7. Building Liberty ships led to the innovation of group health care for workers
Henry J. Kaiser, an industrialist whose companies built the Hoover Dam, owned seven West Coast shipyards which built Liberty ships. He owned several other yards which built warships for the US Navy. These included the escort carriers which contributed greatly to the suppression of the U-boat threat in the Atlantic. Shipyard work was dangerous, and Kaiser and other forward-thinking industrialists recognized the need for both emergency care facilities and long-term health care for his employees and their families. He also realized such care needed to be both readily available and affordable at a time when gasoline rationing precluded long trips by automobile. With the assistance of Dr. Sidney Garfield, Kaiser created a new business, which he called Kaiser Permanente, offering group health care to his employees at his shipyards, which later extended to subsequent industries.
By the late summer of 1944, over 90% of Kaiser employees participated in the group insurance plan and availed themselves of the health care facilities offered by their employer. Kaiser Permanente became one of the first managed care health programs in the United States, despite the steady opposition to it from the American Medical Association. Kaiser shipyard workers were charged 7 cents per day for health care coverage, which from its inception stressed preventative care and work safety. By 1943 health care was offered to the workers’ families. Kaiser decided to continue the program post-war, extending it to other industries, and eventually to the general public. Kaiser Permanente’s health care workers were paid fixed salaries, rather than charging fees based on care provided. That innovation led to dramatic changes in America’s health care industry following the war.