The Sunday NYT had an interesting article about the nation's largest employers building health clinics at their factories and offices:

Today a new wave of clinics is opening, driven largely by a motive that was less of a factor in the past: employers’ desires to reduce their health insurance premiums by taking care of workers before they need to see outside doctors. More than 100 of the nation’s 1,000 largest employers now offer on-site primary care or preventive health services — a number forecast to exceed 250 by the end of the year, according to David Beech, a health benefits consultant.

Corporate America’s new in-house medical offices go well beyond traditional occupational health clinics that hundreds of factories have long maintained for job-related injuries and worker’s compensation cases. Employees can now stop by for check-ups, allergy and flu shots, pregnancy tests or routine monitoring for chronic diseases like diabetes and asthma.

When prescription drugs are required, some employers arrange for the pills to be delivered the next day at the office or plant, while others even maintain fully stocked pharmacies.

The article mentions Toyota, Sprint Nextel, Florida Power and Light, Credit Suisse and Pepsi as some of the high-profile companies providing health clinics.

I suppose this was inevitable, but not because they are interested in employee health beyond workers showing up for work. As the article states, they are doing it to control costs.

The question is, how can a car manufacturer or a soft drink bottler provide less expensive health care than the existing system we have in place, which everyone hails as the greatest system in the world? I guess our system isn't so great after all.

But the bottom line is the bottom line. When shareholder's interests take priority over all other considerations, will workers receive the same quality of health care they would get from their family doctor or a clinic run by the local hospital or health department?

This illustrates again how twisted and perverted our system of health care delivery has become. Employers have no business in the business of health care. There are issues with privacy, portability, employability, family care, continuity of care, and more, all revolving around insurance company dictates and profits instead of a person's abilities, experience, or individual best interests. It has always been baffling to me how we got to this point.

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*In case you don't remember it, the title of this post is a line from the classic "You have meddled in the primal forces of nature, Mr. Beale" scene in the 1976 movie Network. The movie was very prophetic. Before that, Tennessee Ernie Ford's 1946 song Sixteen Tons and the line "Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go, I owe my soul to the company store" was about coal miners, but it seems we have come full circle.

I once worked for a guy who decided to provide "free lunch" for all employees. It was a mandatory program. He openly stated that the purpose was to keep people at their desks. Because, as you know, there's no such thing as "free lunch."

Many see such amenities as lunch, day care centers, laundry and dry-cleaning pickup and drop-off, gyms, and now health care clinics as "benefits". They are. They are benefits to shareholders provided by paternalistic corporations seeking to control every aspect of your life to maximize profits. A better benefit would be a fair wage and a functioning, affordable health care system and free personal time to spend with family and on leisure and personal development.

I am reminded of a philosophy once shared by an associate. He said "I work all week, I get paid on Friday, and we're even. On Monday morning we start all over again." I tend to agree with that philosophy. That's all anyone should want or expect from an employer.

SayUncle's picture

System - you keep using that

System - you keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. ;)

We don't really have a system unless you're elderly or poor. We have a market that is inefficient with respect to cost due to insurance companies, lawyers, and bureaucrats.

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SayUncle
Can't we all just get a long gun?

rikki's picture

Actually, the market is

Actually, the market is inefficient because it is involuntary. No one decides how much or how little health care they need.

Justin's picture

Many see such amenities as

Many see such amenities as lunch, day care centers, laundry and dry-cleaning pickup and drop-off, gyms, and now health care clinics as "benefits". They are. They are benefits to shareholders provided by paternalistic corporations seeking to control every aspect of your life to maximize profits. A better benefit would be a fair wage and a functioning, affordable health care system and free personal time to spend with family and on leisure and personal development.

How are these negative for an employee, especially if they can get the same service cheaper/discounted. If given a choice of taking my kid to an onsite day care that is readily accessible to me for a cheaper rate (payroll deduct perhaps) vs traveling across town before/after work I would jump on it in a heartbeat.

R. Neal's picture

What if you don't like the

What if you don't like the people running the day care or the food they serve your kids? What if they conveniently open early and close late so you can work longer hours? What if they indoctrinate your kids with stuff like "corporations good, government bad" (ok, maybe that's a bad example).

What if you get stuck in a shitty job because you can't afford day care or insurance or whatever except what is provided by your employer?

Maybe it would be better if people made enough to have a "comfortable" lifestyle without both parents having to work? Or if people had flexible work schedules or could work from home so they can make arrangements for their kids with day care providers they choose or even take care of their kids themselves, and go to meetings with teachers, take their kids to doctors appointments, etc.?

Les Jones's picture

Bubba:

"What if you don't like the people running the day care or the food they serve your kids?"

So you're in favor of school vouchers so people can choose the schools their children go to, right? Because after all people have a lot less choice about paying taxes than they do about where they work.

www.lesjones.com

R. Neal's picture

People can work through the

People can work through the political process to improve public schools, or they can opt out on their own dime.

P.S. Not to get too far off topic (although I guess it's sort of related) how is it that Webb School is able to provide such a superior education that parents are willing to pay (a lot) for it? Is it because they are willing to pay for it?

Les Jones's picture

Webb

"Not to get too far off topic (although I guess it's sort of related) how is it that Webb School is able to provide such a superior education that parents are willing to pay (a lot) for it?"

It probably doesn't hurt that Webb has high standards for getting in the door in the first place. That option isn't availbe to public schools, with the exception of magnet schools and such.

P.S. Do little lodestones go to magnet schools?

www.lesjones.com

Sven's picture

What if they indoctrinate

What if they indoctrinate your kids with stuff like "corporations good, government bad" (ok, maybe that's a bad example).

Heh.

Justin's picture

Sounds like you want a

Sounds like you want a Utopian society. So are you saying that companies should NEVER offer anything like daycare, clinics, laundry pick up, on site oil changes/car washes or clinics?

R. Neal's picture

Pretty much, yeah.

Pretty much, yeah.

R. Neal's picture

(But I'm mostly against

(But I'm mostly against employer provided health insurance.)

R. Neal's picture

And how about this. Instead

And how about this. Instead of providing all these "benefits", what if they took the money and paid it directly to you and gave you the choice and the work schedule flexibility to make your own arrangements?

smalc's picture

That's what I think when

That's what I think when hear about outrageous benefits at some companies, particularly internet/software/computer firms.

Forget the sushi in the cafeteria, put that money into salaries.

Actually I have sort of that same feeling when I see CEOs on teevee donating large sums of money to charity-you know it is coming from the workers. Not to mention any names, but one local clothing chain CEO comes to mind.

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