Members of Progressive Labor Party (PLP) are part of the ongoing struggle of retired New York City (NYC) workers fighting against a union/city plan that would switch their health coverage into a Medicare “dis”Advantage program. These plans delay and deny needed treatments. They're requiring preauthorizations for expensive treatments and tests which would add new costs for care that low-income retirees can’t afford. It is a sign of growing fascism in the United States that the Municipal Labor Committee (MLC), a group of over 100 unions, is aligning with the city bosses to attempt to force this change. As the ruling class struggles to deal with their crises, they must get the working class on board with making sacrifices needed to prepare for wider war.
Unions work protect capitalist class interests—not workers
At the end of February, the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) showed which side they're on. Following orders of their President, Lee Saunders, eight union staffers from Washington, D.C. entered the DC37 Retiree Association offices and seized their books, records, phones, and computers. AFSCME replaced all the elected leaders with an administrator who will run the 26,000-member association as AFSCME sees fit. They said they did this because the retiree organization had failed to submit the IRS forms to retain their nonprofit status. The real reason is that the retiree leaders had voted to resume contributions to help fund the legal challenge to the new health plan. AFSCME threatened action last June to shut down workers' fightback.
Some workers see unions as organizations run by workers to fight around their day-to-day needs. The reality is that unions are run by bosses to give workers the illusion that they can reform capitalism to treat them better.
PL'ers participate in struggles workers need to survive in a capitalist-run society. We bring communist ideas into the struggle to build fighting unity of our class and the consciousness needed to combat the bosses’ ideas put forth by union misleaders. Only by winning masses of workers involved in class struggle to join the fight for communist revolution will we be able to build an egalitarian society where all share and control the fruits of their labor.
Attacks on Medicare expose a deeply racist and decaying capitalist system
On March 6th, 150 angry retirees and their allies rallied in front of the DC37 Retiree Association Headquarters. They expressed their anger at the proposed medical coverage change and how it's an attack on low-income (disproportionately Black, Latin, and women) retirees. They vented their anger at the AFSCME staff who were not even in the office to help a retiree who needed questions answered. They demanded an end to the administratorship. A retired school crossing guard who is battling cancer said, “They want me to die but I won’t die. I’ll fight!” Another worker called for ending contributions to the AFSCME political action fund which is being used to attack retirees in NYC. She previously campaigned for AFSCME-endorsed candidates in several states and volunteered to build AFSCME in Puerto Rico but not anymore!
Fightback and read CHALLENGE!
On March 14th, PL'ers were part of the crowd that packed the court for an appeals case. We circulated CHALLENGE at both events along with a Party flier. As we were leaving, one of the judges said she hadn’t seen anything like this before. We will continue to oppose these racist and sexist attacks on our fellow retirees. The city bosses and their union flunkies are finding out that we might be retired but we haven’t expired. We will fight back!
