In summary
Unions at Kaiser Permanente put pressure on the health care giant to raise pay and address what they called understaffing during two strikes over the past year. The results reflected labor’s power in California.
Health care workers fed up with low pay, burnout and understaffing walked out on Kaiser Permanente twice in 12 months, disrupting care and compelling the health giant to hire thousands of temporary workers.
The company’s blue collar unions put Kaiser on notice last week that they were preparing to walk out again in the first week of November, raising the stakes as negotiations continued.
Faced with that threat, Kaiser Permanente late last week announced what the Biden administration called a “historic” contract with the union coalition representing its lowest-paid workers, promising steep raises over the next four years.
It was the latest in a string of scorching labor wins in California this year.
In fact, unions did so well in the Capitol that the Kaiser contract wasn’t even the biggest labor victory for health care workers at the end of last week. That designation went to the law Gov. Gavin Newsom signed instituting a new minimum wage for health workers and gradually raising the floor to $25 an hour over a decade.
Kaiser workers will achieve that milestone faster under the contract the health care giant announced Friday, which raises pay for some 68,000 California workers by 21% through 2027.
Kaiser Vice President and Chief of Human Resources Greg...
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