Penny Wise, Pound Foolish

[mgc1961]

Few people expect their workplace benefits to be a casualty of the culture wars, but in Washington, DC, the battle over same-sex marriage hit local employees of Catholic Charities square in the pocketbook.

Last December, the District passed a law recognizing same-sex marriage and requiring any organization that has contracts with the city to provide equal spousal benefits to employees regardless of a spouse’s gender. DC Catholic Charities, which has extensive contracts with the city to provide social services, argued that it could not offer benefits to same-sex spouses because doing so would violate Catholic teaching on marriage. To avoid that contradiction, it eliminated all spousal benefits for new employees and for current employees who have not elected to cover their spouses. The change became effective after a single day’s notice to the organization’s approximately 850 employees.

In other words, for the sake of “defending marriage,” Catholic Charities has made it harder on its own employees who are or plan to get married. It has also taken the cheap way out: as it hires new employees with this reduced benefits package, it stands to improve its bottom line. Time will tell if Catholic Charities will pass those savings on to employees to supplement their slim social-service salaries.


More at http://blog.sojo.net/2010/06/14/d-c-catholic-charities-penny-wise-pound-foolish/

[happyslug]

1. Unlike Wuerl, Levada attacked the Achilles heal of this movement

I quote from the Article:

Situations like this call for creativity, not retrenchment; a promising solution is modeled by the Archdiocese of San Francisco. That city’s board of supervisors began requiring groups with city contracts to provide equal benefits in 1997. Rather than take the easy way out, then-Archbishop William Levada expanded employee benefits, allowing employees to cover any other legally domiciled adult member of a household — a sibling, parent, or domestic partner.

While the Kinsey report indicate that up to 10% of the population is Homosexual, that number has been attacked by statisticians as NOT being statistically supported (Efforts have been made to "Correct" for these errors, but the Statisticians keeping pointing out the problem is the population SAMPLE he was using had a huge number of Homosexuals in it, do to being close to a known homosexual hangout, and as such the principal of Garbage in Garbage out comes into play). The better numbers (And all of these statistics have questionable validity do to the nature of many homosexuals denying they are homosexuals AND covering such activities up) indicate about 1% of the female population and about 3% of the male population. Given these numbers the cost tied in with covering such people is minimal (AIDS is bigger in the Homosexual population but most such people end up on Social Security NOT private medical coverage, so not that much of a factor). Thus the business community has NOT fought against the expansion of Medical Coverage to such people.

On the other hand Levada's solution to extend coverage to any adult in a employee's household will be opposed by the Business Community for expands coverage to a considerable degree. There are a lot more homes with adults living together who are NOT sexual partners then there are homosexual couples living together. This was the norm prior to WWII, and is slowly returning (I am ignoring heterosexual couples living together, married or unmarried). In addition such a change will NOT require anyone to admit they are a Homosexual couple (i.e. easier for homosexuals to get benefits for they could keep their life style "secret" even from their relatives and neighbors). People who never married for any reason (including, but NOT limited to Homosexuals) could be treated as if married. The business community will oppose such an expansion of benefits for it will be a substantial increase in costs to them. Right now the business community does not view the expansion of the definition of "family" to include homosexuals for the number of such couples is manageable, but it you expand that definition to any adults under the same roof, then you have a large part of the population affects and higher costs to business.

As I have said on the constitutional attacks on the ban on homosexual marriages, the claim that such a ban violates the Federal Constitution has always been denied, the recent attacks have all been based on STATE Equal Protection laws not the Federal Constitution. The US Supreme Court has NEVER had to rule on the issue of how far FEDERAL Equal protection goes, if a state expands equal protection to homosexual (i.e. the state holds under is Equal Protection of the law clause Homosexuals can marry). The Federal Supreme Court can rule that if a State changes from the "Blood relatives plus a spouse who can become a blood relatives of a another blood relative" i.e Mother and Father are BOTH blood relatives to any children but NOT to each other to include Homosexual who are NOT blood relatives, does the FEDERAL EQUAL PROTECTION OF THE LAWS expands that to include anyone living in the same house?. The two bright lines of Equal Protection when it comes to family matters are "Blood Relatives" and "Of the house". Both concepts go back to the Middle ages. If you are NOT a blood relative but live under the same roof, you were treated as a "Servant" but one who has the RIGHT to in-debt the household do to your actions. This has involved to become "Master-Servant Law" and now referred to as "Employer-Employee law". The basic concept was that since you are the employee of your employer and acting for that employer, the employer is responsible for any harm the employee causes while doing the actions of an employee. I bring it up, for under Equal Protection Law concepts the Courts look for "bright lines" to define how far equal protection of the law applies. The Courts do NOT like going over "bright lines" unless they have to and then to the next set of "Bright lines". In the case of expanding marriage to cover homosexuals have we pushed the bright line to far from "Blood Relatives" so that we have to go to "Of the house"? i.e. is it a violation of the FEDERAL EQUAL PROTECTION CLAUSE for a state to restrict marriage to people who claim to have sex together? Sex has NEVER been a basis for any duty, the Common Law legal requirements where to Blood Relatives AND people living under the same roof. Both concepts have been expanded, for example to include parents of other blood relatives (when that Parent is NOT a blood relative) and then to parents whether or not they produce off spring or not (But the potential was there to produce such off spring). Employer-Employer law has expanded to include employees who live in separate households, but just get paid. While the law has been expanded, the underlying concepts have remained i.e. Blood Relatives have stronger claims then non-blood relatives and people living under the same roof, while having no right of inheritance, the employer has a duty to pay for any damage such employees do while carrying out their employment.

Levada, by expanding coverage of his employees to ALL adults in employees household has made another small step in advancing the claim that a spouse has now become nothing more then a person living under the same roof NOT a potential blood relatives to another blood relative (i.e. two people living under the same roof not a mother of father of a child or potential child of the couple). Can this be used to expand "Equal Protection of the law" to any adults living under one roof? If it can will the business community tolerate it and how far does a state have to retreat if the Federal Supreme Court made such a ruling? i.e. will the states, trying to avoid expanding this to all adults living together, to keep down state costs, restore the restrictions to blood relatives and any potential parent of a blood relative?

Could adoptions be sued to get around this problem. Remember, under the Common Law, Adoptions were NOT permitted, thus adoption is a product of the Legislature and as such to be strictly construed. Now Adoption had long been legal in the England and the Colonies by the time the US Constitution was adopted but by act of Parliament and later State Legislature NOT the Common Law. Under those laws married men and women were preferred but again sex was NOT a requirement between the adoptive parents, just the best interest of the child. In any equal protection claim I do NOT see the Federal Supreme Court ruling that since a Homosexual couple could adopt a child together and by law become that child's lawful parent that satisfy the Common Law requirement of a potential natural child. Now the court may rule the other way, but just pointing out the potential short falls of such an attack. It is the best way to attack the above expansion of the right to Homosexual to married to other people under the same roof, but I see the present Supreme Court rejecting it on the grounds the Common Law did NOT recognize adoptions.

Just pointing out Levada's actions are in line with a potential attack on Homosexual Marriages using the Federal Equal Protection law. The attack is to EXPAND that right using the Federal Equal Protection Clause to such an extent the States will withdraw their expansion of the State Equal Protection laws to require the State to permit Homosexual marriages. The Business community will demand such a retraction so to minimize costs for such an expansion will increase the cost of Medical Benefits way more then any expansion to include Homosexuals who marry.

[ZombieHorde]

2. Working for hate groups has disadvantages? Who could have guessed that? nt