On Wednesday, an estimated 75,000 Kaiser Permanente workers across five states and Washington DC walked out in the largest health care workers strike in US history. After several days of negotiations over fair labor practices and higher wages, company and union members failed to reach a compromise.
Both groups “are still at the bargaining table, having worked through the night in an effort to reach an agreement,” the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions said in a statement, noting there “has been a lot of progress.”
Last month, health care workers threatened to go on strike if Kaiser didn’t agree to increased pay and solutions to the ongoing staff shortage, among other demands, before the union contract’s expiration on Saturday. While the strike is set to last for three days, union members say that they’re prepared to extend it to November if necessary.
“This is a difficult decision, and we know it will require sacrifices of us all,” wrote the Coalition. “but Kaiser executives continue to bargain in bad faith over the solutions we urgently need to the Kaiser short staffing crisis and the safety and well being of our patients and workers is on the line.”
As my colleague, Ruth Murai reported, the hospitals have a contingency plan in place to ensure continued operation.
Not to diminish your point but Kaiser is a non-profit.
Not saying that they deserve your sympathy because they don’t.
More saying that non-profit healthcare is killing people too.
Having worked for a non-profit hospital in the past,
I can assure you that the term “non-profit” in this context does not mean what you think it means.“Non-profit” hospitals go after profit every bit as aggressively as “for profit” hospitals, but depending on the legal structure are simply required to accept a certain number of non-paying patients (a requirement that is frequently overlooked and not enforced) and to roll the profits back into the enterprise, including massive C-suite salaries, instead of paying out dividends on shares.
EDITED because I misread the comment to which I was replying, oops
Oh you don’t need to tell me that. I’ve worked in a non-profit hospital as well.
It’s just as shitty and they use that “non-profit” spin to tell you that you should be okay with getting paid less…
FoR tHe PaTiEnTs
I misread your last sentence and replied to what I thought you said, lol. You could not be more right. Thanks for the correction.
I worked at a clinic that was “nonprofit” but couldn’t pay a living wage to anyone who wasn’t considered a big part of administration. iT director made 80k and the president of the company made 150k. The worst part is that everyone making bank had underlings doing their work for them. I know because I was one of those underlings
That’s… how the corporate structure works. “Nonprofit” is just a label for tax purposes
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