Union leaders in Pennsylvania are echoing concerns expressed by the national AFL-CIO about the implementation of the federal health care law.
At this week’s national conference of the AFL-CIO, an umbrella group for dozens of labor unions, union leaders approved a resolution formally calling for changes to the Affordable Care Act. The AFL-CIO said it’s concerned about the affordability and accessibility of health insurance under Obamacare, and also worries that workers’ hours may be cut back as an unintended consequence of the law.
It’s a notable change from 2010, when unions were among the loudest supporters of the Affordable Care Act.
“There are still things that need to get fixed,” Rick Bloomingdale, president of the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO, said on Friday after returning from the conference.
On the whole, unions’ biggest complaint with the ACA is that the federal government would recognize so-called “multi-employer plans” as employer-based health plans. Those types of plans were legalized by the Taft-Hartley Act and are widely used by labor unions to pool insurance costs between unions and management.
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