SUPPORT GROWS for taxing health
benefits, but details remain in dispute.
Fully 56% of Americans now favor
taxing individuals for some portion of their health benefits, compared
with just 9% in 1989, according to a Gallup poll for the Employee
Benefit Research Institue. Some 34% would only tax benefits beyond a
basic package, while 22% would make all health benefits taxable.
Moreover, 40% support eliminating employers' deductions for health
benefits completely or at least partially.
Those polled split almost evenly
on whether they would be willing to pay extra taxes in exchange for a
guarantee of health coverage regardless of their work status. "As
the health-care crisis has worsened . . .more Americans have become
reasonably disposed to some sort of tax on health benefits," says
EBRI President Dallas Salisbury. "However, they still are
divided on the whole issue."
If all taxpayers paid $400
more annually, there would be enough revenue to provide coverage for
all the uninsured.
LABOR"S GLASS CEILING: Despite
a growing role, women lack clout in unions.
The number of female union
members in the U.S. doubled, to 6.2 million from 3.1 million,
between 1960 and 1990, according to the United Nations' International
Labor Organization. During the same period, the overall unionized
work force climbed a scant 1.2 million to 16.7 million. Women, who
account for two out of every three new union members, now comprise
37% of the unionized work force.
But last year, women held the top
jobs at only two of the 95 AFL-CIO unions. Even unions where women
have made gains - such as AFSCME, the state- and local-government
employees union - haven't achieved equality. AFSCME says 50% of its
locals have women presidents, for instance, but the ILO says regional
and council directors, mostly men, have more power.
EMPLOYEE ASSISTANCE plans heed
the bottom line more carefully.
Corporate clients demand more
emphasis on controlling costs, says David Levine, a vice president at
Human Affairs International in Salt Lake City. Mental-health services
are scrutinized especially closely. "Employers are paying for
functionality [in workers], not to help them find themselves,"
explains Robin Weiner, a Foster Higgins consultant in Los Angeles.
Personal Performance Consultants,
a St. Louis managed-care company, says it used savings from its
merger with pharmaceuticals company Medco Containment Services to
expand into child-care and elder-care referral services. And Peter
Cummings, manager of San Diego County's plan, sees programs paying
more attention to issues that directly affect costs - such as team
building and resolving workplace conflict - rather than catering to
the "wounded well."
Hard times spare the program
at Cincinnati Gas & Electric, which has cut 10% of its workers
since last summer. "We're trying to maintain programs that help
people deal with the stresses of change," a spokesman says.
HIGH-TECH STEELWORKERS: USX
says it will employ just 90 workers to process 600,000 tons of
corrosion-resistant steel annually at its new Leipsic, Ohio, mill.
That's about one-third the number needed in less-advanced plants.
The mill, a joint venture with Japan's Kobe Steel Ltd., will be USX's
first major nonunion venture.
STATE POLICE recuits in
New Jersey and North Dakota now must have bachelor's degrees or two
years of college plus prior experience. Officials say population
diversity and new technologies, such as DNA testing, make schooling
vital
A NEW PROFESSION: The
"Waiters Association" is formed to elevate the standards
and status of this country's 1.8 million "ambassadors of
hospitality" The group plans to provide group insurance, job
contacts and a newsletter offering tips on how to improve skills,
reviews of service-related books and "profiles of America's
waiters."
PRINCIPAL PROBLEMS? Some
schools could face a shortage of administrators.
In some areas, rising salaries
give teachers less incentive to move into principals' jobs. In
Montgomery County, Md., teachers earn up to $55, 614, compared with
$63, 635 for starting assistant principals; but teachers only work
10 months. In grosse Pointe, Mich., where teacher salaries have
climbed 40% in the last six years, postings for high school principal
jobs draw half as many applicants as in the past.
Long hours, frequent evening
meetings and rising community pressures drive some candidates away.
So does stress; high school principals in Fairfax County, Va., earn
up to %80,000 - but they manage staffs averaging 200, and school
populations range up to 4,000. The county deliberately raised
teaecher salaries to keep talent in the classroom, but it's having
second thoughts because budget cuts have hurt recruiting efforts.
"The role of the principal
has diminished," adds Assistant School Superintendent Ernest
Lavender in Fulton County, Ga., who was a principal 10 years ago.
"The position is not held in such high esteem."
THE CHECKOFF: A graffiti
artist converts a politically correct "Persons Working"
sign over a Manhattan manhole to read: "Manly Persons
Working." . . . Move over, Oprah: Labor Secretary Robert Reich
has appeared on eight nationally broadcast television talk shows
in the last two weeks.
|
