about health care | TOOLS & RESOURCES | Building a constituency for meaningful health care reform | State-level health care policy campaigns

Building a constituency for meaningful health care reform

Jobs with Justice contributes to the growing movement for health care reform by engaging diverse sectors in demanding healthcare for all. Our main strategy is to integrate three primary areas of work that local coalitions are leading on health care:

1) Improving working conditions for health care workers
Supporting health care workers organizing and bargaining for improved wages, benefits, and working conditions. By helping health care workers organize themselves, we can address under-staffing and other pressing issues that affect patient care.

2) Improving working families’ access to health care through employer-provided insurance
Supporting organizing and bargaining campaigns where health care is a main issue. We can help workers maintain (and hopefully improve) their access to health care and use the opportunity to highlight the need for meaningful health care reform as the solution for preventing this issue from surfacing again the next time the contract is up.

3) Expanding health care access to the uninsured by strengthening the safety net
Supporting community campaigns to keep public facilities open, cover the uninsured, and pass prescription drug legislation. Until we win meaningful health care reform, these battles address the immediate needs of the uninsured and under-insured as well as maintain momentum for the long-term campaign through concrete victories.

In March 2004, Jobs with Justice organized a National Health Care Action Day with approximately 250,000 workers and community activists participating in events in 125 communities. We organized more than 450 workplace actions and over 50 community actions demanding “Health Care For All!” Health Care Action Day was sponsored by eight international unions and six national health care organizations; twenty-six local coalitions participated, involving more than 260 local partners. It was an important step towards building an alliance between organizations resisting employer cost-shifting and those working to protect the public safety net and promote systemic reforms.