States Are Battling Against Wal-Mart Over Health Care | NYT | 11.1.04
In the national debate over what to do about the growing number of working people with little or no health insurance, no other company may be taking more heat than the country’s largest employer, Wal-Mart Stores. …
A survey by Georgia officials found that more than 10,000 children of Wal-Mart employees were in the state’s health program for children at an annual cost of nearly $10 million to taxpayers. A North Carolina hospital found that 31 percent of 1,900 patients who described themselves as Wal-Mart employees were on Medicaid, while an additional 16 percent had no insurance at all. …
Many employees say they simply cannot afford the health plans being offered. Ms. Caizza, for example, worked about 32 hours a week, making $8 an hour. Full-time employees make about $1,200 a month on those wages, meaning the $133 to $264 they are asked to pay for family coverage may not be within their reach. And even the cheapest plans come with a hefty out-of-pocket price for employees, where they may be on the hook for as much as $13,000 in medical costs for their families. …
But Wal-Mart says it is not reasonable to ask companies like it to solve the problems of the uninsured and the escalating cost of medical care. It needs to be “part of a national debate,” Ms. Chambers said.
Samantha Caizza, with children
Izabella McLane, left, and Ilizah
McLane, said that when Wal-Mart
hired her at its Chehalis, Wash.,
store, it told her to contact the
state for health coverage for her
children.
Penny wise and pound foolish? In an indirect fashion are our consumables, in stores such as Wal-Mart, being subsidized by healthcare dollars? Do we pay directly in terms of higher prices at “the store” or pay in the form of increased taxes or less services covered by governmental dollars? It isn’t just a super-store and bargains for a community—but a very complex social and healthcare problem—one that is inextricably entwined with a lack of a national healthcare policy and the wherewithal to have one.
Also see Glorfindel