Maryland's "Wal-Mart" Law

The Maryland Senate yesterday passed a bill that would effectively require Wal-Mart to invest at least 8 percent of its total payroll in health-care benefits for its workers ... OR pay the same amount into the state's Medicaid fund. The Maryland House had already passed a similar bill, and the minor differences in the two pieces of legislation are expected to be ironed out quickly. The bill would then go to Maryland's Republican Governor Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., who is certain to veto it. (Wal-Mart hosted a fundraiser for Ehrlich late last year.) But the bill's supporters say they have more than enough support in both houses to pass it over Ehrlich's veto.

The rationale for the law is simple: Wal-Mart supplies virtually no health insurance to its employees and pays them so poorly that many of them end up as Medicaid recipients in their respective states.