President Obama will host key labor leaders at the White House this afternoon to discuss a number of pressing issues, including the Employee Free Choice Act and health care.
The administration has put EFCA on the back burner, focusing instead on issues like economic recovery, health care, and climate change–much to the dismay of the very people the President will meet with today. But that doesn’t mean there’s no common ground. Labor has by and large been on board with Obama’s health care push, and have by and large succeeded at taking a key financing scheme–a tax on employer-provided health care benefits–off the table, at a time when Democrats are trying desperately to cover the trillion-dollar up front cost of a reform bill.
On hand today will be the labor presidents of the National Labor Coordinating Committee, which was formed earlier this year by AFL-CIO, Change to Win, and the National Education Association. More on the meeting as details emerge.