Health Care Insurance Reform and The Working Poor

Health Care Insurance Reform and the Working Poor
(Cross posted on Square State)

One of the arguments from the health care debate the Republicans don't want to talk about is the number of working poor in the United States who work like dogs and still can't see a doctor.
My youngest sister Roxanne is 32 years old. She had some serious health issues as a kid, but is doing pretty well as an adult. Raised in a large working class family, Roxanne put herself through college, receiving an Associate's degree in Montessori education. She has been employed as a preschool teacher all of her adult life.

My sister's job, like that of most people in early childhood education, has very long hours (7am- 6pm most days) and is emotionally exhausting. She doesn't make anywhere near the pay a public school teacher makes, nor does she get treated with the same level of respect. Preschool teachers and child care providers, in my opinion, have the most difficult jobs and are compensated the least. How do I know? I've done their job, too.

According to the National Association for the Education of Young Children in 2007, the average salary of a preschool teacher was still under $20,000 annually. For my sister's long hours at work, she is paid enough to make a monthly car payment, a car insurance payment, buy her lunches and clothes, pay for personal necessities, and that is about it. She lives with my elderly parents because she cannot afford rent, so she is their caretaker at times, as well. Her employer, like most child care centers and preschools, does not provide health care insurance benefits. Most preschool teachers are married women and covered under their husband's insurance. My sister will probably never marry.

Roxanne cannot afford a dime for health care insurance, especially because she has a pre-existing condition, and the insurance costs are exorbitant (I hate the word "premiums" because it sounds so positive -- let's call them what they are -- stolen income). When my sister had a brush with death a few years back, she could not afford to pay her medical bills, nor the follow-up care she was advised to get. So, when my sister goes to a free clinic to get a prescription, she is completely dependent on a soft-hearted physician, or must grovel to one of the local charities to get it filled.

More often than not, she just goes without. "They need a union!" you say. Attempts at organizing the early childhood education industry have had zero success. Teachers usually go into the industry when their own children are infants, and stay until their kids are in elementary school. These women are often in the most exhausting period of their lives, juggling babies, a job, and very little sleep. Few teachers see it as a full-time, lifelong profession, so putting energy into professionalizing the industry is a low priority for most of these young mothers. Most teachers do not last long enough in early childhood to fight for the benefits they deserve.

My sister, and many early childhood educators, are among the 47 million Americans who cannot afford health care, or health care insurance. In a country like the United States that prides itself on being "modern", this is shameful. All around the world, industrialized nations give their most vulnerable citizens basic level health care as a civil right. For-profit health care systems are seen as dishonest, immoral and inhumane. Even Iran and North Korea, countries we love to hate here in the United States, have universal health care for all of their citizens.

People like my sister, who give every waking moment educating our nation's children and caring for others, are doing the most patriotic, noble service to their country, in my humble opinion. I ask my fellow Americans -- Republican, Democrat, Independent or other, to stand with me and say, "Enough is enough". No longer can we ignore this moral mandate. Health care is a right, not a privilege.

The myth of "the market" fixing all problems is a lie, and must die. The market has never given a "rat's behind" about the most vulnerable people in our society - the sick, children, the elderly, etc. The un-regulated market has created a situation where the richest one percent of Americans has ninety-five percent of the wealth. It has all but ruined our economy and destroyed this country, and it is time to say "THIS MUST STOP". We need to reign in corporate greed, and we need to do it NOW.

"Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane." - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.