[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 101 (Thursday, July 28, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: July 28, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                           HEALTH CARE REFORM

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Illinois [Mr. Durbin] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. Speaker, in the next few weeks, Congress will debate 
the most important and biggest social issue we have ever faced in our 
history, the reform of America's health care system. You heard speeches 
early on from some of my Republican colleagues who would like us to 
wait, to study this a little longer, to put it off. And yet the 
American people know we have been engaged in this debate for almost 2 
years now. We have thoroughly familiarized ourselves with concepts and 
ideas to try to take what is good in our health care system and keep 
it, and to change the things that just are not working for America.
  Tonight I would like to address the whole question of the influences 
that will be on Members of Congress in the next few weeks as the health 
care reform debate begins. A little later on my colleague, the 
gentlewoman from Oregon [Ms. Furse], will take a special order on this 
same subject. I hope those interested will listen closely to her 
remarks.
  Let me tell you, for those listening, sending a letter to your 
Congressman can be a very valuable experience as you put your thoughts 
together. Believe also that Members of Congress see this mail.
  Let me tell you about a letter that I received on health care reform. 
It came from Mike Schuette. Mike is the owner of several grocery stores 
in Breese, IL. He wrote to me and urged that a health care reform bill 
include an employer mandate. That is one of the terms you will hear a 
lot of. An employer mandate is a requirement that employers and 
employees share the cost of health care insurance.
  Mike Schuette, who has many employees in his grocery stores, wrote 
and said:

       It is our feeling that responsible people need health 
     insurance. We could have pocketed a lot more profit through 
     the years had we not paid for our associates' health 
     insurance. But we feel it would have been money that belonged 
     to our associates.

  When Mr. Schuette talked with my office about the issue, he noted 
that as long as the mandate also applied to big retailers such as K-
Mart, he could support an employer mandate and felt it was the right 
thing to do. He said he could pay for his employees' health insurance 
and compete with bigger companies, as long as the bigger companies had 
the same requirement.
  Contrast that with K-Mart's attitude. When K-Mart came to see me and 
sent their lobbyist, as they are entitled to do under our system of 
government, they had an entirely different story. This huge 
corporation, K-Mart, enormous, nationwide retailer, told me they just 
could not afford to pay for their employees' health care coverage. When 
their executive vice president and general counsel, Anthony Palizzi, 
testified before Congress, he said:

       I am here today on behalf of K-Mart and retail companies 
     around this Nation to tell you as much as we might like to, 
     retail employers simply cannot absorb the massive costs of 
     health care reform.

  So on the one hand, we have the tiny chain of grocery stores, the 
Schuette stores in Clinton County, IL, which is already responsibly 
providing health insurance to its employees, and on the other hand, we 
have these mega corporations like K-Mart which claim to speak for 
Schuette, incidentally, and they say it cannot be done.
  I think maybe big K-Mart could learn a lesson from Mike Schuette, to 
take the responsible business position to provide health protection for 
its workers, instead of saying it cannot be done.
  A level playing field is good for all businesses and good for 
competition. But today the competition is not fair. Mike Schuette takes 
care of his employees. He and his family think it is the right thing to 
do. Across the street, K-Mart, competing with him, does not, and that 
is unfair.
  Individual businesses have accepted this responsibility, their shared 
responsibility with their employees to provide health insurance. In the 
next few weeks you will hear loud and clear from the business lobby in 
this town that they oppose health care reform. Don't be surprised. Look 
at the record. This same business lobby opposed Social Security, 
Medicare, minimum wage, worker safety, and virtually every piece of 
socially progressive legislation passed through Congress in this 
century.
  As I contemplate my own vote on this issue in the weeks ahead, I am 
going to be listening closely to Mike Schuette and his family business 
and many like them who have stepped forward and done the responsible 
thing. The big business lobby, the special interest that has the money 
to make all the noise, is not going to have quite the persuasive power 
as hard working businessmen and women around America, doing the right 
thing, showing respect for their employees.

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