[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 97 (Friday, July 22, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: July 22, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                TIME FOR UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE COVERAGE

  (Mr. MILLER of California asked and was given permission to address 
the House for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, yesterday 50 large 
corporations stepped forward and told the Nation the cost of not doing 
universal health care coverage. That is, some of the largest employers 
in the Nation will not continue to be able to provide health care 
coverage to their employees if those they have to compete against can 
still be irresponsible and not provide health care coverage, and shift 
the cost to those corporations who are responsibly providing for it.
  Safeway Stores in California said they would have to consider 
withdrawing health care coverage from employees because they simply are 
in such a competitive part of the market in the grocery business that 
they will not be able to continue to compete with those stores that do 
not provide it to their workers.
  Mr. Speaker, we see the automobile companies coming forward and 
explaining that they are spending $6 billion a year in health care 
coverage, and yet they are finding out that in many instances health 
care costs are lower to their competitors around the world because they 
again have to pick up the cost of health care in the United States that 
is not paid for by employers who are irresponsibly denying that 
coverage to their employees.
  Mr. Speaker, the time has come for us to put an end to these 
inequities in the American marketplace, to put an end to the inequities 
in the international marketplace, and have universal coverage for all 
of America's workers, and to provide them the kind of coverage that 
they can rely on, coverage they know will never be taken away from 
them. The time has come to provide universal health care coverage.

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