Not all unions are against Medicare for All. Here's why ours thinks it's a good idea. Taking health care off the bargaining table would ease conflict with employers and let unions focus on needs like housing, retirement and organizing.

Susan Minato, Kurt Petersen and Ada Briceño | Opinion contributors

Show Caption Hide Caption Warren, Sanders' Medicare for All plan, explained Medicare for All is one of the most hotly debated topics in the 2020 election. But what is it? And how will it work? We explain.

As Democrats debate the future of health policy, politicians and pundits have suggested that unions would oppose nationwide universal health care because they might want to keep the employer-based health care plans that they have won in collective bargaining.

UNITE HERE Local 11 represents more than 30,000 room attendants, servers, cooks and others who keep hotels, cafeterias, stadiums, and airports running across Southern California and Arizona. Like other unions, we work diligently on behalf of these members to secure a variety of benefits, ranging from a living wage to protections against sexual harassment. But the most pressing issue in our workers’ lives is the necessity of health care. While protective and proud of the excellent medical benefits we have won in our contracts, we strongly believe Medicare for All is a promising proposal that should be pursued for our members, and for our country.

Our members in Southern California enjoy high-quality, affordable health care coverage. Room attendants have full family coverage with no deductible, and co-pays are capped at $25 per month. We even have a dental center that only serves union members. Perhaps our plan’s most important feature is the eligibility requirement: members need to work a minimum of 80 hours per month to become eligible. Eighty hours a month is 20 hours a week, meaning a part-time server working three shifts a week has affordable health insurance for her family.

Countless hours negotiating on health

Given these high-quality health care benefits, why would we support a Medicare for All system?

First, health care is acutely expensive, especially when an organization buys it for a pool of thousands of employees instead of a national pool of hundreds of millions of workers. Even though we work hard to maintain low administrative costs — as little as 2% — we regularly face double-digit increases in the cost of health plans. We have no choice but to extract these increases from employers in negotiations, which raises the likelihood of labor conflict.

Second, we spend countless hours and resources at the bargaining table and on the picket line fighting to maintain the current level of care for our members. There are urgent needs beyond health insurance that we need to negotiate, such as winning wages required to afford an apartment amid a housing crisis, or to retire with dignity. The high cost of health insurance makes for hard choices at the bargaining table. Medicare for All would ensure that we do not need to choose between providing health care for our members or a sufficient wage to pay the rent.

Cover everyone, period: Stop fearmongering about 'Medicare for All.' Most families would pay less for better care.

Most important, the future of the labor movement lies in organizing the 90% of American workers who do not yet have a union or access to these benefits. Rather than exerting so much effort protecting medical coverage for our members, the labor movement should focus on organizing the unorganized. We are committed to organizing the working poor of the hospitality industry in swing states like Arizona. For example, few room attendants in Phoenix, a market with low union density, can afford the expensive, high-deductible plans that these employers call “health insurance.” Winning the quality health care our Los Angeles hotel members possess in these less labor friendly areas will require an intensive struggle.

Health care is a basic human right

We got a taste of the magnitude of this strife when our members, the subcontracted cafeteria employees at Loyola Marymount University, risked their jobs by protesting over health care costs, a dispute which almost derailed a recent Democratic debate. Removing the fight for health care from the bargaining table will increase the likelihood of a renewed labor movement, which in our view, is necessary to ending expanding income inequality.

Sickness should not compound economic hardship for workers or their families — and we should be exploring every option for universal health care that would end this injustice once and for all, including Medicare for All. Clearly there are details that need to be discussed about how to implement plans like Medicare for All, and our members should have a seat at the table for its implementation because of their expertise after years of negotiation. But in this discussion, we should recognize that the Medicare for All proposal has moved the needle on making health care a human right, and we should acknowledge the presidential candidates who have championed it as great allies of the labor movement.

Advice to candidates: 2020 Democrats, you're doing it wrong on health care. Stop arguing and show leadership.

If health care were treated as the basic human right that it is, unions like ours could get back to fighting for the other needs of working people, such as organizing the unorganized, winning wages that can keep up with soaring rents, securing a pension to enable a retirement with dignity, and ending discrimination of all kinds. That is what we think a movement that represents all workers should stand for.

Susan Minato, Kurt Petersen and Ada Briceño are co-presidents of UNITE HERE Local 11. Briceño is also chair of the Orange County Democratic Party. Follow them on Twitter: @UNITEHERE11