We're Paying For Walmart Health Care

We interrupt this election week to bring you news from your friendly Walmart Stores. Are you aware that we are paying millions of dollars every year for health care for Walmart employees and their families? You see, Walmart pays such a pittance that employees can't afford to pay a monthly premium for their health care. So taxpayers often have to provide care instead.

Walmart is the largest employer in the US. But they just take and do not give. The big Walmart boxes (stores) have a devastating effect everywhere they are built. Small businesses disappear. Main Street America becomes a ghost town. Walmart abuses labor laws and takes advantage of their employees- the "Walmart family." My friends are baffled when I say I will not ever shop Walmart. They don't know why I wouldn't want to save money. Here is one reason why:


CORPORATE – TAXPAYERS FORCED TO PICK UP WALMART'S SLACK: The state of Georgia found "more than 10,000 children of Wal-Mart employees were in the state's health program for children at an annual cost of nearly $10 million to taxpayers." In California, taxpayers spend $32 million a year providing health care to Wal-Mart workers. And a hospital in North Carolina reports 31 percent of patients who were Wal-Mart employees were on state-funded Medicaid, while an additional 16 percent had no insurance whatsoever. The problem: Many Wal-Mart employees are unable to pay the company's exorbitant monthly premiums. Full-time employees making the $8-an-hour cashier's wage pull in about $1,200 a month, making the $264 a month Wal-Mart demands for family coverage out of reach. Also, Wal-Mart forces employees who work full time to wait six months for insurance; part-time workers must wait two years. "Because of turnover, some employees never work long enough to become eligible."

If we allow this to go on, we should not complain. The recent grassroots effort to take on Sinclair Broadcasting was very successful. There is power available to us if we get together and use it.

Okay! Now back to Election Day! Vote Kerry!