Check out this story in the NYT.
Wal-Mart's executive vice-president for "benefits," M. Susan Chambers, acknowledged in a recent memo that "46 percent of the children of Wal-Mart's 1.33 million United States employees were uninsured or on Medicaid," according to the New York Times, which has published an internal memo to Wal-Mart's Board of Directors.
Sadly, Chambers isn't terribly worried about sick children; she's concerned Wal-Mart is spending too much on benefits.
Mmmm. Trickling down.
Isn't it pretty to think so?
3 comments:
Look at General Motors. In high times, they struck deals with unions that gave their retirees some of the richest retirement benefits available. Now, they are renegotiating these benefits because they are too expensive. GM is on the verge of bankruptcy. And guess what? The unions are dealing. They finally realize that if they want to keep their high-paying jobs, they've got to give a little.
Likewise, Delphi--the autoparts maker that just went into bankruptcy--pays an hourly wage of $65.00/hour for non-skilled labor. That's more than I bill, and I'm college educated. Plus, I get no benefits. I'm not real sympathetic.
The unions have made it very clear that they are gunning for Wal-Mart--to unionize Wal-Mart. They see Wal-Mart as a golden calf, and if they succeed in taking Wal-Mart union, they will do the same thing to them that they did to GM and Ford, and Chrylser, and the big steel companies. Wal-Mart is a new host for the parasite that is organized labor.
I wonder how many of Wal-Mart's associates choose not to obtain some kind of health benefits? You assume they can't afford them. Isn't it safe to assume that many choose not to be insured. You can walk into any ER and be treated, and you don't have to pay. Why shell out $800.00/month for family benefits like I do?
Everybody loves to hate Wal-Mart, but everybody loves their low prices. I bet there's a blue, plastic Wal-Mart bag somewhere in your house. If you want to pay more, then let the unions come in and destroy another American business.
I can't speak for Barba, who posted this note. But your resentment over your own job and anti-unionism aren't very good responses to nearly half of Walmart employees' children going uninsured or on Medicaid, which is what Barba is pointing out. Yes, the system of benefits in the US is backwards, but it has repeatedly been shown to be cheaper for American society as a whole to have a benefits and healthcare system that takes care of all Americans rather than the outlandish insurance industry we have. Premiums rise regardless. We all know that. They do so even for doctors beyond the rate at which doctors are deal with malpractice suits, frivolous or not.
Anyway, I'll choose labor over the richest family in the world any day.
Thanks, straight 8 and Helmut, for the comments.
Typically, I feel obliged to respond to the most personal of straight 8's comments first: if there is a blue plastic Wal-Mart bag somewhere in my house, it's because I snatched it from some scrubby mesquite, where it flapped loudly like the official flower of South Texas. I don't set foot in the store.
And I didn't mean to suggest that I thought unionization is an apt response to such problems at Wal-Mart; on the other hand, the recent negotiations you cite give me some hope that unions might still play some meaningful role in relationships with business (but I agree that there are some serious problems to be addressed, on both sides).
Mostly, though, this entry was meant to complement Helmut's post on "a good society." Though I didn't make the point clearly enough, you really drove it home for me: there is a concrete connection between "free" ER visits on the part of Wal-Mart employees and the low, low prices many of you shoppers enjoy. Whatever you saved on cat litter is being spent for you on government-subsidized health care. What happens without those subsidies? Do we really want that situation?
Politically, the tragedy of such subsidizing is that you can wind up both enjoying the low prices and identifying the working poor as selfish (about contributing to their own health care) and the problem. If either the wealthiest family in the world or our government were willing to admit that we're all better served by some access to health care, we wouldn't be spending so much time accusing laborers of a selfish lack of foresight.
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