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June 8, 2010 |
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Tuesday
Insurance industry aims to take over public, nonprofit workers' comp system
(Column appearing in ReaI Change) -- Initiative 1082, which will likely appear on this fall’s ballot, would privatize our state’s public nonprofit workers’ compensation system. It is sponsored by the right-wing Building Industry Association of Washington and by the insurance industry, including the notorious AIG. Yes, that too-big-to-fail insurance company that we taxpayers bailed out is the nation’s biggest private workers’ compensation insurer. And they want a piece of the action in Washington state. Here are five good reasons why I-1082 would be bad news for injured workers and employers. Learn more.
Good Jobs rally Friday in Longview
Working
families in S.W. Washington know there is no such thing as a "jobless
recovery" from the Great Recession. The restoration of quality jobs is
what will signal an end to this recession, not the return of corporate
profits or stock market gains. Thousands of people in Cowlitz County are
looking for work and can’t find it today. Sustained double-digit
unemployment continues to plague our community, and we feel MORE CAN -- AND
MUST -- BE DONE to employ local workers in local jobs.
Please join the Longview-Kelso Building and Construction Trades Council at this "Good Jobs Now" Rally on Friday, June 11 in Longview. This event -- from 2 to 4 p.m. at Lake Sacajawea (Louisiana & Kessler) -- is endorsed by the Cowlitz-Wahkiakum Central Labor Council. For more information, contact the Longview-Kelso BCTC at 360-577-0535.
Jobs Bill news:
► In today's Bellingham Herald -- Gregoire warns of layoffs unless state gets promised Medicaid funding -- The governor warns that unless Congress acts quickly to provide $23 billion in additional Medicaid funding to the states, Washington may have to lay off up to 12,000 workers. In a letter to the state's congressional delegation, Gregoire said the state was counting on the $480 million it expected to receive. Absent the funding, she said she would be forced to call a special session of the Legislature and if the Legislature acted quickly to fill the budget deficit, the state might have to cut 6,000 jobs. If the Legislature waited until January when it regularly meets, the state might have to cut 12,000 workers, she said.
► In today's NY Times -- Medicaid cut places states in a bind -- Congress's failure to restore the Medicaid funds to states “would actually kill everything the stimulus has done,” said Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell. “It would be enormously destructive.”
► At Politico -- Senate
Dems move on Jobs Bill -- Trying to get to 60 votes, Senate Democrats
proposed changes to a House-passed jobs bill Tuesday that would increase aid
to cash-strapped states while treading more lightly on new tax rules aimed
at private equity interests with clout in the party.
► In today's Washington Post -- Tax break for money managers hangs on amid financial debate -- For three years in a row, many of the country's wealthiest financiers have held on to what critics call an enormous tax break for Wall Street. Each year, a measure that would change the tax treatment of "carried interest" passes the House, only to hit a wall in the Senate. It's back, this time in the jobs bill approved by the House last month. And if ever there were a time to pass a tax increase on billionaire money managers this would be it. Yet the Senate looms and two powerful Democrats Sen. Harry Reid and Max Baucus are working to soften it.
► A related story In today's Washington Post -- Voters support of Congress at an all-time low -- Just 29% now say they are inclined to support their House representative, even lower than in 1994, when voters swept the Democrats out of power in that chamber after 40 years in the majority.
► In today's NY Times -- "A very deep hole" on jobs (Bob Herbert column) -- It’s impossible to overstate the threat that this crisis of unemployment poses to the well-being of the United States. With so many people out of work and so much of the rest of the population deeply in debt, where is the spending going to come from to power a true economic recovery? The deficit hawks are forecasting Armageddon, but how is anyone going to get a handle on the federal deficits if we don’t get millions of people back to work and paying taxes?
State election news:
► At Publicola -- Pot campaign denounces SEIU for "walking away" -- The faltering I-1068 campaign to legalize pot issues a bummed-out press release. Hoping for financial backing from the SEIU so the campaign could used paid signature gatherers, but the union decided against it after "concluding there were too many questions about the policy.”
► In today's Olympian -- A few filing twists on Day 1 -- A self-styled tea party "grandma" filed to challenge state Sen. Tim Sheldon in the rural 35th Legislative District on Monday, the opening day for candidates to file in Washington's fall election cycle.
Local news:
► In today's Spokesman-Review -- EWU's provost stepping down -- John Mason, Eastern Washington University’s provost, has resigned amid conflict with college faculty and just three days before the faculty senate was to hold a no-confidence vote on his leadership.
► In today's Bellingham Herald -- Bellingham to hold hearing on transportation district -- The City Council may create a taxing district for transportation and ask voters for a sales tax increase.
National news:
► At AFL-CIO Now -- Jobs, economic fears -- not love of right -- fuel workers' anger -- The nation’s working families “are understandably frustrated, anxious and angry,” says AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker. “They are angry at Wall Street and the government… they don’t see anybody out there fighting with passion for good jobs… the forces of the right are at work to turn that anger in a dangerous direction.”
► A related story in today's NY Times -- Pushing liberal agenda, with Democrats as target -- Up to 2,000 activists assemble in Washington, D.C. to press the White House and Congress to fight harder for an ambitious progressive agenda, including a generous jobs bill.
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BP's live BS
Cam™ ► In The Onion -- Massive flow of BS continues to gush from BP headquarters -- The toxic bullshit, which began to spew from the mouths of BP executives shortly after the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in April, has completely devastated the Gulf region, delaying cleanup efforts, affecting thousands of jobs, and endangering the lives of all nearby wildlife. |
► In today's Wash. Post -- Reports at BP over years find history of problems -- A series of internal investigations over the past decade warned senior BP managers that the oil company repeatedly disregarded safety and environmental rules and risked a serious accident if it did not change its ways. Taken together, these documents portray a company that systemically ignored its own safety policies across its North American operations -- from Alaska to the Gulf of Mexico to California and Texas. Executives were not held accountable for the failures, and some were promoted despite them.
► At SeattlePI.com -- Poll: Criminally prosecute BP for oil spill -- Almost two-thirds of Americans agree "strongly" or "somewhat" that the federal government should pursue criminal charges against BP and other companies involved in the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster.
► In today's Washington Post -- White House directing agencies to cut budgets -- The White House is directing agencies to develop plans for trimming at least 5% from their budgets by identifying programs that do little to advance their missions or President Obama's agenda.
► In today's NY Times -- Former manager of Iowa slaughterhouse is acquitted of labor charges -- The former manager of a kosher slaughterhouse that was the site of a 2008 immigration raid was acquitted of criminal charges that he knowingly employed under-age workers at the plant.
► In today's
NY Times -- With
strikes, China's workers seem to gain power -- Just days after resolving
a strike by agreeing to give substantial raises to 1,900 workers at its
transmission factory, Honda Motor said Tuesday that employees at another of
its parts plants in southern China had staged a walkout. The second Honda
strike comes amid growing signs that China’s huge migrant work force is
gaining bargaining power. New pressure to raise pay and improve labor
conditions is likely to raise the cost of doing business and could induce
some companies to shift production elsewhere.
TUESDAY,
JUNE 8, 2010
A hostile takeover
For-profit insurers want to take
over our state's workers' comp system
The following column by the staff of WSLC Reports Today appears in the latest edition of Real Change. (Feel free to follow that link and leave a comment at the end.)
About 100 years ago in Washington State, we gave up the right to sue our employers when we get injured at work. In exchange, we got a public nonprofit insurance system that pays our medical costs and partially replaces the wages of those who miss work due to on-the-job injuries.
Our employers gladly accepted this trade-off. Facing potentially bankrupting lawsuits whenever an employee was injured, businesses jumped at the chance to pay for this insurance, as long as they got some legal immunity.
The system is called workers’ compensation. And by most accounts, it’s worked pretty well for a century.
But now, the insurance companies want a piece of the action.
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The Washington State Labor Council has prepared a flier for download and distribution. Check back for more Initiative 1082 educational materials in the coming weeks. |
Initiative 1082, which will likely appear on this fall’s ballot, would privatize our state’s public nonprofit workers’ compensation system. It is sponsored by the right wing Building Industry Association of Washington and by the insurance industry, including the notorious AIG. Yes, that too-big-to-fail insurance company that we taxpayers bailed out is the nation’s biggest private workers’ compensation insurer.
AIG and company will spend millions of dollars to put I-1082 on the ballot and buy advertising to try to convince Washington voters that it will “save jobs.”
Of course, their real objective is to make more money.
It should shock no one that giant international insurance companies couldn’t care less about saving jobs in this state or about whether Washington is “competitive” enough to attract and maintain businesses. They want to make more money. They plan to do that by investing in I-1082 and saying whatever is necessary to convince voters to privatize Washington’s workers’ compensation system.
Here are five good reasons why you should not sign or vote for I-1082:
I-1082 will drive up employers’ costs. These same profit-minded insurance companies that gouge us on health insurance will do the same with workers’ compensation. Rates will skyrocket for employers that want to stay in our public non-profit system because private insurers will cherry-pick the lowest risk employers from the system.
I-1082 will kill jobs and lower wages. I-1082’s carrot for workers is that it promises to end the workers’ roughly 25 percent share of contributions to the system. But that translates to a 25 percent rate hike for employers, which will be forced to cut wages to try to make up the difference, or worse, to cut precious jobs at the worst possible time amid a recession.
I-1082
will add a profit motive to our public, nonprofit system. Wall
Street-based insurance companies like AIG are driven by the bottom line,
not by public service. They try to deny as many injured workers’
claims as possible, and charge employers as much as they can possibly
get away with.
I-1082 will force injured workers to fight the giant insurance companies
for their benefits. These private insurers routinely deny claims –
just as they do for health insurance – and they have deep pockets to
drag out the legal process through endless appeals.
I-1082
will lead to taxpayer bailouts to maintain employers’ coverage and
workers’ benefits when insurance companies go bankrupt. This has
repeatedly happened in California and other states that privatized,
costing taxpayers billions of dollars. After insurers charged
artificially low rates to try to gain market share, some failed, leaving
the state to pick up the tab.
The most insidious aspect of the Initiative 1082 is its deliberate
disinformation campaign intended to undermine confidence in our public
nonprofit workers’ compensation system. They want you to believe that
our public system is an inefficient and costly “job killer.”
The gap between I-1082 proponents’ negative rhetoric and the truth is shocking. Not only does Washington have comparatively low premiums, employers’ costs for coverage here are the fifth lowest of any state in the nation. So says the national measure most often cited by industry experts, a state-by-state comparison performed by the Oregon Department of Consumer and Business Services.
Other independent assessments – including by the Insurance Information Institute, Risk and Insurance magazine and the most recent performance audit conducted for the state by an outside firm – have also found Washington to be a low-cost state while paying relatively high benefits.
How is that possible? Our public nonprofit system costs less to run. Unlike private insurers, it has no profit margins, no commissions, no brokerage fees, and no extravagant executive salaries. It has no marketing or advertising costs. A.M. Best, which measures national insurance industry performance, found that total overhead costs for Washington’s public nonprofit system were about one-quarter of the national average.
No, our system is not perfect. There are ways to improve it and make it even better for injured workers and employers.
But Initiative 1082 is not the answer. It is an attempted hostile takeover of Washington’s public non-profit system by the insurance industry. AIG and company are the only ones who would benefit from I-1082.
Copyright © 2010 -- Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO