vVv,;' • -• 'v m V>r-y•^'r ". '' ^ '••-f..• ! Protest to User 'Taxes' Spreads ATUNTIC GULF> LAKiS ANG MM SEAEUSERS :• ' '4 ' •'•yy. Volume 53, Number 10 October 1991 Casino RIverboat Crew Goes Seafarers Poge 3 '•:y :fc' mployees on the Alton Belle Casino, a riverboat gambling ship, a gift shop and a ticket sales office. Some employees work as telephone have designated the Seafarers International Union as their collective reservationists out of an office. The venture, based in Alton, III., is the first Ebargaining representative. The employees work aboard the vessel and of its kind to begin operation since the state's legislature enacted a bill on the company's floating barge which houses two restaurants, a lounge. allowing gambling on vessels plying its waterways. Page 3. ir . iif- . :l r'S < ' J I. J. ' • •• i . ( • SlU in Sea Rescue It Ain't Over, 'Tii it's Over Seafarers plucked four people from a life raft 300 miles off the coast of North Carolina last Uncertainty still surrounds the Persian Gulf area with month. The rescued individuals were adrift for four days after their 100-year-old schooner Iraq playing tough in allowing inspection of its weapons :f:l sank as a result of taking on water when a wooden plank ruptured. SS Lake Chief Cook Judith and nuclear arsenals. Meanwhile 1,250 Iraqi mines have Chester (right) provides two of the schooner's crewmembers with a warm drink and blankets been detonated or defused in Persian Gulf waters. not long after they were rescued. Page 5. Pages 3 and 28. 'y/444 44- •• •-V.i V .i;'r;j,,W. ^>'-t ^ ,-•.,/. t, (^; •.-• "y .i .•.•7'';-ir-iV^ ,>" "x- " A; .;: J: 0W^\ "}\ I ,4 President's Report -f', -•:,-! ,^:)'-'V,- ' 5; #?-;V; Our Nation's Achilles' Heel out of every four people without health care The issue of who pays for health care cover­ i JU!--.,:-i- i, coverage l^lds a job. age has resulted in some very tough negotiat­ Whai it comes to matters of importance to Those facing the biggest gap in health care ing sessions between hundreds of local and „ •'" I working people, nothing is higher on the list coverage are the nati(m*s senior citizens. Hun­ national unions and their contracted employ­ than access to affordable and ers. In the past few years, thousands of em­ decent health care. But medi­ dreds of companies around America are dump­ W'i: ing retirees from their medical plans because ployees have gone on strike to protect their cal coverage is rapidly be­ welfare plan benefits. coming an out-of-reach item of the liability such costs represent to their bal­ for average Americans. ance sheets. The average elderly citizen in the In addition, union employers that contribute Meanwhile, U. S. companies United States is looking at sp^^ng 15 per­ to a medical plan for their employees often are struggling to meet whop­ cent of his or her income on medical care. find that their non-union coni|xititlon offers lit­ ping increases in health insur­ The situation is getting ugly. For-profit in­ tle in the way of health benefits. Premiums ance premiums. The nation surance companies are dividing the world be­ charged for covered employees must also in­ as a whole is gripped by the tween those who are healthy and who have the corporate the costs to the medical establish­ health care crisis which puts highest chance of staying that way and those . ment of providing care to the millions of Michael Sacco the United States at a huge who are sick or likely to need medcal att^- people with no insurance. So, in effect what is disadvantage as it moves into the 21st century. tion. Those companies then only sell their in­ happening is that companies paying for health surance to the h^thy. insurance are subsidizing companies who offer Today, 37 million Americans have no medi­ no such coverage. cal insurance—cme of the most basic and neces­ Highest Cost in World sary services. Working people who want to In light of this current disaster and possible Today, health care costs take up 45 percent future catastrophe, the AFL-CIO has put forth maintain their coverage are having to assume of American corporate operating profits. If the mc»'e and more of the costs—through deduct­ some broad proposals to reform our unwieldy, United States is really serious ateut competing ineffective and expensive heallh care structure. ibles or co-pay arrangements. Or workers sim­ with Europe and Japan, it must even the play­ ply find themselves not getting as many ing field for its companies. All countries in Eu­ Affordable Health Care for All b^efits for the same amount of money. rope and Japan and Canada and other As we discuss what is almost a universal highly-industrialized nations have much fairer The AFL-CIO's four biLsic goals are: problem for most Americans, we should bear mechanisms of apportioning the bill when it Heallh care costs must be contained, and the in mind that we of the Seafarers have been comes to health care costs. skyrocketing nature of increases in health ser­ very fortunate with regard to our contract cov­ vices must be brought into check. Access to I might add here that in 1990 there was a medical care must be open to all Americans. erage in health insurance. In comparison to total of $675 billion spent on health care in the other medical coverage programs, the Seafar­ Red tape, waste and paperwork must be elimi­ -iU' • ' •• •'• United States. "Ihat was one-third more on a nated or drastically reduced. ATKI, the retiree :• •"- ers Welfare Plan comes out ahead per capita basis than what was spent in Canada health care crisis must be solved. This unique and preferred position of Sea­ and 50 percent more than what was spent in IP farers is in stark contrast to the millions of Japan and Germany. Yet in those nations, all Although our people enjoy sound protec­ Americans who have no health coverage or citizens have access to health care. The United tion, we feel it is in the interests of all Ameri­ 'r-iv' ..'v "; who are participants in policies which offer States, it turns out, is paying more for less than cans and the nation to have a universal health only bare-bones benefits. any of our competitor nations. care program that will provide alTordable and The statistics are fdghtening. Consider that decent coverage for every person in the United '.o- Solid Citizens in Trouble ill 1972 U.S. health care expenditures were States. Eventually this has to come about be­ There is a tendency to think of those mil­ $93.2 billion. The estimate fear 1992 health ex­ cause our citizens, our companies, our nation lions of people with no private health care as penditures is $800.2 billion. Over a 20-year pe­ cannot afford to enter the 21st century on the the poorest of the poor. The fact is, however, riod medical costs went up 858 percent. And brink of such a disaster. that the great majority of them are just like total health care exp^ditures continue to spi­ It is therefore in all of our interests to work you and me—they are working people. Three ral upwards at a rate of 18 to 30 percent a year. towards a universal health care system. t •-• '••••: -•!< • , Hussein's Omerlness Blocks Wrap-Up of Gulf Conflict The situation in the Persian Gulf At press time, a United Nations the United States. By the end of some continue to transport equip­ remains tenuous as a result of inspection team charged with re­ September, close to 95 percent ment, while others are undergoing Saddam Hussein's recalcitrance viewing the state of Iraq's chemi­ of all unit equipment had been scheduled maintenance. in the face of attempts by the cal, nuclear and biological weap­ moved out of the Gulf. United Nations to enforce the ons, was in Iraq attempting to At the end of September, 57 terms of the April 11 cease-fire inspect military sites via helicop­ Sealift Can Be Reversed Ready Reserve Force (RRF) ships which officially ended Operation ters. News services reported that But the flow of sealift operations continue in activation status, with Desert Storm. U.N. inspectors have uncovered can easily be reversed should the 41 of these under MSC's control. In mid-September U.S. Presi­ extensive Iraqi attempts to dis­ need arrive, noted a spokesman The remaining RRF ships are dent George Bush threatened to guise and disassemble and move for the Military Sealift Command either on exercises or on assign­ send American warplanes back facilities believed to harbor nu­ (MSC), the military's waterbome ments unrelated the Persian Gulf «.Jv'4W over Iraq if Hussein continued clear research or production cen­ transport agency. Critical to an situation. 4'^JSS' '• to defy the terms of the U.N's ters for chemical and biological immediate response are the mili­ The U.S. military deployment Security Council resolutions. weapons. tary's prepositioning ships, many in the gulf, at the end of Septem­ Hussein has thrown up a series of Meanwhile, American sealift of which are crewed by Seafarers ber, stands at 11,000 Army per­ obstacles designed to frustrate and operations are continuing to trans­ and operated by SlU-contracted sonnel—mainly troops based in prevent a full United Nations' in­ port materiel back to its assigned companies. the area around Dharan and Ad spection of his military arsenal. locations in Northern Europe or Currently, the MSC's five Diego Damman, Saudi Arabia; nearly Garcia-based prepositioning ships 5,000 Air Force troops—some •are reconstituted and fully loaded.