In Michigan, Accepting Medicaid Makes You A Dues-Paying Union Member
The unions tried this in Michigan once before, trying to force daycare providers who accepted public money to pay dues.
That one didn’t work out, but now they’ve got a new tact. If you accept Medicaid, the SEIU wants to force you to pay dues.
If you’re a parent who accepts Medicaid payments from the State of Michigan to help support your mentally-disabled adult children, you qualify as a state employee for the purposes of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). They can now claim and receive a portion of your Medicaid in the form of union dues.
Robert and Patricia Haynes live in Michigan with their two adult children, who have cerebral palsy. The state government provides the family with insurance through Medicaid, but also treats them as caregivers. For the SEIU, this makes them public employees and thus members of the union, which receives $30 out of the family’s monthly Medicaid subsidy. The Michigan Quality Community Care Council (MQC3) deducts union dues on behalf of SEIU.
Michigan Department of Community Health Director Olga Dazzo explained the process in to her members of her staff. “MQC3 basically runs the program for SEIU and passes the union dues from the state to the union,” she wrote in an emailobtained by the Mackinac Center. Initiated in 2006 under then-Gov. Jennifer Granholm, D-Mich., the plan reportedly provides the SEIU with $6 million annually in union dues deducted from those Medicaid subsidies.
This is why people hate labor unions.
On the surface, unions really aren’t all that controversial a concept. The idea of workers forming associations and negotiating compensation packages collectively isn’t all that controversial, and in fact its constitutionally protected.
The problem is that this is so far beyond that basic premise of workers voluntarily forming organizations to negotiate for better salaries that it’s well into the realm of organized crime.
This isn’t