Chat with AI
Human Resource Management 15th Edition by Gary Dessler
Edition 15ISBN: 978-0134237510Human Resource Management 15th Edition by Gary Dessler
Edition 15ISBN: 978-0134237510 Exercise 5
Striking for Benefits
A few years ago, the strike by Southern California grocery workers against the state's major supermarket chains was almost 5 months old. The main issue was employee benefits, and specifically how much (if any) of the employees' health-care costs the employees should pay themselves. Based on their existing contract, Southern California grocery workers had unusually good health benefits. For example, they paid nothing toward their health insurance premiums, and paid only $10 co-payments for doctor visits. However, supporting these excellent health benefits cost the big Southern California grocery chains over $4 per hour per worker.
The big grocery chains were not proposing cutting health-care insurance benefits for their existing employees. Instead, they proposed putting any new employees hired after the new contract went into effect into a separate insurance pool, and contributing $1.35 per hour for their health insurance coverage. That meant new employees' health insurance would cost each new employee perhaps $10 per week. And, if that $10 per week weren't enough to cover the cost of health care, then the employees would have to pay more, or do without some of their benefits.
It was a difficult situation for all involved. For the grocery chain employers, skyrocketing health-care costs were undermining their competitiveness; the current employees feared any step down the slippery slope that might eventually mean cutting their own health benefits. The unions didn't welcome a situation in which they'd end up representing two classes of employees, one (the existing employees) who had excellent health insurance benefits, and another (newly hired employees) whose benefits were relatively meager, and who might therefore be unhappy from the moment they took their jobs and joined the union.
Assume you are mediating this dispute. Discuss five creative solutions you would suggest for how the grocers could reduce the health insurance benefits and the cost of their total benefits package without making any employees pay more.
A few years ago, the strike by Southern California grocery workers against the state's major supermarket chains was almost 5 months old. The main issue was employee benefits, and specifically how much (if any) of the employees' health-care costs the employees should pay themselves. Based on their existing contract, Southern California grocery workers had unusually good health benefits. For example, they paid nothing toward their health insurance premiums, and paid only $10 co-payments for doctor visits. However, supporting these excellent health benefits cost the big Southern California grocery chains over $4 per hour per worker.
The big grocery chains were not proposing cutting health-care insurance benefits for their existing employees. Instead, they proposed putting any new employees hired after the new contract went into effect into a separate insurance pool, and contributing $1.35 per hour for their health insurance coverage. That meant new employees' health insurance would cost each new employee perhaps $10 per week. And, if that $10 per week weren't enough to cover the cost of health care, then the employees would have to pay more, or do without some of their benefits.
It was a difficult situation for all involved. For the grocery chain employers, skyrocketing health-care costs were undermining their competitiveness; the current employees feared any step down the slippery slope that might eventually mean cutting their own health benefits. The unions didn't welcome a situation in which they'd end up representing two classes of employees, one (the existing employees) who had excellent health insurance benefits, and another (newly hired employees) whose benefits were relatively meager, and who might therefore be unhappy from the moment they took their jobs and joined the union.
Assume you are mediating this dispute. Discuss five creative solutions you would suggest for how the grocers could reduce the health insurance benefits and the cost of their total benefits package without making any employees pay more.
Explanation
Verified
Verified
Five creative solutions to reduce total ...
Human Resource Management 15th Edition by Gary Dessler
Why don’t you like this exercise?
Other Minimum 8 character and maximum 255 character
Character 255
