Health care chickens come home to roost on the West Side

James G. McConnell

While the debate over federal health care reform legislation rages on in town hall meetings around the country, in Presidential speeches on radio and television, in media commentary across the nation, and in staff offices in the halls of Congress, awaiting final action from Senate and House leadership who will come back to Washington September 8 and make final attempts to reconcile six different committee products into a final legislative measure, the chickens are already coming home to roost at an independent hand tool manufacturer on Chicago's West Side. Early this morning Teamsters Local 743 set up picket lines around the factories and offices of S K Hand Tool Corporation at 3535 West 47th Street in Chicago, and at 9500 West 55th Street in west suburban McCook, striking over S K's unilateral decision to drop health care coverage for the company's 70 employees, in the middle of labor negotiations which have dragged on for nine months.

S K's last offer to its 70 union workers was a pay cut from $14 per hour to only $10 per hour. According to the Teamsters, the company's action in dropping worker health coverage would amount to a reduction to just over minimum wages for the Teamster members. S K workers have not had a raise in the last six years. "We are willing to make concessions to save the company," said Teamsters Steward David Biedrzycki, "but we can't lose out health insurance. They expect us to pay for our health coverage out of pocket when they're also asking for a 20% pay cut."

In addition to its own SK branded line of hand and air tools sold on the internet and out of roving hand tool trucks around the area, S K also manufactures Craftsman hand tools sold by Sears. the company was founded here in 1921, and has passed through a number of ownership changes over the years, the most recent being a management buyout following the acquisition of its French parent Facom Tools by Stanley Tools in 2005.

With the promise on the horizon of a federal government health "option" selling health coverage at subsidized rates to people who have no health insurance through their place of work, I look for many more small businesses with union shops to shed health coverage for workers as union contracts expire in the coming months, in the hope that the federal program will pick up that portion of their operating costs. and put the difference into owners' pockets as profit. While Congressional and Obama administration proponents of health reform legislation with a "public option" continue to insist that the government plan is required to extend coverage to 45 million citizens who don't have health insurance now, opponents have argued that inclusion of a "public option" will force many workers who do have company provided health coverage into the ranks of the uninsured, driving the projected costs to taxpayers well above the currently predicted $900 billion.

It looks like the proof is in the pudding, and health reform legislation opponents now have a perfect example of what is to come, though the legislation isn't on the floor of either house just yet.