A rchive Date
[ 05-01-2004 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ U.S ]
|
[3 automakers to offer same-sex benefits
Copyright 2000 Houston Chronicle News Services
June 8, 2000, 9:57PM
DETROIT - General Motors, Ford and DaimlerChrysler's Chrysler division announced Thursday that they would begin offering medical, dental and prescription drug benefits for same-sex partners of their 466,000 hourly and salaried employees in the United States.
It is the largest move yet by corporate America to provide such benefits for gay and lesbian couples. The move was hailed by gay rights activists as a potential tipping point in persuading other old-economy employers to do the same.
Many companies in the financial, media, entertainment and airline industries and some state and local governments have offered same-sex benefits in the past several years. But gay and lesbian advocates said the automakers' decision dwarfed previous corporate moves and was particularly welcome because Midwestern companies have been slow to provide such benefits.
"When the Big Three come together as a group to announce domestic benefits for same-sex couples, it's really a sea change," said Kim I. Mills, the education director of the Human Rights Campaign, a group that represents gay, lesbian and transgender Americans. "We have not seen this kind of movement in the manufacturing sector."
The two largest U.S. companies offering same-sex benefits until now have been IBM and Citigroup, she said. Both companies are based in the New York area, where gays and lesbians are more influential than in the Midwest.
The Catholic Archdiocese of Detroit expressed dismay at the automakers' decision. The Catholic Church favors open and equal access to health care, but "anything that compromises or erodes the traditional shape of the family tears at the very fabric of moral relationships that the church seeks to uphold," said Ned McGrath, a spokesman for the archdiocese.
The federal government does not provide same-sex benefits for its employees. In the private sector and state and local governments, such benefits are offered to 18 percent of workers, according to a study last year by the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan group in Oakland, Calif.
The companies and governments offering the benefits are most likely to be in the Northeast, on the West Coast or in Minnesota and Wisconsin, two Midwestern states with a liberal tradition, said Kenneth McDonnell, a research analyst at the Employee Benefit Research Institute in Washington.
David Murphy, Ford's vice president for human resources, said the United Auto Workers union had demanded same-sex benefits during contract negotiations last autumn. Ford concluded that the benefits would add less than $5 million a year to Ford's $2 billion in annual health care costs.
GM and DaimlerChrysler also calculated that the costs would be small, Murphy said.
When automakers provide a new benefit to their hourly workers, they usually offer it to salaried employees, too, as they are doing now. Companies in other industries have found that less than 1 percent of their employees register for same-sex benefits, and Murphy predicted that this would hold for the auto industry.
The automakers will not offer the benefit to retirees, but same-sex partners of current employees can retain their benefits after these employees retire. Unmarried heterosexual partners of employees will remain ineligible for benefits.
The UAW has been under mounting pressure from its gay and lesbian members to win better legal protections and benefits for them. The Canadian Auto Workers union had made the issue a priority, winning same-sex benefits from GM in Canada in 1993. Chrysler resisted in Canada until it lost an arbitration case in 1997, and Ford held out in Canada until last year.
The same-sex benefits will take effect Aug. 1.
Chrysler drew national attention in 1997 when it chose not to advertise on the episode of Ellen, a television sitcom, in which the lead character, played by Ellen DeGeneres, made clear that she was a lesbian. Chrysler executives further antagonized gay and lesbian groups when they compared the show with the murder trial of O.J. Simpson, saying that they did not buy advertisements on socially polarizing shows. Chrysler resumed advertising on subsequent episodes of Ellen that included lesbian themes.
The controversy caused some gay and lesbian employees at Chrysler to organize as People of Diversity, an advocacy group that now has about 100 members. Only a quarter of them are in the UAW, but they tried hard to enlist the UAW's support, said Michelle Walters, the group's co-chairwoman.
DaimlerChrysler's other divisions, Mercedes cars and Freightliner heavy trucks, are not unionized except for one Freightliner factory that has a separate labor contract. Both divisions said Thursday that they had no plans to offer same-sex benefits. Toyota, also nonunion in the United States, said it would not offer the benefits either.
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
|