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:

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This weekend, we honor the memories of all those who tragically lost their lives 21 years ago on September 11th, including the more than than 600 who were members of New York City unions.

Sep 2, 2022 | News Story

This year, the New York City Labor Movement will come together on Fifth Avenue for the first time since 2019, bringing back our annual Labor Day Parade with a spectacular show of solidarity and pride.

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A union campaign dating back two years and involving workers at several New York-based architecture firms has notched its first victory.

Sep 2, 2022 | News Story

The Air Line Pilots Association, Int’l (ALPA) hosted a nationwide informational picket yesterday, to send a strong message to airline management across the country that it’s time to address their operational problems and prioritize passengers, pilots and other frontline workers who made extraordi

Sep 2, 2022 | News Story

NYU adjuncts, members of ACT-UAW Local 7902, are bargaining a new contract this year, with their current contract expiring at midnight on September 30th, 2022.

Aug 26, 2022 | News Story

Help is on the way for New Yorkers seeking a union job in the transportation sector. The Consortium for Worker Education and partners in government, labor, and business are launching a new workforce training program, New York City Pathways to Industrial and Construction Careers (PINCC).

Aug 26, 2022 | News Story

Unified workers at a Chipotle Mexican Grill in Lansing, Michigan, voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to form a union with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, making it the first of the restaurant chain’s 3,000 locations to organize.

Aug 19, 2022 | News Story

On Wednesday, members of SMART Sheet Metal Workers Local 28, Laborers Local 79, Steamfitters Local 638, community supporters and other union workers rallied in front of the Tribeca Film Center, calling on self-professed union man Robert De Niro to stop cutting corners on workplace standards by us

Aug 19, 2022 | News Story

Workers at the Trader Joe’s Wine Shop in Union Square spent the last four months laying the groundwork to unionize their store.