Progress Illinois

“If you are going through hell, keep going.” – Winston Churchill

Every day, we see the painful downward spiral of an economy dominated by speculation and paper profits intended to maximize short-term return at the expense of our nation’s long-term health. In the current global financial crisis, we feel the effects of that philosophy in ways that threaten serious destabilization. We now must rebuild what 25 years of failure has taken from us: a vibrant, healthy middle class that honors labor, creates real wealth, grows strong communities, and helps to lift our fellow citizens out of poverty. We must rapidly implement new and innovative solutions to heal our environment rather than hasten its demise. Specifically, we must re-discover, re-invent, and re-build manufacturing in the knowledge economy.

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In 1980, the United Labor Unions set out to organize employees at Detroit fast food chains in the hopes of sparking a nationwide movement to unionize the workforce in this fast-growing industry.  As a rookie organizer working on the campaign, I learned firsthand what is at stake when workers stand up for better wages, healthcare, and a voice on the job.

We started with a Burger King franchise in Detroit’s Greyhound station. While the drive was a challenge, the spark spread between employees as they encouraged each other to join the union and stand up to their managers. Greyhound Food Management ran a tough campaign to keep workers from organizing -- threatening some, making promises to others -- but didn’t succeed. By a margin of just one vote, the Burger King employees opted to create a union.
 


Encouraged by our victory, we shifted our focus to three McDonald’s franchises on Detroit’s North Side. The employees were struggling with all kinds of issues -- minimum wage violations, sexual harassment, unfair scheduling, and health and safety issues ranging from grill burns to meat slicer injuries. Fed up and fired up, they decided to organize a union and won overwhelming support from their co-workers. Nothing could stop them.

Or so they thought.



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Fair housing has suffered for too long as a largely ignored priority in America. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) continuously neglects its duty to affirmatively advance the cause. Many others dismiss the issue as historical.  And the movement itself has suffered from poor funding and organization throughout its history.

Nonetheless, promoting integration and reducing discrimination in housing is a crucial component to improving our metropolitan regions going forward.

Despite important victories that helped guarantee civil rights (including systemic changes in the lending and insurance fields), the first 40 years of fair housing advocacy has almost completely failed at improving the integration of metropolitan communities. Multiple metrics show that most communities throughout the United States continue to suffer from high segregation. While demographic changes occur across many regions, what we often see is short-term integration swiftly replaced by re-segregation. Common examples include the entry of white residents into gentrifying urban neighborhoods and increases in minority populations in suburban municipalities. In the vast majority of these cases, the initial increase in diversity is followed by re-segregation due to displacement or flight.

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The threat of large spending increases normally extinguishes any talk of expanded health coverage. In the wake of the financial system’s speculative collapse, Barack Obama told reporters that he would have to delay initiatives promised on the campaign trail. But international experience demonstrates that universal coverage need not be contingent upon high spending; indeed, the rest of the industrialized world provides comprehensive health benefits to all citizens for around half of the current U.S. outlay.

In fact, Illinoisans already pay enough to cover comprehensive, high-quality care for all – we just don’t get it. The reason we don’t is because insurance companies waste billions of our premium dollars on marketing, underwriting, denying coverage, and fighting claims. Eliminating this profit-focused paperwork would save at least $17 billion annually, enough to provide health care for all Illinoisans without paying more than we already spend. The Health Care for All Illinois Act (HB 311), introduced by Rep. Mary Flowers, is Illinois’ best option for fixing our broken health care system.

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