In Southern California, more than 2,500 members of NUHW began
a three-day strike against Kaiser Permanente early this morning. Tomorrow, they’ll be
joined by 20,000 more Kaiser workers in the largest strike in Kaiser’s history.
Here’s an
article in the Los Angeles Times about today's walkout by 1,100 NUHW Registered
Nurses at Kaiser’s largest hospital in Southern California.
And here’s TV
news coverage from today's picket line in San Diego, where NUHW’s mental
health workers are on strike.
As workers tell the press about Kaiser’s $5.7 billion in
profits and its multi-million-dollar executive salaries, Kaiser seems to
be having difficulty explaining why it refuses to fix short-staffing problems
and is trying to slash frontline caregivers’ health benefits and pensions.
A little birdy sent along this explosive document: a pay stub from Kaiser’s Chief Operating
Officer, Bernard Tyson. How much did Bernard take home during a single two-week pay
period? $805,422!! (Click on the pay stub to see more details). That’s because of
the massive bonuses that nonprofit Kaiser pays to its executives. No wonder that Kaiser's execs are hiding in their offices from the TV cameras!
