As Jobs Disappear, So Does Health Insurance

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2008/03/30/as-jobs-disappear-so-does-health-insurance/

by James Parks, Mar 30, 2008

A big part of the American Dream is based on the premise that if you work hard, you can provide for yourself and your family. But in today’s economy, good jobs are disappearing.

To survive, America’s workers are forced to take low-paying jobs that rarely offer health care or retirement security—and that’s not right, says Constance, a 59-year-old single woman from Illinois. If you work in the United States, you should be able to do more than just scrape by.



I left a job in a neighboring state two years ago to come back to help take care of my last immediate family member. I am single. I moved to Illinois, accepting a position with a small insurance company, who downsized, and within six months I was out of work. You can’t afford health insurance on unemployment wages.

I hired into a new position five months later, after a long search, and enrolled in their health insurance. I worked for them nine months, and again the company downsized and my job was eliminated. Again, I lost the health insurance, even though I was offered COBRA, the exorbitant cost. You can’t pay $400 a month for health insurance when you are making $150 a week on unemployment.

After searching for employment, and finding nothing in this depressed economy here, I took a position with an insurance agency, which employs six people. would not purchase a group plan and told us we were considered “self employed,” and we have no benefits.

Needless to say, at age 59, my alternative is eating or having health care. I have always worked all my life, paid my bills, voted in every election, and now find myself living beneath the poverty level.

FULL story at link.

[Vincardog]

1. This is the Party Of Death's dream for ameriKKKa. Death to the POD