Strange Bed Fellows
You know that you are in trouble when Wal-Mart and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) are on the same side of an issue and you are on the other side. As has been widely reported, both Wal-Mart and the SEIU are urging the Obama administration to pass healthcare reform. Part of their statement on the issue included this: “Support for a mandate (for insurance coverage for all) also requires the strongest possible commitment to rein in healthcare costs. Guaranteeing cost containment is essential.”
What is not clear is how the SEIU expects to rein in healthcare costs and not have its members take a financial hit? Maybe they are looking at how the Obama adminstration handled the Chrysler and GM bankruptcies. Based on how the unions faired in those cases, maybe the SEIU is expecting everyone else to take the hit but them?
What is also not clear is how these strange bed fellows expect to suspend the laws of economics. If you give everyone health insurance, thus guaranteeing a big increase in demand, but do nothing to increase the supply of doctors and nurses, the laws of economics say that prices will rise, not go down. The government’s history with price controls (during World War II) is part of how we got into the situation of having employer sponsored health care, where some poeple have great coverage and others have none.