[NJFAC] Working Without Health Insurance

Chronic Condition: Working Without Health Insurance

Jan 10, 2025 By Emma Curchin, John Schmitt, CEPR

...."...even after the full implementation of the ACA, more than 27 million US residents still remain without health insurance.¹ As we document here, almost 16 million of the uninsured are workers in full-time jobs, part-time jobs, or unemployed and actively seeking work. Over 10 million of these uninsured workers hold year-round, full-time jobs.

Workers between the ages of 18 and 64 have long been less likely than the average US resident to have health insurance (see Figure 1). Many workers fall through the holes in the patchwork of health insurance coverage, which includes employer-provided plans, individually purchased coverage through state-level health exchanges, and Medicaid (which is especially important for low-income workers). The vast majority of workers are ineligible for key government health insurance programs that provide higher rates of coverage for other populations. Workers under the age of 65, for example, are not eligible for the Medicare program, which provides nearly universal coverage for the US population 65 and older. Workers are also generally too old to qualify for the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), which, together with Medicaid, produces uninsured rates for children that are about half those of adult workers.² Finally, a sizable share of the workforce lives in households with incomes that push them above the thresholds where they would qualify for Medicaid and other forms of need-based coverage.....

As the data show, some groups of workers are much more likely than others to be uninsured. Workers who experience any spell of unemployment during the course of a year are the most likely to be without insurance (18.7 percent), followed by part-time or part-year workers (14.4 percent). But even a large share of full-time, full-year workers (10.5 percent) go without any health insurance coverage from any source during the course of the year.....

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June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
http://www.njfac.org

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[NJFAC] "salting" the workplace

"What Is Salting, the Organizing Tactic Spicing Up the Labor Movement?" [Kim Kelly, Teen Vogue]. "The resurgence of the American labor movement is being led in no small part by a cohort of young, diverse, fired-up workers around the country. Union density remains embarrassingly low overall, but last month the National Labor Relations Board, or NLRB, released some genuinely inspiring numbers that suggest the perceived upswing in union activity is more than just a vibe. During the 2024 fiscal year, which ended in September, the number of union petitions filed jumped 27% compared with 2023 — and was more than double what the agency received in 2021. Why does this matter? Basically, filing these petitions is a concrete sign that more people are trying to unionize their workplaces… This new generation of organizers is embracing all sorts of strategies, including one of the oldest tactics in the pro-union handbook: salting. Salting is an organizing tactic in which a person gets a job at a specific workplace with the goal of unionizing their coworkers. This kind of shop-floor organizing has a long history within the labor movement, and was once so common it was thoroughly unremarkable; if you were a young worker with socialist or progressive ideas in, say, the early 1900s, it was the most normal thing in the world to start talking to your coworkers about unionizing as soon as you'd learned their names." • It's great that Teen Vogue has a labor beat, but why only Teen Vogue? quote from nakedcapitalism.com

June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
http://www.njfac.org

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[NJFAC] H-1B visas: It's wage theft, pure and simple, Neuberger

It's wage theft, pure and simple Thomas Neuburger Dec 31 For those who bought the "Learn to code" lie (source) "We live among predators, lions and tigers and bears, each determined to eat what they can of us before another takes a bite first." —Yours truly, here This is something everyone who's worked in high tech has known for decades. As I put it a few days ago: "H-1B is a wage-theft scam, because the rich aren't rich enough yet." Now for some detail. First, from reporter Lee Fang: Next this, about Amazon and its H-1B visa applications for warehouse jobs: And this, from right-wing commenter Ashley St. Clair. (She could lose her seat at the table if she keeps on like this.) Finally, consider reading this data-rich thread regarding the "body shops" involved in H-1B worker trafficking: Within which we find such goodies as this — ten times the statutory limit of approvals per year. Your (well, actually their) government breaks the law for them voluntarily. And this — almost all of these wages are well below market: 'Learn to Code' It's very simple. High tech companies like Google and Apple (and, really, all of them) bring in foreign H-1B workers to 1) create indentured employees — people who can only live in the U.S. by staying in the good graces of their employer — and 2) keep Americans from earning too much. Because money.Share Americans in high tech have been suffering through layoffs since 2022, massive ones, with no end in sight, and H-1B visas exist to fill the gap. Take that, well-paid American worker. "Learn to code" indeed. We live among predators...

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June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
http://www.njfac.org

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[NJFAC] on the Luddites and their current relevance: a book review

The Attenuated Politics of Popular Luddism by Mark Allison

Brian Merchant, Blood in the Machine: The Origins of the Rebellion against Big Tech (New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2023), 496 pages, $30, hardcover.

As the subtitle, The Origins of the Rebellion against Big Tech, indicates, Merchant seeks to draw parallels between Luddism, which arose in response to the dislocations of England's Industrial Revolution, and the burgeoning resistance to Silicon Valley digital capitalism. The algorithm-orchestrated gig economy, cloud computing, and the artificial intelligence climacteric have inaugurated a second machine age that threatens a degradation of work at least as acute and pervasive as the one that inspired the Luddites to take up their oversized hammers. In the months since Blood in the Machine's publication, the tech backlash has only gathered momentum as concern with the major AI companies' cavalier attitude toward safety and intellectual property—and public apprehension of an impending employment apocalypse—fuels anti-tech sentiment. Consequently, the book is even more topical now than when it initially appeared. Given Merchant's exquisite timeliness and exceptional moral clarity,....

Merchant tells the story of Luddism with fidelity and panache. The Luddites were a loosely affiliated network of textile workers in the English north and Midlands, the cradle of the Industrial Revolution, in the 1810s. Frame knitters, stockingers, and other craftspeople watched incredulously as manufacturers introduced machinery that enabled their own labor to be performed by unskilled workers—frequently children—at a fraction of the cost. Even more alarming, these devices were installed in a new architectural edifice, the factory, the inmates of which were subject to unprecedented labor intensity and discipline. Accompanying the Industrial Revolution, Merchant underscores, was an equally important cultural revolution: proudly independent artisans, many of whom had carried on their trade alongside their families at home, now had to report to what William Blake unforgettably called the "dark satanic mills," where operatives were subordinated to the remorseless rhythm of automated production and the petty tyranny of overseers. Skilled craftworkers faced a Solomonic decision: starvation or proletarianization.

Refusing this baleful choice, many opted for resistance instead. Nevertheless, the Luddites were not crazed technophobes—indeed, many were themselves amateur inventors or mechanical enthusiasts. They did not turn to pulverizing machines (a bargaining tactic that had been utilized opportunistically for centuries) until they had exhausted all other avenues for redress. As Merchant documents, immiserated craftworkers pressed for the enforcement of regulations governing their trades that were already on the books, petitioned parliament to enact basic labor protection laws, and proposed alternatives that would enable manufacturers to make a profit without reducing their employees to penury. For these efforts, they were ignored and mocked by turns. Ironically, the machine wrecking for which Luddism became notorious was "the bargaining tool of last resort."² Given the intransigence of the governing and employing classes, Merchant insists, the Luddites' recourse to this tactic "was, if anything, a logical response."³

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June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
http://www.njfac.org

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[NJFAC] Stricker article on wage stagnation

Frank Stricker's article in Dollars and Sense was featured in Nakedcapitalism.com

Five Decades of Stagnant Wages Dollars & Sense

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June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
http://www.njfac.org

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[NJFAC] Galbraith: Why Bidenomics Was Such a Bust

Why Bidenomics Was Such a Bust

A large majority of voters gave the Biden administration a failing grade on the economy. For the sake of future policy battles, it is worthwhile to try to understand their reasons. James K. Galbraith

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If voters are unhappy with the good readings on standard indicators—unemployment, the monthly inflation rate, economic growth—it must be because those indicators no longer connect to their sense of well-being. I have written on this before. In particular, low unemployment rates may reflect widespread disaffection with bad jobs; a low inflation rate does not reverse past price increases; and the incomes from growth may flow to profits and capital gains. These indicators are not useless—if they were bad, the situation would be even worse—but a good showing on them is insufficient.....

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June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
http://www.njfac.org

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[NJFAC] AI permits new "heights" in worker monitoring

Deedy @deedydas New workplace dystopia just dropped. AI monitoring software now flags you if you type slower than coworkers, take >30sec breaks, or checks notes have a consistent Mon-Thu but slightly different Friday. Bonus: It's collecting your workflow data to help automate your job away. https://x.com/deedydas/status/1860371464974926299

June Zaccone
National Jobs for All Network
http://www.njfac.org

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