Whole Foods CEO soft-pedals the health-care remarks that inspired a boycott

Whole Foods CEO John Mackey. Image by JOE M500 via Flickr

When the Whole Foods CEO decided to chime in on the health care debate in August, it seemed like an inopportune moment. His views, which looked as though they’d been torn straight from the Republican playbook, seemed they would only hurt efforts to expand health coverage to those who lack it.

It also seemed callous for him to upbraid the efforts of so many of his customers to help their fellow humans in the way they thought best… while they’re paying his salary, ensuring his success, and funding the expansion of his company.

So I joined Laurie Essig’s Holy War Against Whole Foods and I stopped shopping there. I didn’t want to stop shopping there. There aren’t many viable alternatives to Whole Foods on the South Side of Chicago. I really missed shopping there. At first.

Now Mackey is trying to woo his way back into our good graces, and I’m willing to hear what he has to say. But something funny happened when I stopped shopping at Whole Foods. I found other places to buy good food, and I started saving money–a lot of money. So I don’t know, John. You’re going to have to woo me a lot harder now. You might have to endorse the public option and lower the price of organics by 30 percent.

He doesn’t go quite that far:

“I honestly don’t know why the article became such a lightning rod,” says John Mackey, CEO and founder of Whole Foods Market Inc., as he tries to explain the firestorm caused by his August op-ed on these pages opposing government-run health care. “I think a lot of people who got angry haven’t read what I actually wrote. There was a lot of emotional reaction—fear and anger. I just wanted to get people to think about whether there was a better way to reform the system….

“President Obama called for constructive suggestions for health-care reform,” he explains. “I took him at his word.” Mr. Mackey continues: “It just seems to me there are some fundamental reforms that we’ve adopted at Whole Foods that would make health care much more affordable for the uninsured.”

What Mr. Mackey is proposing is more or less what he has already implemented at his company—a plan that would allow more health savings accounts (HSAs), more low-premium, high-deductible plans, more incentives for wellness, and medical malpractice reform.

via The Weekend Interview with John Mackey: The Conscience of a Capitalist – WSJ.com.

I’ll try to get at why these proposals, on their face, are so unhelpful. For starters, only a millionaire, who doesn’t have to worry about health care, would propose them:

• more health savings accounts (HSAs): Many people who can’t afford health care don’t have the resources for savings accounts. So thanks very much for not taxing income that we’re not making.

• more low-premium, high-deductible plans: We would continue to pay every month for most of our health care needs and we would also begin to pay for insurance that doesn’t help us unless we get seriously injured or ill. It’s a gamble, and many people with limited resources will bet on their own health and, instead of buying insurance, use the money to, say, feed themselves and their children.

• more incentives for wellness: Great idea as a supplement to health insurance. Not so great as a replacement for it.

• Medical malpractice reform: Mackey knows as well as any Republican bloviator that this will likely never come from Democrats, who are afraid to alienate trial lawyers. So why didn’t Bush take it on?