From: Gary Wiltshire 

On Mon, 22 May 2000 15:25:57 -0500, Bill Lucy  wrote:
.....
>If an employer picks up all health care premiums, do you propose that the
>employee gets dependent coverage for free?
>
>If you are proposing that the employee pick up 100% of health care premiums
>(including employer cost), I'm with you. The "hiding" of
health care cost
>through employer pickup has gone on too long.
>
>And that still doesn't answer the question of "who is a
dependent". Is it
>Grandma? Uncle Joe? Your neighbor?
>
>Or the person you've chosen to devote your life to?
.....
You actually answered this last couple of paragraphs above.  The notion
that employers should pay for health insurance got started during the wage
and price controls in WWII, if I remember correctly as a way to get around
paying illegally higher wages to attract the few available employees.  I'd
rather the employer give the money that would go to insurance to the
employee.  The employees could then join "health unions" similar
to credit unions.  As a longtime member of the Navy Federal Credit Union, I
can tell you it's the best thing since sliced bread.  In fact, this might
be a function that a credit union might be interested in picking up.  I'm
sure there are laws against that, but I already want to curb the power of
the State.

Should my employer provide me with a car?  How about sushi?  I go through a
LOT of sushi.  How about ALL of my food?  Hmmm..., I'd say that
employer-paid HMOs are the modern equivalent of the "company
store" able to artificially inflate prices.

Also, employer-paid health care and other benefits discriminate against not
only gays, but single people as well.

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