With its access to a government lifeline possibly at risk, General Motors executives were locked in intense negotiations Monday with leaders of the United Automobile Workers over ways to cut its vast bills for retiree health care.
. . . On Monday, G.M. pressed union leaders in a meeting in Detroit for a deal on financing what was the centerpiece of the 2007 U.A.W. contract — a perpetual, G.M.-financed trust to cover health care costs of hundreds of thousands of retired hourly workers and their surviving spouses.
. . . G.M. has the most at stake with the U.A.W. Its future obligations for retiree health care are estimated at $47 billion, and by next year it is required by its contract to contribute more than $10 billion to the trust set up in 2007.
The company, which nearly ran out of money before receiving the first $9.4 billion of its $13.4 billion in late December, is pressing the U.A.W. to accept stock for as much as 50 percent of its next contribution to the trust, according to two people knowledgeable about the discussions.
Mr. Gettelfinger, for his part, is trying to protect one of the jewels of the U.A.W. contract, which is essentially health care for life for anyone who worked on the assembly line and their surviving spouses. G.M. has already canceled health care for more than 100,000 of its salaried retirees. . . . U.A.W. members are bracing for bad news, and worrying that their health care plan will be sacrificed to keep G.M. from going bankrupt. “Where does it all stop?” said Mike Green, president of U.A.W. Local No. 652, which represents workers in Lansing, Mich. “It would be devastating. Our typical person works between 30 and 40 years. They did their part. Why should they have it taken away with the sweep of a pen?”
If thousands of folks would not suffer severely (and damage the prospect for all of us in an economic recovery) one could say that the auto companies are getting what they deserved. After all, they were leading opponents of health care reform during the Clinton Presidency. But now is not the time for petty satisfactions.
As part of the government intervention in the domestic auto industry, a good hard look should be taken at having the federal government take over the health care responsibilities of GM, Chrysler and Ford - in exchange for the stock that GM (and other car companies) are offering to worker pension funds.
Nationalization you say? Well, we can always sell it back when and if things get better. Another added benefit is that this would be a big step towards putting the health care issue out of the hands of reactionaries who will always oppose health care reform. In short, get the executive dolts out of the way of a rational and imperative discussion of our health care crisis.
Let me put it this way, if the government can issue guarantees in the trillions of dollars to prop up the financial industry, issuing a 100 billion dollars in guarantees for health care for auto workers seems a small price to pay to forward the objectives of saving our auto industry AND forwarding health care reform.
In my view, this possibility should be seriously explored.
Speaking for me only
