NEW YORK CITY, February 23—NYC’s City Council held hearings on a bill that would cut city sponsored health benefits. These cuts are coming because capitalism is in crisis and at war. The bosses are trying to manage their crisis on the backs of the working class. The bosses view the lives of retirees as expendable since they no longer produce profits. At the hearing city and union leaders spoke on the need to control costs by cutting benefits. Retirees spoke against decreasing access to health benefits or increasing the costs to workers when they use these benefits. The struggle to stop the reduction of city sponsored health benefits to these and the current workforce continues. The racist cuts are also exposing once again that the union’s leadership is loyal to the bosses system and will do whatever the ruling class needs them to do.Progressive Labor Party (PLP) members active in this struggle are urging our friends to join our movement to build a communist world where healthcare will be free to all based only on their needs.
Workers are fighting back!
CHALLENGE has reported on efforts by retirees to stop these givebacks which have been agreed to by the New York City government and the Municipal Labor Committee (MLC), an umbrella of all city unions having contracts with NYC. Demonstrations at city hall and union headquarters as well as mass letter writing and telephone call campaigns have expressed our anger at attempts to privatize our medicare benefits. This attempted change will mean less access to needed health treatment and will affect low-income workers the most (disproportionately. Black, Latin and women). Now this same gang is pressing for similar reductions for the active workers. Similar cuts are going on or have taken place throughout the U.S.
War and economic crisis driving attacks on health benefits
The U.S. bosses are facing the increased likelihood of war as they face off against their main imperialist rival China and its ally Russia. To prepare for war, bosses want to divert billions to the war budget. They know that healthcare costs as a share of the U.S. gross national product have risen from 5 percent in 1960 to 19.7 percent in 2020 (USA facts.org). Lowering these costs potentially would free up money for the war chests.
The war is related to the economic crisis being felt around the world as imperialist powers like the U.S., China and Russia compete for profits and power. As hospitals merge and grow into larger conglomerates, they demand higher rates for their services. For example the cost of a colonoscopy can range from $1,100 to $3,700 for the same procedure depending on where you go (Choicehealth.com). The pharmaceutical industry is charging whatever the market will pay for new life saving drugs. New cancer drugs cost hundreds of thousands of dollars per year for those who can afford them or have insurance that will pay for them. National total health expenditures are expected to grow by at least 5.1 percent from 2021-2030 (USAfacts.org). The biggest bosses, who control policy, want to cut these costs so that they can compete against their imperialist rivals.
Fight to learn, learn to fight!
As we engage our class enemy, we need to learn about how capitalism works. We are building PLP study groups to help build more communist leaders/fighters in this battle. Join us to build a healthier world under communism!