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:

Jan 14, 2022 | News Story

Workers at the Amazon warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama, will have their voices heard in a second union election in February after the corporation broke the law during the original vote last year.

Jan 14, 2022 | News Story

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Jan 7, 2022 | News Story

The Association of Legal Aid Attorneys/UAW Local 2325 held a virtual rally on Wednesday to demand the New York State Office of Court Administration and Governor Hochul reinstitute virtual arraignments until the rates of COVID-19 positivity have subsided to lower levels.

Jan 3, 2022 | News Story

The Build Back Better agenda means trillions of dollars of investment in our jobs, families and communities.

Jan 15, 2021 | News Story

On Tuesday, during the second part of his State of the State address, Gov. Cuomo announced the first steps of what's being called a "New York Arts Revival," an effort to boost New York's $120 billion-a-year arts industry, which has been on lockdown for 10 months.

Feb 5, 2021 | News Story

Amazon has agreed to pay $61.7 million to settle allegations that it stole its Amazon Flex drivers tips over a two-and-a-half year period, the Federal Trade Commission said on Tuesday.

Dec 31, 2021 | News Story

As we look back on the past year, we're reflecting on the continuing challenges that the New York City labor movement has faced, but also on the significant ground we’ve gained and the enormous potential ahead of us.

Dec 23, 2021 | News Story

Members of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union (BCTGM) who work at Kellogg’s ready to eat cereal plants in Battle Creek, Mich., Lancaster, Pa., Omaha, Neb. and Memphis, Tenn. have voted to accept the recommended collective bargaining agreement.

Dec 23, 2021 | News Story

On Tuesday, employees at the well-regarded firm SHoP Architects announced that they are seeking to unionize with the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers. If successful, they will be the the first union at a prominent private-sector architecture firm in the country.

Dec 23, 2021 | News Story

Columbia student workers are still on strike in what is currently the largest such action in the country. Three thousand workers, including undergraduate and graduate teaching and research assistants at Columbia University, are now in the eighth week of their strike.