SEARCH
AFL-CIO Urges Stricter Bank Bailout Process, Hails NEA Affiliations |
|
The AFL-CIO Executive Council wrapped up its winter meeting in Miami today, calling for stricter regulation and oversight of the financial industry, urging President Obama to ensure that taxpayers get “fair value” for any additional funds used to bail out the nation’s banks, authorizing continuation of discussions on unifying the labor movement and urging adoption of a global charter of rights for working women.
Also today, the AFL-CIO and the National Education Association (NEA) announced that three more NEA local chapters, with more than 3,000 members, have affiliated with the AFL-CIO under the Solidarity Partnership program. The program is supported by AFT, a long-time AFL-CIO affiliate.
Says AFL-CIO President John Sweeney:
These affiliations show that we are unified and committed to fighting for quality education in our nation’s classrooms.
The need for working families to come together to deal with the worst economy since the Great Depression is more important than ever, says NEA President Dennis Van Roekel.
The new affiliations collectively will advance the agenda to transform public education for the 21st century, create great public schools for every student, reform health care and strengthen the economy.
The new NEA affiliations mean those chapters will be able to join with local AFL-CIO central labor councils and state federations to work to meet the needs of teachers and students and all working families in the fight for health care, retirement security and good jobs.
Saying the unity of the labor movement is “among the most important issues facing unions today,” the Executive Council yesterday authorized continued discussions between the AFL-CIO and Change to Win (CtW) about bringing the union movement back together.
The discussions during the past few weeks have involved leaders of the AFL-CIO and CtW, along with top officers of individual unions in both organizations. While no agreements have been reached, many issues have been identified and options explored.
In its statement, the council says:
We urge all those involved in these discussions to take this responsibility seriously, and to use their best efforts to find a path to reconciliation that strengthens the AFL-CIO and unites the labor movement.
Click here to read the full statement.
Financial Industry Regulation
On the financial front, the council says the era of deregulation of the financial industry—especially exotic mortgage-backed securities and hedge funds during the Bush years—took a “terrible toll” on America’s working families.
Whether measured in lost jobs and homes, lower earnings, eroding retirement security or devastated communities, workers have paid the price for Wall Street’s greed. But in reality, the cost of deregulation and financial alchemy are far higher. The lasting damage is in missed opportunities and investments not made in the real economy.
Two of the measures the council statement calls for are:
- A revitalized Securities and Exchange Commission with jurisdiction to regulate hedge funds, derivatives, private equity and any new investment vehicles that are developed.
- An agency focused on protecting consumers of financial services, such as mortgages and credit cards because “we have paid a terrible price for treating consumer protection as an afterthought in bank regulation.”
The council also called for a renewed emphasis on global financial regulation and urged the Obama administration to
make a strong and enforceable global regulatory floor a diplomatic priority.
Click here for the full statement.
Bank Bailouts
Since October, tens of billions of taxpayer dollars have gone to bail out troubled banks. But the government and taxpayers have gotten little in return for the investments, says the council. In fact, some banks have needed a second shot of federal funds.
Acknowledging the need for government intervention when major and “systemically significant” financial institutions are on the brink of collapse, the council says:
Government interventions must be structured to protect the public interest, and not merely rescue executives or wealthy investors. This is an issue of both fairness and our national interest.
In any further bailout, the Obama administration must
get fair value for any more public money put into the banks. In the case of distressed banks, this means the government will end up with a controlling share of common stock. The government should use that stake to force a cleanup of the banks’ balance sheets. The result should be banks that can either be turned over to bondholders in exchange for bondholder concessions or sold back into the public markets. We believe the debate over nationalization is delaying the inevitable bank restructuring, which is something our economy cannot afford.
Click here to read the full statement.
Women’s Rights
With International Women’s Day set for March 10, the council called for establishment of a global charter guaranteeing the rights of working women around the globe.
From Berlin to Bogotá, from Bangkok to Baghdad and from Boston to Brazzaville, women work every day, contributing to the economic vitality of society as a whole.
Throughout the world, women are the hardest hit by the global economic crisis. Most work in low-skill and low-wage jobs. They are paid less than men in nearly every country, and they work longer hours. Their work is often dangerous, and many women risk their lives every time they go to their jobs.
The council says the AFL-CIO “therefore focuses our work on major areas in which women’s rights must be defended and enhanced worldwide, including”:
- Freedom of association—the right to organize;
- Education and training;
- Employment and equal pay;
- Social protection with particular focus on maternity protection and access to health care;
- Family responsibilities;
- Harassment and violence against women; and
- Full participation of women in union structures and operation.
Click here to read the global charter statement and here for the statement on working women’s rights in a global economy. For a new report on the inequality faced by working women around the world, click here.
Casino Workers
The council pledged its support for casino workers in New Jersey, Connecticut, Nevada and Indiana who are “waging heroic fights” to win a voice at work, but who have faced intensive employer efforts to thwart their choice to join a union and bargain for a fair contract.
Casino owners have fired worker-activists, intimidated workers during elections and refused to bargain despite overwhelming union victory margins in certified National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) elections. If there ever was a case for the urgent need of the Employee Free Choice Act, the gaming industry’s response to dealer organizing provides it.
In Atlantic City, N.J., where several thousand dealers and other gaming workers voted to join the UAW, not a single dealer has a collective bargaining agreement today.
Click here to read the full statement.
Senior Housing
The council also called for an increase in affordable housing for the nation’s low-income seniors.
Almost 4.8 million households of people 65 and older have extremely or very urgent housing needs. More than 1.5 million seniors pay more than 50 percent of their income on rent alone, and more than 8.4 million have annual incomes of less than $10,500.
Click here to read the full statement.
Marriage Equality
Proposition 8, the ballot measure that ended equal marriage rights and amended the California state constitution to ban lesbian and gay couples from the right to marry, is now before the state Supreme Court. The council approved a statement backing the move to declare Proposition 8 unconstitutional and restore equal marriage rights for all Californians.
Click here to read the full statement.
U.S. Census
When the U.S. Census begins next March, it is imperative, says the council, that a full and accurate count takes place. The council urges Congress to fully fund the 2010 Census and calls on affiliated unions, state federations and central labor councils to take part and encourage their members to participate.
Decisions on matters of national importance for working families, including health care, community development, housing, education, transportation, social services, employment and other vital programs, are guided by the Census.
Additionally, Census data are used to determine how many seats a state will have in the U.S. House of Representatives and in drawing boundary lines for federal, state and local legislative districts. Census data also are used to monitor and enforce key anti-discrimination laws and civil rights statutes, such as the Voting Rights Act.
Click here to read the full statement.
3 Comments
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
Dear Congressional Leaders, If US tax payers end-up as underwriters of failed financial institutions anyway, why do we need a mortgage system that includes the AIG’s, the Countrywides, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, or AnyMac? The only
reason that I can see is that they promote astronomical profits for very greedy people. I see the same excesses in our current national health insurance scam, in the failure to enact a national energy policy, in wasteful military procurement and more. It’s all to sustain a greed based system to screw the “little guy” in order to unleash unbridled profits for the very rich. Now, I see where execs that failed at Countrywide have pooled their outlandish personal gains, probably coupled with more public funds to form PennyMac to buy-up toxic loans for pennies on a dollar. I’d have someone watching those crooks like a hawk. There looks to be allot of Madoff’s out there. If the Federal Government is truly intent on renewing America, you’re going to have to roll-up your sleeves and go hard after greed and corruption in all facets of our society; otherwise, we’re doomed.
I agree. There are a lot of criminals in pin striped suits at the top of banking, financial, insurance and real estate glass towers. I see no difference between PennyMac and the Junk Bond scheme launched by Michael Milken to bail out the same class of criminals and hucksters back in 1984-87. Only Milken used Junk Bonds to finance a new Las Vegas boom. Seems like Big Money just keeps recycling the same old ponzi schemes in our Casino Society. “You pays your money and you takes your chances !”
The small mention in the above article (AFL-CIO Urges Stricter Bank Bailout Process, …) does not convey the nature of the disasterous class war attack upon working people that is involved in the “Bank Bailout”.
These events are not simply caused by massive greed and corruption among the politicians of both parties, Wall Street criminals operating ponzi schemes, real estate gangsters, etc. The link below goes to an article that goes deeper into what and why this economic catastrophe has happened from a socialist perspective.
(link to full article here:)
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/mar2009/pers-m07.shtml
The AFL-CIO and “nationalization”
7 March 2009
Barry Grey
The AFL-CIO Executive Council, at its annual winter meeting in Miami Beach, Florida, adopted a resolution Thursday urging the Obama administration to temporarily nationalize failing banks. What is the significance of this policy statement? Does it represent a radical reorientation by the AFL-CIO, which, after all, has been throughout its history an implacable foe of socialism and defender of the profit system?
It is nothing of the sort. There is not a trace of economic radicalism, or even independent thinking, in the statement of the labor bureaucrats. Rather, the AFL-CIO has merely joined a growing list of economists and political figures from across the spectrum of American establishment politics advocating a temporary government takeover of banking giants such as Citigroup and Bank of America as a more effective means of utilizing taxpayer funds to bail out the financial aristocracy and restabilize US capitalism.
The union officials, like many others in the establishment, argue that a short-term government takeover is the best means of offloading the bad debts of the banks onto the public in order to return the banks to profitability and avert a full-scale collapse of the private banking system.
…
The very fact that the issue of nationalization has arisen testifies to the failure of the capitalist market system, which is unalterably defended by the union bureaucracy. All of the various schemes proposed to bail out the banks, including temporary nationalization, seek to make the working class pay for the breakdown of the profit system.”