JournalInquirer.com
It’s a case of blood money
CT@Work
Published: Thursday, August 13, 2009 11:57 AM EDT
Leo Canty

There is no question this tough economy has been extra tough on the workforce. Businesses everywhere are struggling to stay afloat and keep their profit margins from turning red. After all, if corporations can’t make ends meet, there won’t be any jobs out there for workers.
One time-tested strategy to keep those jobs around is to make cuts. Cuts in jobs, pay, and benefits all help these corporations to maintain the steady stream of profits to which they’ve grown accustomed. And most importantly, those cuts insure that executive pay, stock options, and bonuses won’t have to be sacrificed.Even nonprofits understand the importance of making cuts to protect executives and the company line.

Case in point: the American Red Cross. Blood is big business, as in $3 billion a year big. With her $565,000 paycheck, Red Cross CEO Gail McGovern understands how big. The Red Cross supplies almost 50 percent of the blood in our nation. Sure, it takes thousands of nurses, phlebotomists, drivers, lab techs, and other professionals to keep that blood supply flowing — including 225 blood collection workers at Connecticut Blood Services Region in Farmington. But let’s face it: In order to keep business booming, cuts have to be made.The Red Cross has borrowed from other “successful” business models. They’ve taken to moving donors in and out faster than the McDonald’s drive-through and extended the hours of the blood drives so they can fit more donors in.But the most important cost savings has been to cut people. Do you really need nurses on site in case someone has a bad reaction? Why have two people doing the job when one person can just work twice as fast? Couple that with cuts to pay and benefits for this reduced workforce and now you’re boosting profits. Oh, and forget about testing the blood — it slows down production. Besides, the FDA fines, totaling $21 million in the last five years for poor blood safety, cost less than skipping the tests.More blood, more cash, bigger bonuses.

It comes as no surprise the Red Cross is borrowing another page from Corporate America’s anti-union playbook. In regions across the country, including Connecticut, it is refusing to enter into a fair agreement with the very workers who protect the quality and integrity of the blood supply. Red Cross is practically daring the workers to strike, no doubt in the hopes of replacing those pesky union workers who actually care about safe blood with a lower paid, more compliant, and more transient workforce. Think Wal-Mart, but instead call it Blood-Mart.

Now, what would Clara Barton do? She founded the Red Cross and the first local chapter was opened up in Dansville, N.Y., on Aug. 22, 1881. I can’t imagine that a founder planting seeds to grow a caring, kind, humanitarian, organization would cherish an enterprise that beat up its workers and offered volunteer donors the same love that vampires give mortals. Maybe Red Cross management should get a session with Dr Phil. He is, after all, a member of the “Celebrity Cabinet” and might find a humanitarian reason to get the sociopathic managers into therapy. Might even be a good show for TV, so the rest of the corporate bums that do the same thing might learn something.

In the meantime, Red Cross blood-collection workers in Connecticut see this awful corporate behavior continuing. It is making an impact not only on workers, but donors and volunteers. The workers have a union and are pulling together on this front, actively fighting back. They believe donors deserve safe, protected blood drives. No patient receiving Red Cross blood should worry about the quality. They have to fight for a safe environment for their co-workers and a fair wage and benefit plan. They donate their own blood for the cause and are pushing to rebuild the spotty reputation of the uncaring, greedy management.

So they are picketing and kicking up some dust and fighting the boss. Good for them. Good for us. Someone has to stand up to this profits and bonuses vs. people at work contest. There’s too much management-first style management going around already. The last thing we need is to have every employer out for blood.

Leo Canty is executive secretary of the Connecticut AFL-CIO and chairman of the board of the Connecticut Health Foundation. He lives in Windsor.