Wal-Mart, Union Join Forces on Health Care

In July, he wrote an opinion article in the Wall Street Journal declaring the death of employer-based health coverage and urging businesses to look for new solutions. Stern followed up with a letter to each head of a Fortune 500 company. Over the next few months, he received responses from many of them. By December, he was in discreet talks with Wal-Mart on ways they could reach a consensus on the problem of health care, if nothing else.

"We've disagreed on many issues in the past, and I'm sure we will disagree on others going forward," Sarah Clark, a spokeswoman for Wal-Mart, said yesterday. "However, resolving America's health-care crisis is so important to this country that we're willing to put aside our differences and work together."

In addition to Wal-Mart and the SEIU, the coalition announced yesterday includes other groups that historically have been at odds: AT&T, Intel, the Communications Workers of America, the Howard H. Baker Jr. Center for the Public Policy and Kelly Services. The coalition issued a statement decrying the state of the nation's health-care system and outlining four principles for an alternative, including ensuring that everyone has quality and affordable coverage.

But not everyone is convinced the coalition will be effective. Gerald M. Shea, the AFL-CIO's head of health policy, said he was concerned about the lack of detail in the coalition's plans.

"Their public positioning campaign is one thing. What they do is another," he said. "They want a solution by 2012 -- that's too far away from our point of view. What are you ready to do now?"

The UFCW had met with a Wal-Mart executive in December to discuss health care but decided the company was not taking enough steps to significantly improve its employee coverage. And it came out swinging again yesterday, with members handing out fliers from Wake-Up Wal-Mart denouncing the company at the news conference.

"Why Wal-Mart would want to look for a partner to cover up its health-care crisis is obvious," said Paul Blank, director of Wake-Up Wal-Mart. "But why anybody would decide to give a disingenuous player that stage is unconscionable."

Stern said the SEIU's Wal-Mart Watch will continue to speak out against the retailer as it sees fit. But now he has his eyes on bigger fish. The coalition spent the afternoon making rounds at Congress, stopping at the offices of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Rep. James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.), among others.

"We're way past the question, 'Can an employer solve this problem?' " he said. "We're at a point where the country has to solve the problem."

Staff writer Amy Joyce contributed to this report.