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About Northwest labor press. (Portland , Ore.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 16, 2015)
SERVING ORGANIZED LABOR IN OREGON AND SOUTHWEST WASHINGTON SINCE 1900 NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS VOLUME 116, NUMBER 20 INSIDE AFL-CIO confab Meeting Notices Classified ads Awards Night 3 4 6 7 PORTLAND, OREGON OCTOBER 16, 2015 Obama signs TPP The 12-nation pact would favor the rights of investors over workers By Don McIntosh Associate Editor The secret negotiations are complete. The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) — kind of a quadruple NAFTA — was fi- nalized Oct. 5 and will be head- ing to Congress for a ratifica- tion vote. TPP is a partnership between corporate lawyers and government leaders from 12 Pacific Rim nations — to write a massive set of rules that would lock in corporate profits and protect investors from democracy. But that’s not how President Barack Obama’s trade czar put it. U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman is a former Citigroup executive and Har- vard Law classmate of Obama’s. During his Senate confirmation it came out that he owned substantial funds in a Cayman Islands tax haven. Froman’s the guy who led the TPP talks to completion, and he wants you to think TPP is all about benefiting American workers. For details of the sales pitch, or just to witness the Obama Administration’s world-class chutzpah, take a look at Fro- man’s brand-new propaganda web site — ustr.gov/tpp. The site features a red-white-and- blue logo that reads “TPP: Made In America,” and the “We already know enough to oppose the TPP. It’s going to off- shore jobs and drive down wages.” — Citizens Trade Campaign director Arthur Stamoulis tagline, “leveling the playing field for American workers and American businesses.” The TPP “includes the strongest worker protections of any trade agreement in history,” the web Turn to Page 5 HEALTH CARE Machinists Lodge 63 member Sam Beekman (right) at the starting line at Timberline Lodge with his friend Brian Epps ... and below at the finish line in Seaside. ’Fighting Machinist’ completes Hood to Coast route … in a wheelchair ALS doesn’t stop Sam Beekman’s quest for adventure. By Michael Gutwig Editor & Manager Longtime Machinists Lodge 63 member Sam Beekman put to- gether a four-man team of ALS patients to help raise awareness about the disease. They did it by riding their wheelchairs 175 miles from Timberline Lodge on Mt. Hood to the promenade in Seaside on the Oregon coast. Initially, the idea was to enter a team in the popular Hood to Coast Relay, an annual event that Beekman and the Machin- ists Union — The Fighting Ma- chinists — participated in for more than a decade starting in the mid-’90s. Race officials, however, worried about their safety, so the plan was nixed. Beekman and his friend Brian Epp, who also has ALS, came up with Plan B — wait until a few weeks after the Hood to Coast Relay, and do it on their own. So, at 9 a.m. on Sept. 25, Beekman and Epps set out from Timberline Lodge for the first of nine legs of the “non-sanc- Turn to Page 8 Premiums continue to outpace inflation and workers’ wages Deductibles triple in 10 years, and family premiums now aver- age $17,545 a year The Kaiser Family Founda- tion’s 17th annual nationwide employer survey confirms what most workers are already feeling: Health care costs are gobbling up more and more of their wages. Employers are the principal source of health insurance in the United States, providing health benefits for about 147 million Americans who are un- der 65. But most workers share the cost of the medical services they use. That cost sharing can take a variety of forms, includ- ing a share of the premium de- ductibles, co-payments (fixed dollar amounts per visit), and co-insurance (a percentage of the charge for services). Who’s covered? The premium In 2015, 57 percent of employ- ers offer health benefits to at least some of their workers, sta- tistically unchanged from the 55 percent in 2014. That in- cludes 98 percent of large firms (200 or more workers) but just 47 percent of the smallest firms (three to nine workers). Single and family premiums for employer-sponsored health insurance rose an average of 4 percent between 2014 and 2015. Since 2005, premiums have grown an average of 5 percent each year, down from the 11 percent annually they Turn to Page 5
