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Truer words were never spoken (via the Freep): House Speaker Andy Dillon dropped a policy bomb Wednesday on Lansing to cut the cost of public employee health care and help the state address a whopping $1.7-billion deficit.
'Bomb' about sums it up. Dillon's plan may sound good, but once you get past the sparkle and glamor of the term 'statewide health plan' it's apparent that this just another case of robbing Peter to pay Paul, or is it robbing Peter to help Andy get elected? *cough, cough* Regardless, Dillon announced his plan yesterday with a full court press, pulling out the stops in the usual fanfare that we've all come to expect. The fact that some of the state's largest unions were barred from the press conference and had to wait to find out from the media themselves after the conference, is if nothing else, disconcerting. Under Dillon's plan, public service employees, everyone from teachers to firefighters to police officers, to legislators and even the Governor, and their retirees, all told more than 400,000, would be swept into one massive health plan. He claims that it would save the state $900 million. Well that sounds all fine and dandy, except when you consider that a move like this would essentially neuter any of these groups, particularly the unions, from being able to effectively engage in collective bargaining, a backbone that has ensured fair pay and labor practices, all things that these deserving folks might normally be blocked from. Also worth mentioning are the very strange bedfellows of the plan. Starting with the Michigan Association of School Boards (MASB) who's clashed with the teachers unions more than once, and ending with the very guy who tried to recall Dillon not that long ago - Leon Drolet.
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