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Shuler: Workers Sending SOS to ‘Fix the Jobs Crisis’
When AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler is on the road talking to workers around the country, she says the issue most on their minds is jobs.
Speaking before a group of labor, management, government and academic leaders and experts at the Labor and Employment Relations Association (LERA) annual meeting in Atlanta yesterday morning, Shuler said she was
bringing an SOS from the people I’ve met: Help us fix the jobs crisis.
She highlighted the terrible struggles of the nation’s young workers who are the latest victims of a 30-year corporate-led drive to create a low-wage workforce. Shuler explained how all workers—union and nonunion—enjoy better wages and benefits when unions are strong.
Shuler also went step-by-step over the AFL-CIO’s five-point plan to save and create millions of jobs in the next year.
Click here to read her entire presentation.
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Shuler says each one of us has to do something – what about printing and distributing these 5 union points to our neighbors and elected representatives?
The AFL-CIO is calling on Congress and the Obama administration to take five steps now to care for the jobless and put America back to work.
1. Extend the lifeline for jobless workers. Unless Congress acts now, supplemental unemployment benefits, additional food assistance and expansion of COBRA health care benefits will expire at the end of the year. They must be extended for another 12 months to prevent working families from bankruptcy, home foreclosure and loss of health care. Extending benefits also will boost personal spending and create jobs throughout the economy.
2. Rebuild America’s schools, roads and energy systems. America still has at least $2.2 trillion in unmet infrastructure needs. We should put people to work to fix our nation’s broken-down school buildings and invest in transportation, green technology, energy efficiency and more.
3. Increase aid to state and local governments to maintain vital services. State and local governments and school districts have a $178 billion budget shortfall this year alone—while the recession creates greater need for their services. States and communities must get help to maintain critical frontline services, prevent massive job cuts and avoid deep damage to education just when our children need it most.
4. Put people to work doing work that needs to be done. If the private sector can’t or won’t provide the needed jobs, the government should step up to the plate, putting people who need jobs together with work that needs to be done. These should never be replacements for existing public jobs. They must pay competitive wages and should target distressed communities.
5. Put TARP funds to work for Main Street.The bank bailout helped Wall Street, not Main Street. We should put some of the billions of dollars in leftover Troubled Asset Relief Program funds to work creating jobs by enabling community banks to lend money to small- and medium-size businesses. If small businesses can get credit, they will create jobs.
America’s jobs situation would be even more dire without the economic stimulus program President Obama and Congress enacted, which has saved or created 1 million jobs. But the depth of this crisis demands that we do more—and that we do it now, before more people lose their jobs, their homes, their health care and their hope.
See chart: The Gap In The Labor Market