California Workers Share Health Care Horror Stories

http://blog.aflcio.org/2007/04/17/california-workers-share-health-care-horror-stories/

California Workers Share Health Care Horror Stories

by Mike Hall, Apr 17, 2007

Workers across California today are describing their experiences with the nation’s crumbling health care system—whether they’ve been unable to get the medical care they need for their families; the impact of health care’s soaring costs on their ability to pay bills and support their families; and how their health insurance status affects so many other decisions in their lives.

The California Labor Federation is part of the It’s Our Health Care coalition sponsoring today’s speak-outs in Los Angeles, Oakland and Sacramento. As the California Labor Federation puts it on its website:

Californians face a health care crisis. Each year, we are paying more for our health care and getting less. Double digit increases in our health insurance costs and higher co-payments and deductibles face every working family in California. Employment-based health coverage is eroding while the number of uninsured Californians approaches seven million.

The California Labor Federation provides comparisons of three major health care proposals for the state, here and here.

(Meanwhile, the AFL-CIO community affiliate Working America is sponsoring the Health Care Hustle, an online forum where you can read health care horror stories from around the country—and submit your own.)

In January, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) grabbed headlines when he proposed a bill to require all Californians to buy health insurance. But like last year’s Massachusetts health care legislation (championed by Republican presidential candidate and then-governor Mitt Romney), the plan shifts more health care costs onto working families. Says Art Pulaski, the state’s labor federation executive secretary-treasurer:

It is the wrong prescription for California’s health care crisis. The governor’s plan shifts the responsibility for health care costs onto already overburdened workers and their families. This proposal will be a boon to insurance companies, but a bust for most workers. This plan requires all Californians to buy health insurance with no guarantee that it will be affordable or that coverage will be adequate. We are concerned that the plan creates an incentive for employers who currently provide health care to drop coverage and instead pay only a minimal tax.

FULL story at link.