Starbucks: No Longer A Coffee Company
That’s right, folks. Starbucks now spends more on health insurance for its workers than it does for the primary product it sells: coffee. We’re in trouble, folks:
Howard Schultz, chairman of Starbucks, announces his plans to spend more on health insurance for its employees this year than on raw materials needed to brew its coffee.
According to Schultz, the Seattle-based company has had double-digit increases in insurance costs for the last four years.
Schultz made the announcement at a Washington, D.C. meeting with lawmakers from his home state – one of several organized by Schultz to address “a growing health care crisis.”
Shultz said he hopes congressional leaders will put the issue “at the front of their agenda.”
It’s similar to the American car manufacturers; they spend more on health insurance than on the steel to build their cars.
Something’s got to change, but mark my words–if it hasn’t changed by the time the avian flu hits (if the epidemiology predictions are right), it’ll definitely change after.
If by “change after” you mean “there will be so many fewer patients.”
Considering the effect spiraling health care costs have on their precious Bottom Lines, I would think the CEOs of major corporations would be banging down the doors of the Congresscritters they’ve bought and demanding a Canadian-style or German-style government-run health plan right now to stop the hemorrhage. Regrettably, ideology is apparently stronger than reason or even the precious Bottom Line. All those CEOs– including the ones at pharmaceutical and Managed Care corporations whose greed is propelling the spiral– belong to the same country clubs and attend the same GOP fundraising banquets. The very concept of “socialism” is such an anathema to them that they may be incapable of even considering it as a solution to their seemingly-intractable problem.
How much will the costs have to increase before ideology is forced to give way?
I am excited to see starbucks treats there employees so well. Its great new they are providing health insurance and spending more on health coverage over there primary product coffee.