Marc Stier at Large

Originally published in the Philadelphia Daily News, August 5, 2009 http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/52498012.html IN THE SEARCH for how to pay for health care reform, pundits and some senators keep talking about taxing employer-based health care benefits despite the fact such a tax would fall not on the wealthy – whose incomes shot up while their taxes were being sliced by the Bush administration – but on the middle class. Taxing employer-based health care makes sense in theory – when things are cheaper we buy more of them. If everything but medical care is taxed, perhaps we do buy more of it than we need. But I’m a community organizer as well as an academic, and I like to make the case for abstract ideas by telling personal stories. It struck me that among the hundreds of stories I’ve collected this year about people and their health care, I’ve heard none that support… Continue reading

I know you are all have been working hard for health care reform. But I need you to do a bit more. Because the debate about health care in Washington has come down to this: If the insurance companies win, we lose.   HCAN and our partners are doing rallies all over the country to make the fundamental choice crystal clear.  You can help by coming out to fight for quality affordable health care at one of our rallies across the state: Big Insurance: Sick of It  Rallies for Health Insurance Reform Tuesday, September 22 Click more for locations and to RSVP for events in Pittsburgh, Williamsport, Wilkes-Barre, Erie, and Philadelphia Continue reading

Here is your opportunity. All over the country, on Tuesday, September 22, Health Care For American Now, MoveOn, the AFL-CIO, SEIU and other groups are holding Big Insurance: Sick of It rallies. One of three national flagship events is in Philadelphia at 4:45 PM Dilworth Plaza, at the northwest corner of City Hall. Our target is Cigna insurance, whose world headquarters is in Philadelphia Wendell Potter, the former Cigna executive who has been speaking out about the awful practice of insurances companies will speak. So will Arlene Holt Baker, the Executive Vice President of the AFL-CIO. The eyes of the country will be on us, so we need a HUGE TURNOUT for this event. So please, RSVP for the event here, right now. And please invite your friends to this event today. Continue reading

The “Get It Done” health care rally at the Lions Park in Bristol Borough, PA, on Saturday, September 5th, 2009, drew a crowd of 300 people. The rally was one of hundreds taking across the country as part of the Health Care for America Now! campaign. The “Part 1” video features speeches given by several Bucks residents; Parts 2 and 3 have Congressman Patrick Murphy’s passionate speech in defense of health care reform.   Continue reading

 Created with flickr slideshow. Created with flickr slideshow.The 2009 Labor Day parade was all about change that would make life better for working people. And a key to that, as President Pat Eiding said in his impassioned speech is to reform health care in 2009. Thousands of working people attended the parade and representatives of almost every union that took part carried posters or wore stickers in support of health care reform. Here are pictures of some of them. Continue reading