Former IAM President George Kourpias detailed the challenges facing retirees, and the shortcomings with the Bush Administration’s health and prescription drug policies.

Retiree Issues to Play Major Role in Election

Former IAM President George Kourpias detailed the challenges facing retirees, and the shortcomings with the Bush Administration’s health and prescription drug policies.

Kourpias, president of the Alliance for Retired Americans, said the November election is about issues important to retirees such as Social Security and Medicare privatization and saving the U.S. pension system.

“Can we honestly say to our children that they are going to live a better life?” asked Kourpias. “Are there going to be Social Security and Medicare? Pensions? I don’t think so. That’s why we have to get out there and do everything we can to send George Bush back to Texas.”

Retiree panel, from left, Roger Hare; Ursula Diaz, moderator Charlie Micallef and Bill Holayter gave delegates an overview of retiree issues in the next election.

Winpisinger Center Assistant Director Charlie Micallef, chaired a panel of retirees, Roger Hare, Ursula Diaz, and Bill Hoylater. “These folks have become experts on the issues that affect retirees,” said Micallef.

Hare expressed concern about prescription drug costs. He said bus trips to Canada to buy cheaper drugs save retirees 50 percent or more. The trips were “essential for people on fixed incomes that have to take drugs and must find a place to get them cheap."

Ursula Diaz has studied the new Medicare prescription drug plan and finds that it is expensive with inadequate coverage. “It is based on money, and giving everybody money and very little service to the people the plan is designed for,” said Diaz.

Bill Holayter believes the Bush administration wants to destroy both Social Security and Medicare through privatization and vouchers for Medicare. He said that a single-payer national healthcare plan is the best solution.

“We pay, on a per capita basis, $5.8 thousand a year for health coverage insurance,” said Holayter. “That’s twice as much as any other industrialized nation in the world. And we get less.”

Kevin Smith, the Chief Executive of GKN, spoke to delegates in Cincinnati and sounded more like a union leader than the president of a 245-year old manufacturing firm with 40,000 workers in 30 companies around the world.

GKN Partnership Saves Good Jobs

Kevin Smith, the Chief Executive of GKN, spoke to delegates in Cincinnati and sounded more like a union leader than the president of a 245-year old manufacturing firm with 40,000 workers in 30 companies around the world.

Introduced by President Tom Buffenbarger as an employer who believes in unions and investing in America, Smith cited his experience with the IAM at GKN in St. Louis as a benchmark example of how an up-front working relationship can produce benefits for employer and employee alike.

In the last three years, an IAM-GKN partnership brought the military parts facility in St. Louis from an uncertain future to hiring more than 300 IAM members and bringing work back to the facility that had been previously outsourced.

Smith also emphasized the importance of health and safety at GKN companies, calling it the number one measure of performance. “Corporate social responsibility is much more than a section in our annual company report,” said Smith.

At a GKN company cafeteria in Brazil, Smith cited the practice of providing employees with free food and no limit on how much they can eat. “If, however, at the end of the meal you leave food on your plate, it is weighed, you’re charged for it and the proceeds go to a local charity,” said Smith as delegates applauded.

The British executive acknowledged the impact of globalization but emphasized GKN’s commitment to investing in America. “During the last seven years, GKN has invested $1.3 billion dollars in manufacturing in the United States,” said Smith, who added the U.S. continues to be his firm’s largest target for future investment. “Our company’s experience with the IAM has given GKN the confidence that globally competitive, unionized and American aerospace manufacturing facilities are sustainable.”