Earlier this month, Wal-Mart lost a key political battle when lawmakers in Maryland overrode a gubernatorial veto and effectively required Wal-Mart to spend more on employee health care. The retail behemoth’s biggest concern was how many other states would follow suit. The fears are well-founded — Wal-Mart now has to worry about Washington state.
More than 3,100 Wal-Mart employees in Washington were benefiting from state-subsidized health coverage throughout 2004 — nearly double the total for any other company, according to two confidential state reports.
That total is much higher than previously thought. And it indicates that as many as 20 percent of Wal-Mart’s employees were getting taxpayer-funded health care for themselves or their dependents.
The reports are sure to fuel the debate over a labor-backed push in the Legislature to require companies such as Wal-Mart to pay more for health care. Democrats in the House and Senate say the reports show that Wal-Mart and some other big companies are shifting millions of dollars in health-care costs to the state.
“I think taxpayers should be outraged,” Rep. Steve Conway, D-Tacoma, said Monday. “They are subsidizing one of the wealthiest corporations in the world.”
How soon will we see Wal-Mart embrace a publicly-financed single-payer system? I’d say it gets more likely all the time.