Wal-Mart teamed up with the SEIU in calling for a mandate for employers to provide health insurance. What, are they hoping their employees’ spouses’ employers will provide better coverage than they do? If this was such an important issue to Wal-Mart why are so many of their employees on Medicaid? Maybe they’re trying to undermine the competition, as the US Chamber of Commerce alleged.
The decision by Wal-Mart to break away from the Chamber and its ilk marks the first visible crack in the business coalition on healthcare reform.
The Chamber issued a blistering denunciation of Wal-Mart’s action Tuesday, saying the company is trying to undermine other retailers through anti-competitive means.
“Some businesses make the decision to use the government as a weapon against their competition,” James Gelfand, the Chamber’s senior manager for health policy, said in a statement. “We do not agree with this method — the government is a blunt instrument and taxes have extreme unintended consequences, negatively affecting the economy as a whole. We also recognize that momentum is moving against an employer mandate. The business community will be stepping up our advocacy as necessary, too.” …
SEIU and other unions have assailed Wal-Mart for years for its workplace policies, wages and fringe benefits, arguing that the behemoth retailer was making enormous profits on the backs of low-wage workers.
But the company has taken concrete steps in recent years to expand health coverage for its employees, though sometimes through controversial means such as encouraging workers to sign up for government programs. Wal-Mart now says that more than 90 percent of its employees have health coverage, though many receive it from other sources.
At the same time, Wal-Mart successfully fought back against state laws that would have required the companies to provide health insurance. Maryland actually enacted such a law, but a federal court overturned it in 2006.
I stopped shopping at Wal-Mart years ago because the local store is a dump. Whatever the motive behind Wal-Mart’s decision, if the democrats pass a health care package with employer mandates and public option we’re going to see even more Americans out of work in this recession.
