Currency Manipulation Should Top U.S.-China Talks
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China’s currency manipulation should be the main focus of talks this week between high level U.S. and Chinese government officials, says Scott Paul, executive director of the Alliance for American Manufacturing (AAM).
The meetings in Washington, D.C. May 9 –10 provide an important opportunity for the American delegation—led by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner—to back up the Obama administration’s tough talk on the Chinese government’s undervalued currency with strong action, he says.
If the administration will not get tough and demand that China play by the rules, Congress will have no option but to once again pass tough legislation to counter the artificial advantage China enjoys on trade.
Human Rights Day: Workers Ask, ‘What’s Gone Wrong at Chase?’
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Today is International Human Rights Day and hundreds of union members, religious leaders, activists, farm workers and victims of bank home foreclosures are protesting at 100 JPMorgan Chase Bank branches across the country to demand the bank respect the basic human rights of people to have decent places to live and work.
Large banks such as Chase are flush with cash and protestors handed out fliers asking, “What’s Gone Wrong at Chase?” and demanded the bank declare a one-year moratorium on home foreclosures. The Wall Street Journal reports that Chase has $19.5 billion worth of home loans in foreclosure, more than any other bank.
Trumka’s Message to LGBT Teens: It Gets Better
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The union movement has long been in the forefront of the fight against discrimination in the workplace and throughout society. Spurred by the reports of bullying and suicides of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transsexual (LGBT) students in schools, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka joined President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and other leaders who are filming videos for the It Gets Better campaign.
Begun by columnist Dan Savage, the It Gets Better campaign supports and encourages LGBT teens to “hang in there” because they are not alone. It lets them know others are working to ensure that things will get better for them.
In his video (above), Trumka, who comes from an East European immigrant family, relates how hard it was growing up in the coal mine country of southwest Pennsylvania. When he was kid, he says, there were ugly names for everyone. His older relatives spoke with thick accents and were routinely given the hardest and most dangerous work in the mines. Their pay often was shorted because they did not understand the language and were afraid to speak out.
ILWU Vows to Fight Police Takeover of Costa Rican Longshore Union
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Jennifer Sargent, Coast communications director at the ILWU, sends us the latest on the struggles by longshore workers in Costa Rica.
The International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU) has asked the Obama administration to investigate illegal ousting of elected union leaders. Declaring that longshore workers are united beyond international borders, the ILWU today denounced Wednesday’s police takeover of SINTRAJAP, the union representing longshore workers in the Caribbean ports of Limón and Moín, Costa Rica, and promised to increase its months-long campaign to help restore union democracy in the Central American country. Limón and Moín are major importers of petroleum and other products and major exporters of bananas, coffee, cocoa and coconuts.
ILWU President Robert McEllrath said:
Longshore workers are united globally, and when police start breaking glass and occupying the union hall in Costa Rica, it’s a call for international solidarity.
U.S. Trade Reps in China Need to Ask: What Will Make America Strong?
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When U.S. trade reps meet with their counterparts in China next week for the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, they should keep in mind this frightening fact: Last year, the biggest single U.S. export to China was $7.6 billion of paper and scrap metal, while China’s number one export to the United States was $46 billion of computer equipment.
In short, says Economic Strategy Institute founder Clyde Prestowitz, the entire wealth-producing basis of the U.S. economy has been eroding over the past 30 years, and unless this nation develops an industrial policy soon, the days of family-supporting U.S. jobs are gone.
Prestowitz, who served as principal trade negotiator for the Reagan administration, gave a timely presentation here at the AFL-CIO this week on his new book, “The Betrayal of American Prosperity: Free Market Delusions, America’s Decline and How We Must Combat in the Post-Dollar Era.”
He pointed to China’s currency manipulation as a big factor in the trade imbalance between the two countries ($227 billion in 2009), with China suppressing the value of the yuan in relation to the dollar, a practice that decreases the price of China’s exports and increases the cost of American goods imported into China. (The Alliance for American Manufacturing makes it easy to send a message to President Obama and Congress and urge them to stop China’s currency manipulation. Click here.)
Memo to Leaders Meeting with China: Time for U.S. Policy that Aids Our Economy
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Here in Washington, D.C., President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner are taking part in a big-time summit with China. Let’s hope they have substantive discussions on economic policies that aid U.S. workers. Over the past few days, several great pieces on trade and manufacturing have been published that should feed into the discussions of U.S. participants in what is officially called the “sixth Strategic and Economic Dialogue with China.” Here’s a summary.
**U.S. “protectionism” is a myth. There’s an “untold story of protectionism,” say United Steelworkers (USW) President Leo Gerard and Scott Paul, executive director of the Alliance for American Manufacturing. That is, the set of barriers other governments erect to block American goods and the mercantilist measures they utilize to gain market share in the United States.
These practices range from China’s currency misalignment and massive industrial subsidies to non-tariff barriers in Korea and Japan. All these impediments have been well documented by U.S. trade officials, but the mere act of identifying these practices is now viewed as protectionism, even though taking action to eliminate them would expand world trade, reduce global imbalances and preserve the free market.
Sen.-Designate Gillibrand Supports Employee Free Choice Act
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Former New York senator and presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton has been confirmed as secretary of state, and tomorrow, Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand will take the oath of office as New York’s newest senator.
With Clinton, New York’s working families had a strong advocate for good jobs and the freedom to form unions and bargain, so Gillibrand has big shoes to fill. Although she hasn’t been in Congress long, she’s been a strong supporter of the needs of working families.
In her first term in Congress, Gillibrand signed on as a co-sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act and voted to pass it in March 2007.
In addition to her support for the Employee Free Choice Act, Gillibrand earned a 98 percent rating from the AFL-CIO in 2007 and 2008, backing working families with her votes on children’s health care, fair pay, unemployment benefits, workplace safety and other critical issues. At the press conference where Gov. David Paterson announced Gillibrand’s appointment Friday, she was introduced by New York State AFL-CIO President Denis Hughes, who said he looked forward to working with Gillibrand in the Senate.
Obama-Biden Win for Working Families
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| Barack Obama, president for working families. | |
We’re cheering as we write: Sens. Barack Obama and Joe Biden will be the next U.S. president and vice president, respectively, propelled to the nation’s highest office with the critical support of union members in the labor movement’s biggest-ever get-out-the-vote mobilization. The Obama-Biden ticket so far has won 284 electoral votes, more than the 270 needed for victory and all votes from the states have not been tallied. And although the Senate count is not yet final, working families so far have voted in another four union-endorsed candidates to the U.S. Senate.
After eight years of an administration hostile to unions, workers and a working-family friendly economy, America’s union members helped bring about much-needed change by electing Obama and working family-friendly candidates up and down the ballot.
Sen. Clinton, Rep. Lewis, Sweeney, Holt Baker Rally Seniors for Obama
Today in Pittsburgh, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and AFL-CIO President John Sweeney joined members of the Alliance for Retired Americans to rally on behalf of Sen. Barack Obama. Meanwhile, in Georgia, AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker joined the Alliance and Rep. John Lewis for a forum on seniors’ issues in Atlanta.
Clinton and Sweeney spoke to more than 1,000 seniors in Pittsburgh, highlighting why Obama is the right choice for retirees in this critical state. Obama will protect Social Security benefits, eliminate income taxes on low- and middle-income seniors and ensure Medicare cuts costs for seniors by negotiating for lower drug prices.
