Thursday, February 08, 2007

Strange Bedfellows: WalMart and Union Join Forces

In one of the strangest alliances of recent memory, WalMart and arch foe the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), joined forces to announce that they were going to work together to push the federal government to provide universal healthcare and to get out of the system of employer provided healthcare. As reported in a Washington Times article, H. Lee Scott, CEO of WalMart and Andy Stern, President of the SEIU, held a press conference in in Washington, D.C. and "...pledged to work together for the first time to fix what they called the nation's health-care crisis by 2012." Joining in the press conference were representatives from AT&T, Kelly Services, Intel, and the Communication Workers of America.

The thrust of the announcement was that the healthcare system in the U.S. is not working, people are uncovered by insurance and the system of employer provided healthcare makes U.S. companies less competetive in a world market.

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