![]() Thousands of LA healthcare workers rally on Labor Day.Kaiser Permanente healthcare workers to picket at SoCal medical facilities.Kaiser Permanente workers plan possible 3-day strike.Kaiser Permanente workers prepare for looming strike.We would go on strike because we care about fixing those things,” Lucas added.The union, however, continued circulating plans for picketing - with 75,000 Kaiser workers expected to take part across California and several other states. Waiting six months in Colorado for a radiology appointment. It would cause delays, but you know what else causes delays in patient care? Not having a staff to treat the patients. Would a strike impact patient care? It would. He added that the company is already releasing ads to hire strikebreakers, offering wages three times what workers receive now. The quality will get worse,” Regan said about Kaiser Permanente facilities if the strike is approved. “How will this affect patient care? The delays will get worse. 1 and impact dozens of nationwide Kaiser Permanente hospitals, clinics and other facilities. ![]() If it’s authorized, the strike could start as early as Oct. ![]() Regan referred to the flurry of labor organizing and strikes as the “hot union summer of 2023.” “I think everyone knows you cannot live, you cannot take care of a family in Los Angeles, San Diego, Denver, Washington, D.C., Seattle, Honolulu, on $19, $20, $21 an hour,” Regan said.Įarlier in the press conference, Regan connected the request of health care workers to those of Hollywood screenwriters, teachers, hotel workers and other unionized workers striking this year: fair wages that take into account high cost-of-living expenses and inflation. Kaiser offered its own proposal by email yesterday, he said, of $21 an hour minimum wage in 2026. The union’s proposal, Regan said, was for a four-year contract with annual pay increases, and a minimum wage of $25 an hour. Kaiser’s CEO, he continued, made a salary of $17 million last year. The company, Regan noted, has gone from $50 billion to over $62 billion in net worth in the last year, and its investment portfolio is more than $120 billion - all of which goes untaxed because of Kaiser’s nonprofit status. He said Kaiser has the money both to hire more hospital staff and to pay existing staff a fair wage. It’s been debilitating in so many ways.”Īlthough Kaiser Permanente is a nonprofit health care company, it’s nonprofit in name only, Regan said. “Health care workers for the last three years have been pushed to the limits. A once-in-a-century event,” Regan said, adding that 63 members of his union died during the pandemic. “That’s where we’ve gotten to on the heels of a pandemic. history, Regan said, affecting possibly millions of people in seven states and Washington, D.C. If the strike is authorized by union members, it would be the largest strike of health care workers in U.S. With 38 days left in the workers’ contract with the company, Kaiser Permanente has refused to even meet with the union’s bargaining team, said Dave Regan, president of SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West.īecause of the company's intransigence, the leadership of the union will ask rank-and-file members to authorize a strike for unfair labor negotiations starting on August 26 and going through mid-September. ![]() Lucas went on to say that the rising cost of living, compounded by inflation, makes it hard for health care workers to stay at their jobs. ![]() “Kaiser used to be the industry leader, but they have abdicated that role by failing to work with us to solve the staffing crisis, and we are all paying for it, the patients, our families and the folks providing the healthcare,” she said. She stressed that hospital understaffing overburdens health care workers and it causes delays in treating patients. The people that are left to provide care are maxed.” “Too many facilities are stretched to the brink. “We are here today, because there is a crisis in patient care at Kaiser Permanente,” said Caroline Lucas, the executive director of the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions, which has 12 local union members, at a press conference announcing the vote in Los Angeles. (CN) - The coalition of unions that represents 85,000 health care workers at Kaiser Permanente hospitals and clinics around the country announced on Thursday that it will soon begin the process of asking members to vote to strike over unfair labor negotiating practices, understaffing and underpaying workers. ![]()
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