Health Care

Health care is a basic human right. America’s labor movement has worked for more than a century for guaranteed high-quality health care for everyone. The Affordable Care Act is a historic milestone on this journey, but we still have a long way to go.
America must continue moving forward toward a more equitable and cost-effective health care system. Moving forward means working with employers to demand health care payment and delivery reforms to control costs, allowing people of all ages to buy into the equivalent of Medicare through a public plan option and allowing Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices. Of course, the most cost-effective and equitable way to provide quality health care is through the social insurance model (“Medicare for All”), as other industrialized countries have shown.
The worst thing we could do is move backward by repealing the Affordable Care Act or its key provisions; privatizing Medicare or turning it into a voucher program; raising the Medicare eligibility age; increasing Medicare co-pays and deductibles or otherwise cutting Medicare benefits; or taxing employment-based health care benefits.
More about this issue:
President Biden gave his annual State of the Union address Tuesday night. AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler weighed in:
Labor and Civil rights leaders gathered Thursday night for the NYC CLC's annual Labor and Civil Rights event, a panel in which they engaged in a vibrant discussion of the role of the Labor Movement in the fight for racial, social, and economic justice.
At 1:43 a.m. on Wednesday, Writers Guild of America, East members in the HuffPost Union secured a tentative agreement on a new contract with HuffPost and its parent company Buzzfeed. The Union will announce details of the deal upon ratification of the new collective bargaining agreement.
Members of the Alphabet Workers Union held a rally in front of one of the company's NYC Google Store locations yesterday, protesting the recent layoffs of thousands of co-workers.
Unionized employees on strike from HarperCollins Publishers hosted a rally yesterday outside parent company, News Corp, offices in Manhattan, where they were joined by supporters from unions across the City as well as elected officials.
"We vehemently condemn BDG’s decision to lay off nearly 40 unit members and shutter Gawker," the Bustle Digital Group Union (a unit of Writers Guild of America, East) said in a statement yesterday.
Post-production workers in the Film Unit of Saturday Night Live have signaled their readiness to strike over frustration with the slow pace of first contract negotiations.
The WGAE union contract at HuffPost expires at midnight on Tuesday, January 31.
On Wednesday, contracted cleaners from Twitter’s NYC and San Francisco offices, 32BJ SEIU members, labor leaders, elected officials, and allies rallied outside Twitter HQ in Manhattan. Cleaners at Twitter’s 245-249 West 17th St.
HarperCollins Publishers has finally agreed to enter mediation with the union, Local 2110 UAW. The union has been on strike since November 10, 2022, and have not heard directly from the company since their last bargaining session on November 2.