PAPER OR PLASTIC OR HEALTH BENEFITS?

Grocer strike in Cahleefornea California:

The union representing some 70,000 Southern California grocery workers called a strike against Safeway Inc.'s Vons and two rival supermarket chains responded Sunday by locking out union workers.

Picket lines organized by the United Food and Commercial Workers Union formed at Vons across from Los Angeles to San Diego, one of the nation's most populous regions and a key market for the grocery chains.

In response to the Vons strike, Albertsons Inc. and Kroger Co.'s Ralphs, which are covered by the same master contract, locked out union workers from the first shift on Sunday, a union spokeswoman said.

The contract between the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, the AFL-CIO affiliate that represents about 1.4 million workers, and the region's three dominant supermarket chains expired on Oct. 5.

The labor dispute, which hinges on health-care costs, comes as unionized grocery workers across the United States have contracts up for a difficult renegotiation as their employers look to cut costs to offset weaker sales growth.

Union workers in Southern California voted 97 percent in favor of rejecting a two-month-old contract offer from the grocery chains and authorizing a strike Friday.

The United Food and Commercial Workers Union, also known as the UFCW, charges that the chains, using the competitive threat of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. as a stalking horse, are trying to shift hundreds of millions of dollars in health-care costs to workers through higher insurance co-payments and caps that would limit sharply limit reimbursement for surgery and other expensive treatment.

Looks like I'll be stopping by the admittedly inferior IV Market and Mac's Market for a while, as I am surrounded on all sides by Ralphs, Vons and Albertsons. The Facts Machine stands in solidarity with the UFCW, and because I mean that, I will refrain from posting here for the remainder of the day. (Well, you're already doing that because you have a paper to write. -ed. Yeah, I know, just let me have my moment)

So, um, does this mean the Simpsons are going back to Africa?