The War on Nurses and Other Workers
The War on Nurses and Other Workers
Date: Friday, September 15, 2006 12:41 AM
<<<<< JOB DESTRUCTION NEWSLETTER No. 1556 -- 09/15/2006 >>>>>
Seth Sandronsky wrote an excellent article about the negative effects that
the Senate's Comprehensive Immigration Bill (S.2611) will have on domestic
nurses. He has a firm grasp on the fact that immigration is being used as a
weapon to flood labor markets and to bust unions.
Sandronsky made one factual error:
Contrast the Senate's immigration provision for the labor shortage
of U.S. nurses and a national labor policy for medical doctors.
There is a government restriction on the number of foreign
physicians who may practice medicine in the U.S.
His assumption that doctors would be better off than nurses if S2611 passed
isn't correct. S2611 has an exemption from the employment based green card
cap for a wide variety of occupations -- including medical doctors in "SEC.
505. SHORTAGE OCCUPATIONS". The bill gives exemptions to aliens who have an
advanced degree in science, technology, engineering, math, college
professors and researchers, and any other category that the DHS decides to
waive. The green card, or EB visa, is unlimited for foreign physicians who
agree to work in a location designated by the Department of Health and
Human Services as having a shortage of health care professionals (in other
words, in lousy areas that most doctors don't want to practice in). This
exemption will last until September 30, 2017 at which time most white
collar professions in the USA will be on the endangered species list.
***** READ THE PREVIOUS PARAGRAPH AGAIN VERY CAREFULLY *****
... because you might have missed the fact that shortage occupations will
be subject to unlimited green card visas. Decisions about which medical job
categories have shortages, and therefore which are exempted, would be
totally at the whims of the DHS. If you are an engineer, scientist, or
programmer you will be thrown to the wolves just like doctors and nurses!
Sandronsky overlooked another piece of legislation that is just as
devastating to doctors and nurses. Section 201 of the Skil Bill (H.R. 5744
and S. 2691) contains an identical visa exemption as S2611. The Skil bill
has a much higher probability of passing through Congress because it's a
standalone bill that continues to be off the radar screen of immigration
and labor activists.
Sandronsky also failed to mention the threat that H-1B poses for doctors
and nurses. H-1B visas can be used for almost anyone in the medical
industry, and of course the numbers of H-1Bs will be dramatically increased
if either S2611 or the Skil bill is passed.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
http://www.counterpunch.org/sandronsky09122006.html
September 12, 2006
A Joint Attack by the Senate and the NLRB
The War on Nurses and Other Workers
By SETH SANDRONSKY
These are trying times for U.S. labor unions. Their strength is on the
wane. There are many reasons why. One reason is a fierce attack by
employers and the federal government. Some of the attacks are harder to see
than others.
A provision in the recently passed Senate immigration reform bill expands
the number of foreign nurses who may work in the U.S. Lifting this cap on
immigration is the idea of Sen. Sam Brownback, a Kansas Republican, and
backed by the American Hospital Association. The AHA represents hospitals,
health care networks and systems. Since the 1990 federal election cycle,
the AHA has spent just under $13 million, split about evenly between
Democrats and Republicans, to lobby candidates, according to the Center for
Responsive Politics.
Immigration is an economic issue. It crosses national borders. Government's
role is crucial in this movement of working people. Case in point is the
opening of the U.S. job market to some foreign workers. Contrast the
Senate's immigration provision for the labor shortage of U.S. nurses and a
national labor policy for medical doctors. There is a government
restriction on the number of foreign physicians who may practice medicine
in the U.S. Thus domestic doctors are the most highly paid in the
industrialized world. Why? U.S. doctors are insulated from foreign job
competition.
Such insulation from foreign competition limits the supply of doctors
practicing medicine in the U.S. A limited supply of doctors practicing
medicine stateside increases the demand for their labor services. This
policy boosts doctors' annual salaries. Their high pay drives up the
over-all price of health care throughout the country's economy.
No other nation pays more for its health care than the U.S. In 2003, the
U.S. spent 15 percent of its gross domestic product on health care versus
five percent in 1960, according to the Organization for Economic
Co-operation and Development. The U.S. lacks universal coverage. Canada
spent 9.9 percent of its GDP on health care in 2003 compared with 5.4
percent in 1960. All Canadians have health-care coverage.
In the meantime, the weakening of U.S. blue-collar workers' protection from
foreign competition has driven down their real wages, or what their pay can
actually purchase in the marketplace. The Senate's provision in its
immigration reform bill will drop the wages and benefits of native-born
nurses both inside and outside of labor unions. This is the desired outcome
for the AHA, U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Right to Work
Foundation, the lowering of their constituencies' costs for labor services.
In this way, lower wages help to boost profits for employers.
Nursing homes operators and home health-care employers are also seeking
more foreign workers. These workers earn very low wages. The American
Health Care Association, which represents for-profit nursing homes, and the
National Association for Home Care both joined an industry coalition to
lobby Congress for a new visa that they hoped would annually admit 400,000
low-skilled workers -- the grist of the home-care field -- which would be
equal to the number that now arrive illegally" (Wall Street Journal, July
26, 2006). It is unclear what is low-skilled about caring for people living
in their homes. Nevertheless, the basic point that immigration is a labor
issue remains.
On another labor front, the Wall Street Journal reported on July 23 that a
summer ruling by the U.S. National Labor Relations Board could change the
employment status of some of the nation's nurses and other wage earners by
re-classifying them as supervisors who use "independent judgment."
Significantly, supervisors cannot be in unions, U.S. labor law says.
The National Labor Relations Act, the nation's primary law determining the
rights of employees to join unions and bargain collectively, excludes
"supervisors" from the definition of "employee", according to an issue
brief from the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). The Act defines a
"supervisor" as "any individual having authority, in the interest of the
employer, to hire, transfer, suspend, lay off, recall, promote, discharge,
assign, reward, or discipline other employees, or responsibly to direct
them, or to adjust their grievances, or effectively to recommend such
action, if in connection with the foregoing the exercise of such authority
is not of a merely routine or clerical nature, but requires the use of
independent judgment."
President George W. Bush appointed each of the five current NLRB members.
President Clinton appointed the previous members of the labor board. The
United States Supreme Court has twice rejected prior Board rulings for
minimizing the importance of independent judgment in the assignment or
direction of employees by nursing personnel, the NLRB stated in a press
release. In those cases, the Board found that nurses who direct other
employees in their patient care duties are not statutory supervisors."
In 2001 in a 5-4 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court found the Clinton NLRB's
interpretation of "independent judgment" to be wrong. The Court ruled that
registered nurses on the payroll of Kentucky River Community Care used
independent judgment through oversight (such as scheduling) of co-workers'
labor. Therefore, the RNs should have the occupational status of
supervisors under U.S. labor law, according to the Court.
Now at stake in the Bush NLRB decision on the Kentucky River cases, pending
since 2002, is the supervisory status of charge nurses employed by
health-care facilities in Michigan and Minnesota and manufacturing workers
("leadmen" and "load supervisors") in Mississippi. In terms of the
corporate healthcare sector, consider a brief filed by the AHA to the Bush
NLRB.
The charge nurse's role presumes an education and experience that equip him
or her to assume a management function. If charge nurses are not perceived
as supervisors with managerial prerogatives, the quality of patient care
will suffer, hospitals will continue to experience staff shortages and the
already significant financial burdens on hospitals will increase. Charge
nurses' loyalties will be strained and their already challenging job of
ensuring quality care will only become more difficult.
A ruling by the NLRB, the federal agency that certifies union workplace
elections, is expected soon. Up to eight million employees inside and
outside of labor unions could be affected, according to the EPI. These
women and men toil in dozens of occupations, from construction to financial
services and health care.
Clearly, an NLRB ruling reclassifying nurses and millions of wage earners
as supervisors would cut the potential number of unionized employees in the
U.S. Plus, overtime wage rates would likely drop or disappear for the newly
created category of salaried supervisors. They would see their workloads
increase without a rise in pay. Moreover, employees now in unions could
lose their contract protections. Welcome to President Bush's ownership
society.
What is to be done in the face of the Bush NLRB and Republican controlled
Congress? For one answer we turn to the 65,000-member California Nurses
Association. Registered nurses are the mainstays of the CNA, which also
represents nurses through the National Nurses Organizing Committee across
the U.S. Crucially, the CNA has been a strong backer of universal health
for the U.S. populace, and endorsed anti-war and consumer activist Ralph
Nader as a presidential candidate in 2000.
The CNA, which was an independent union that decided, in fall 2005, to
consider joining the AFL-CIO, has gone beyond getting more bread and butter
for its rank and file to advocating for the general public. In 2004,
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (transforming himself into a
liberal Republican now) threw down the gauntlet to the CNA concerning
hospital staffing requirements. He sought to keep the ratio of one nurse to
six patients. A state law signed by the previous governor, Democrat Gray
Davis, required the ratio to drop to 1-5. As an advocate for improved
patient care, the CNA opposed Schwarzenegger's move. Everywhere he went in
public, the nurses union was there to meet him with protest rallies. This
political stance surely has its roots in the largely untold and
under-appreciated history of female nurses standing up to male doctors.
That book waits to be written.
Schwarzenegger's hospital proposal preceded the special election he called
for November 8, 2005. Momentum created by the nurses union helped to defeat
all four of the governor's ballot measures. His measures would have changed
laws on public teacher tenure, labor union dues, legislative district
borders and the state budget. A kind of united front emerged to battle the
governor. CNA's popularity rose. His dropped. Working people united to take
down a politician and his paymasters. There is a lesson here for California
and the nation. The lesson goes far beyond voting for or against a ballot
measure.
Seth Sandronsky is a member of Sacramento Area Peace Action and a co-editor
of Because People Matter, Sacramento's progressive paper. He can be reached
at: ssandron@hotmail.com
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