be a great way to improve our health care system.

[khill]

The very idea that GM execs, wealthy but not the real power at GM, would advocate for universal health-care, or any other social program, is pretty "out there". The nature of the economic system and it's masters has not changed and they will never do anything that we don't make them do.

[Mark Keller]

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