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Robert Reich on Health CareFormer Secretary of Labor; Democratic Challenger MA Governor |
"We won't get a public option, or anything close to it, unless people who feel strongly about it make a racket," Reich said. "1. Be very loud & very vocal: Write, phone, & e-mail. 2: Get others to do the same. 3: Get voters and make a hell of a fuss. 4: March on Washington."
Democrats also shy away from any mention of universal health care because they still believe that Hillary’s ill-fated plan of 1994 was responsible for the Republican takeover of Congress later the same year. Their memories need jogging. Hillary Care sank of its own complex weight--which also made it a perfect foil for right-wing demagoguery. But it didn’t go down without a fight, and not without substantial public support at the start. In 1993, a majority of Americans listed “universal health care” as the most important unmet public need and their highest priority for government action. What better time to revive the idea of universal health care than now, since the federal budget is flush and working families need it more than ever?
A: The President proposed a minimum wage increase in 1992 during the campaign, and then when health care reform was on the table, when there was a possibility that employers would be providing health care for all employees, we felt that we didn’t want to add an additional few pennies to payrolls. But the minute health care was no longer viable - and that very ambitious health care plan, as you recall, did not get enacted -- we went back and proposed, in January of 1995, an increase in the minimum wage, and we’ve been fighting for that for the last year and three quarters. Hopefully, we will get it because Americans at the bottom, twelve million of them, deserve at least a livable wage.