AFL-CIO reaffirms support of single payer

AFL-CIO

September 11, 2013
Adopted Resolutions

Resolution 54: AFL-CIO Convention Resolution on the Affordable Care Act

WHEREAS, in 2009, the AFL-CIO Convention passed two health care resolutions—Health Care Reform Now and the Social Insurance Model for Health Care Reform—which reaffirmed the labor movement’s commitment to health care for all, ultimately through a single-payer system. In 2010, Congress passed the Affordable Care Act (ACA);

(23 more WHEREASs)

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the AFL-CIO reaffirms the health care resolutions adopted by the 2009 convention, including the commitment to pursue health care for all ultimately through a single-payer system;

(8 more BE-IT-FURTHER-RESOLVEDs)

http://www.aflcio.org/About/Exec-Council/Conventions/2013/Resolutions-and-Amendments/Resolution-54-AFL-CIO-Convention-Resolution-on-the-Affordable-Care-Act

Comment:

By Don McCanne, M.D.

There are two important health care reform issues before us today. The most important by far is that this nation desperately needs a single payer system. The other is that the Affordable Care Act is well on its way to being fully implemented, with all of its intolerable flaws. Yesterday, AFL-CIO passed a resolution dealing with both of these.

The first WHEREAS and the first BE-IT-RESOLVED reaffirmed organized labor’s support of single payer reform. It is an imperative.

The other twenty-three WHEREASs and eight BE-IT-FURTHER-RESOLVEDs can be accessed at the link above. They concern very serious flaws in the Affordable Care Act, especially applicable to union members, which will be very difficult to correct. They are important to understand because flaws such as these permeate the entire Act.

Maintaining and expanding our highly dysfunctional health care financing system while adding administrative complexity is precisely what we did not need. All of this could have been avoided by moving directly to a single payer system. We can still do that, even if we have already wasted much time and money, while prolonging hardship and suffering.

Although organized labor’s targeted attack on the Affordable Care Act is making headlines today, they passed another resolution that is also very important:

Resolution 15: Protecting and Expanding Medicare Benefits

Excerpts:

Instead of cuts and cost shifting, we call for improvements to Medicare. Doing so is an essential prerequisite to establishing it as a model for a universal, single-payer system.

Instead of looking for ways to destroy Medicare, which has been a leader in improving our dysfunctional health care system, we must build on its experience as a single-payer program, demonstrating that single payer is the most cost-effective and equitable way to provide quality health care.

http://www.aflcio.org/About/Exec-Council/Conventions/2013/Resolutions-and-Amendments/Resolution-15-Protecting-and-Expanding-Medicare-Benefits