Barack Obama
 Campaign SiteWatch Video |
On the Employee Free Choice Act: The Employee Free Choice Act is a starting point, but there is more to do. It should be an unfair labor practice to discriminate against any employee who doesn’t want to sit and listen to anti-union propaganda during working hours. And I will revoke the anti-worker, anti-union executive orders President Bush signed. On Good Jobs: As President, my trade policy will open foreign markets to create and support good middle-class jobs – for American workers. At a very minimum we need to stop giving tax incentives to companies to shift job overseas. And we need to reward companies who invest in America. On Health Care: Every American has the right to affordable, comprehensive and portable health coverage. My plan will guarantee coverage through partnerships among employers, private health plans, the federal government and states. |
On the Issues
Employee Free Choice Act
In response to CWA's questionnaire Barack Obama said the following about the Employee Free Choice Act:
I am an original co-sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act and voted for the legislation because I firmly believe that workers should choose whether they want to join a union without fear of intimidation, coercion, or threats to their livelihoods. I am convinced that millions of Americans would join a union if given a fair opportunity, but the National Labor Relations Act in its current form too often allows employers to violate workers’ rights with impunity. The Employee Free Choice Act is a bipartisan effort to make the process of organizing less vulnerable to employer lawbreaking by requiring card-check recognition and increasing penalties on employers that violate the law.
I was disappointed that the Senate failed to pass EFCA. Strengthening our workers’ right to organize shouldn’t be controversial – or partisan. It will be working Americans, united and organized, that will help us restore a sense of shared prosperity and security to this nation. I will continue to advocate for EFCA as a senator and will sign it as president. As your question notes, it took 10 years for the Congress to give America’s lowest paid workers a raise. That was far too long (and we still need to index the minimum wage to inflation), and I will work hard as president to ensure that we don’t have to wait another 10 years to protect the collective bargaining rights of America’s workers. Part of what it will take to get EFCA through the Congress is an ability to get beyond this “50 plus one” strategy that has characterized our politics for far too long. We need both a President with the determination to work for this important legislation and a Congress with the means to pass it. I believe that I am the candidate who can unite the country, work effectively across party lines, and change the partisan atmosphere in Washington. And, equally important, as the general election nominee I would be the only candidate who could expand the electoral map, creating opportunities for Democrats in areas where the party has not competed recently, and pick up labor-friendly seats in Congress. That’s what it will take to get EFCA signed into law.
EFCA is a starting point, but there is more to do. It should be an unfair labor practice to discriminate or threaten to discriminate against any employee who doesn’t want to sit and listen to anti-union propaganda during working hours. And I will revoke the anti-worker, anti-union executive orders President Bush signed. Bush wiped out labor-management cooperation in the federal government. I will restore it. He forced federal contractors to put up posters telling workers that they have a right not to join a union. I will require federal contractors to inform workers of all of their rights – most important, their right to organize and their right to bargain collectively. And he barred Project Labor Agreements on federal construction projects. These agreements assure that projects will be built without strikes, lock-outs, or other disruptions that might delay completion and increase costs to taxpayers. But they do that the right way – by making sure that construction workers get a fair wage and benefits negotiated by their union. I will withdraw that executive order and issue a new executive order encouraging project labor agreements.
And I will add one executive order that Bush didn’t consider. The American people should not have to worry about their tax dollars being spent by federal contractors to hire union-busting consultants who are paid to stop workers from organizing. When I am President, employers doing business with the federal government will no longer be allowed to use federal funds to oppose union organizing.
Health Care
In response to CWA's questionnaire, Barack Obama said the following about health care:
I believe that every American has the right to affordable, comprehensive and portable health coverage. My plan will guarantee coverage for every American through partnerships among employers, private health plans, the federal government, and the states. My plan both builds on and improves our current insurance system, which most Americans continue to rely upon, and leaves Medicare intact for older and disabled Americans. Under my plan, Americans will be able to maintain their current coverage if they choose to, and will see the quality of their health care improve and their costs go down. My plan also addresses the large gaps in coverage that leave 45 million Americans uninsured. Specifically, my plan will: (1) establish a new public insurance program, available to Americans who neither qualify for Medicaid or SCHIP nor have access to insurance through their employers, as well as to small businesses that want to offer insurance to their employees; (2) create a National Health Insurance Exchange to help Americans and businesses that want to purchase private health insurance directly; (3) require all employers to contribute towards health coverage for their employees or towards the cost of the public plan ; (4) mandate that all children have health care coverage; (5) expand eligibility for the Medicaid and SCHIP programs; and (6) allow flexibility for state health reform plans.
Under my plan, the medical system as a whole will save money; we will realize tremendous savings within the health care system from improving efficiency and quality and reducing wasted expenditures system-wide. Specifically, these savings will result from investments in health information technology, improvements in prevention and management of chronic conditions, increased insurance industry competition and reduced industry overhead, the provision of federal reinsurance for catastrophic coverage, and reduced spending on uncompensated care.
For example, today administrative costs in private insurance average 14 percent of benefits. I will considerably reduce insurance industry overhead by instituting the National Health Insurance Exchange, which will provide purchasing pools, standardize insurance packages, reduce marketing expenses, and promote competition. It has been estimated that this innovation will save upwards of $46 billion per year.
Moreover, there is significant room for savings by investing in health information technology. Even by conservative estimates, it has been predicted that such investments could save $77 billion per year long-term. I propose we spend $10 billion per year, for five years, to accelerate adoption of health IT so that we can harness these much greater savings more quickly.
Finally, better care management has the potential to save significant amounts of money as well. A RAND study has predicted that roughly $120 billion can be saved by improving our efforts regarding prevention and disease management. My plan commits to promoting healthier lifestyles in schools, the workplace, and the home, as well as preventive services, disease management, care coordination, and other efforts.
Under my plan, we can expect to save roughly $200 billion. And these are only conservative estimates. This translates into savings of up to $2,500 for the typical family. Other researchers estimate substantially larger possible savings.
In addition to using these savings from within the healthcare system, the additional federal costs of the subsidies would be paid for by allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire for people making more than $250,000 per year, as they are scheduled to do.
Finally, my plan will help, not hurt, U.S. businesses. All but the smallest businesses will be asked to contribute to the larger health care system, either through participation in an employee health plan or contribution to my national plan. So if employers are already currently providing quality coverage to their employees, they will not have to make a contribution; if they are not, they will have to contribute unless they are especially small in size. Moreover, under my health care plan, federal reinsurance will be offered to employer health plans to help ensure that unexpected or catastrophic illnesses do not price health insurance out of reach for businesses and their employees. For many small businesses in particular, having a single employee with catastrophic expenditures can make insurance unaffordable for all of the workers in the firm. My plan will reimburse employer health plans for a portion of the catastrophic costs they incur above a certain threshold – if they guarantee that such savings will be used to reduce the cost of workers’ premiums. Providing reinsurance for catastrophic coverage will also reduce premiums.
Good Jobs
In response to CWA's questionnaire, Barack Obama said the following about jobs and trade:
I originally moved to Chicago to work with churches and community organizations who were dealing with the devastation caused by the closure of steel plants throughout the region. Tens of thousands of people had been laid off. So I have seen up close and spent my adult life trying to help workers and their families manage the downside of globalization. While I firmly believe American workers are the best in the world and that if given a fair race we can compete with anyone, no American worker should have to compete with child or forced labor abroad. That is why I have fought to put strong provisions against such practices in the core of trade agreements.
I opposed the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) because it did not satisfy the principle of respect and protection for the right of workers. In addition to putting protections for workers in the core of our trade agreements we must enforce our agreements through the World Trade Organization and other existing mechanisms. We have to pressure our trading partners to end unfair government subsidies to foreign exporters, non-tariff barriers on U.S. exports, and artificially devalued currency, like China’s, that puts U.S. companies at a perpetual disadvantage. As President, my trade policy will open foreign markets to create and support good middle-class jobs – for American workers.
At a very minimum we need to stop giving tax incentives to companies to shift job overseas. And we need to reward companies who invest in America.
But this is not enough. I have seen first hand that our federal efforts to help workers retain their jobs are weak, our efforts to come in after there is a plant closing are inadequate, and our strategies to make sure capital is available to create new businesses in those communities are non-existent. So we need to have a new aggressive strategy to make sure that we can compete and keep those good jobs here in American and that we are reinvesting in those workers and communities that are being burdened by globalization and not benefiting from it.
As President, I will make strategic, long-term investments into American infrastructure to create more high-wage jobs. I will expand federal funding for basic research, expand the deployment of broadband technology, and make the research and development tax credit permanent so that businesses can invest in innovation and create high-paying, secure jobs. And I will make investments in education, training, and workforce development so that Americans can leverage our strengths – our ingenuity and entrepreneurialism – to create new high-wage jobs and prosper in a world economy.
