Wal-Mart to offer improved health care

BENTONVILLE, Ark. — Wal-Mart, under attack for its health care coverage for its employees, plans improvements that would include expanding the availability of its lowest-cost plan and shortening the waiting periods to enroll part-time workers and their children.

At the same time, Wal-Mart Chief Executive Lee Scott said Thursday that employers cannot continue to meet the rising costs of health care and urged a government-business partnership to find an answer.

The announcement marks the second time in six months that the world's largest retailer has moved to improve health benefits and comes ahead of Scott's speech Sunday about the issue to the nation's governors, who are looking for ways to cap rising costs for taxpayer-funded health plans that cover the uninsured. Details of the new health-benefit plans are expected to be unveiled in the coming months.

Scott is also expected to renew Wal-Mart's criticism of bills filed in at least 22 states, including Washington state, that would force the retailer to spend more on health care.

Wake Up Wal-Mart, one of Wal-Mart's harshest critics, released a report Thursday that showed the health-care issue at Wal-Mart is getting worse — Wal-Mart failed to provide coverage to more than 57 percent of its employees last year, up from 52 percent the previous year. The group said the report is based on new analysis of Wal-Mart's reported data of its health-care spending.