{"id":20180,"date":"2013-08-20T08:37:08","date_gmt":"2013-08-20T12:37:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=20180"},"modified":"2013-08-20T08:37:08","modified_gmt":"2013-08-20T12:37:08","slug":"the-unions-have-opposed-obamacare-for-a-while","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=20180","title":{"rendered":"The Unions Have Opposed ObamaCare For A While"},"content":{"rendered":"

On July 18, the Schoolcraft County Republican Party website<\/a> posted a copy of a letter from Jimmy Hoffa<\/a>, Teamsters’ President, Joseph Hamsen UFCW<\/a> President, and D. Taylor UNITE-HERE<\/a> President.<\/p>\n

This is the letter:<\/p>\n

Dear Leader Reid and Leader Pelosi:<\/strong><\/p>\n

When you and the President sought our support for the Affordable Care Act (ACA), you pledged that if we\u00a0liked the health plans we have now, we could keep them. Sadly, that promise is under threat. Right now, unless\u00a0you and the Obama Administration enact an equitable fix, the ACA will shatter not only our hard-earned health\u00a0benefits, but destroy the foundation of the 40 hour work week that is the backbone of the American middle class<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Like millions of other Americans, our members are front-line workers in the American<\/a> economy. We have\u00a0been strong supporters of the notion that all Americans should have access to quality, affordable health care.\u00a0We have also been strong supporters of you. In campaign after campaign we have put boots on the ground,\u00a0gone door-to-door to get out the vote, run phone banks and raised money to secure this vision.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Now this vision has come back to haunt us.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Since the ACA was enacted, we have been bringing our deep concerns to the Administration, seeking reasonable\u00a0regulatory interpretations to the statute that would help prevent the destruction of non-profit health plans. As\u00a0you both know first-hand, our persuasive arguments have been disregarded and met with a stone wall by the\u00a0White House and the pertinent agencies. This is especially stinging because other stakeholders have repeatedly\u00a0received successful interpretations for their respective grievances. Most disconcerting of course is last week\u2019s\u00a0huge accommodation for the employer community\u2014extending the statutorily mandated \u201cDecember 31, 2013\u201d\u00a0deadline for the employer mandate and penalties.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Time is running out: Congress wrote this law; we voted for you. We have a problem; you need to fix it. The\u00a0unintended consequences of the ACA are severe. Perverse incentives are already creating nightmare scenarios:<\/strong><\/p>\n

First, the law creates an incentive for employers to keep employees\u2019 work hours below 30 hours a week. Numerous\u00a0employers have begun to cut workers\u2019 hours to avoid this obligation, and many of them are doing so openly.\u00a0The impact is two-fold: fewer hours means less pay while also losing our current health benefits.<\/strong>
\n \u0001<\/strong>
\n Second, millions of Americans are covered by non-profit health insurance plans like the ones in which most of\u00a0our members participate. These non-profit plans are governed jointly by unions and companies under the\u00a0Taft-Hartley Act. Our health plans have been built over decades by working men and women. Under the ACA\u00a0as interpreted by the Administration, our employees will treated differently and not be eligible for subsidies\u00a0afforded other citizens. As such, many employees will be relegated to second-class status and shut out of the help\u00a0the law offers to for-profit insurance plans.<\/strong><\/p>\n

And finally, even though non-profit plans like ours won\u2019t receive the same subsidies as for-profit plans, they\u2019ll\u00a0be taxed to pay for those subsidies. Taken together, these restrictions will make non-profit plans like ours unsustainable,\u00a0and will undermine the health-care market of viable alternatives to the big health insurance companies.<\/strong><\/p>\n

On behalf of the millions of working men and women we represent and the families they support, we can no\u00a0longer stand silent in the face of elements of the Affordable Care Act that will destroy the very health and wellbeing\u00a0of our members along with millions of other hardworking Americans.<\/strong><\/p>\n

We believe that there are common-sense corrections that can be made within the existing statute that will allow\u00a0our members to continue to keep their current health plans and benefits just as you and the President pledged.\u00a0Unless changes are made, however, that promise is hollow.<\/strong><\/p>\n

We continue to stand behind real health care reform, but the law as it stands will hurt millions of Americans\u00a0including the members of our respective unions.<\/strong><\/p>\n

We are looking to you to make sure these changes are made.<\/strong><\/p>\n

James P. Hoffa<\/a><\/strong>
\n General President<\/strong>
\n International Brotherhood of Teamsters<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Joseph Hansen<\/strong>
\n International President<\/strong>
\n UFCW<\/strong><\/p>\n

D. Taylor<\/strong>
\n President<\/strong>
\n UNITE-HERE<\/strong><\/p>\n

I am not under the illusion that union leaders will suddenly become conservatives–that is not going to happen. But understand that the unions provide the majority of funding and volunteers for Democrat Party candidates. The unions often pay their members to show up at rallies or to do stand-outs for Democrats. If the unions are unhappy with ObamaCare<\/a> and decide to sit on their hands in 2014, the Democrat Party will be severely impacted. This is a letter that will that Congressmen Pelosi and Reid will read carefully.<\/p>\n

Just for the record, the worst-case scenario on this would be for President Obama<\/a> to somehow carve out an exception for the unions. Hopefully enough Americans are paying attention right now to prevent that from happening.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Enhanced<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On July 18, the Schoolcraft County Republican Party website posted a copy of a letter from Jimmy Hoffa, Teamsters’ President, Joseph Hamsen UFCW President, and D. Taylor UNITE-HERE President. This is the letter: Dear Leader Reid and Leader Pelosi: When … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[6157,97,6158,134,5743,6160,6159,285],"class_list":["post-20180","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-american-middle-class","tag-barack-obama","tag-james-p-hoffa","tag-patient-protection-and-affordable-care-act","tag-teamsters","tag-unite-here","tag-united-food-and-commercial-workers","tag-united-states"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20180","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20180"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20180\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20182,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20180\/revisions\/20182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20180"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20180"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20180"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}