Trumka: Obama Showed He Hears People Not Heard by 1%
President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address tonight made clear that he hears the people who aren’t being heard by the 1 percent, says AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka. Obama’s speech showed he “listened to the single mom working two jobs to get by, to the out-of-work construction worker, to the retired factory worker, to the student serving coffee to help pay for college.”
By laying out a vision of an America that can create jobs and prosperity for all instead of wealth for the few, Trumka said the president “voiced the aspirations and concerns of those who are too often ignored.”
Obama also made clear that the era of the 1 percent getting rich by looting the economy, rather than creating jobs, is over.
“Now it’s time for Congress to stop standing in the way of rebuilding our country and act,” Trumka said.
President Obama presented Congress a choice, Trumka said, between Obama’s vision of the need to invest to achieve stable, long-term prosperity for all and the vision of presidential candidates squabbling over how much further to cut the taxes of the 1 percent.
Obama “spoke to the confidence of working people that if we are determined and committed, we can revitalize ‘Made in the USA.’ That commitment to American manufacturing, made possible in part by enhanced enforcement of trade laws being violated by China , is welcome news to the too many productive, hard working Americans sitting idle unnecessarily.”
Trumka praised the President’s powerful insistance “on a more humble Wall Street subject to a thorough investigation of the misconduct in the mortgage markets that wrecked our economy,” and applauded the creation of a new mortgage crisis unit to be co-chaired by New York’s Attorney General, Eric Schneiderman. Read the rest of this entry »
Citizen’s United Further Tilted Playing Field to 1%
Today is the second anniversary of Citizen’s United, the U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down restrictions on independent campaign spending by business corporations and their supporters.
Noting that the Citizen’s United ruling “further tilted the playing field in favor of the 1 percent and against the 99 percent whose voices are being drowned out by excessive corporate spending and influence,” AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka says we must reform the system “to restore the corporation to its rightful place.”
In doing so, the greatest care must be taken to ensure that the Bill of Rights’ protections for real people, including protections for democratic organizations and movements, are not inadvertently weakened. The AFL-CIO will work to support efforts to rein in corporate power that simultaneously protect our nation’s Bill of Rights, and to ensure those efforts are focused on the most effective means to address corporate dominance of our political system.
Read Trumka’s full statement here.
Trumka Dissents from Jobs Council Report
The 72-page report, issued yesterday by the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, makes many solid suggestions for how to address our nation’s jobs crisis, says AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka. But Trumka says the fundamental focus is so flawed that, as a member of the council, he issued a dissent to the report. In sum, Trumka writes:
I believe the report downplays the need for a proactive role for the U.S. government in many of these areas; fails to address the significant additional revenues needed to address the challenges identified on an appropriate scale; and in many cases erroneously identifies the root causes of the underlying structural problems.
While agreeing with the report’s support for a vibrant and growing manufacturing sector, Trumka says the report does not address the fact that “our government’s own policies with respect to trade, taxes, and currency have created enormous competitive disadvantages for American-based producers.”
And while Trumka shares the report’s goal of attracting more investment and good Read the rest of this entry »
Unemployed Workers Win Jobless Aid Extension
Congress this morning extended for two months unemployment insurance (UI) for America’s jobless workers. Republicans in the House earlier this week had blocked the UI extenstion, but after suffering badly in opinion polling, they announced they’d join with 89 out of 100 senators from both political parties who’d already voted to renew unemployment aid for two months—with no cuts and no strings attached.
Media headlines throughout the week–including the conservative Wall Street Journal–and Republican stalwarts such as Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), had decried House Speaker John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) refusal to move the UI bill, which gives a lifeline to 2.8 million jobless Americans who otherwise would lose UI after Dec. 31.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka described the victory for jobless Americans as “not a hnndout or a free ride” but “a lifeline.”
In the fight to extend aid for the jobless, the 99 percent went on the offense against 1 percent politicians. And we won. And if working people keep it up, we’ll score more victories and build a better future. Not every time—two steps forward, one step back. But look around. People all across the country are saying our economy and our democracy are out of balance. And they’re winning the public debate.
Pity the 1%! Billionaires Bemoan Criticism by ‘Imbeciles’
 |
|
It’s tough these days being a member of the top 1 percent, what with all the complaints about the widening income gap and tax breaks for billionaires, not to mention the demands of the 99 percent for a little accountability. “It feels lonely…,” said John A. Allison IV, former CEO of BB&T, one of the nation’s top 10 banks, to Bloomberg News.
Or, as billionaire Tom Golisano, founder of Paychex Inc., so delicately put it, according to Bloomberg:
“If I hear a politician use the term ‘paying your fair share’ one more time, I’m going to vomit,” said Golisano, who turned 70 last month, celebrating the birthday with girlfriend Monica Seles, the former tennis star who won nine Grand Slam singles titles.
Even Jamie Dimond, the J.P. Morgan Chase CEO who took home a cool $23 million last year, and John Paulson, the billionaire hedge fund manager, have publicly bemoaned their targeting by Occupy Wall Street and other detractors.
So what’s a lonely, nauseous billionaire to do? Organize!
Enter the so-called Job Creators Alliance (JCA), a sort of one-stop messaging operation, complete with a speakers bureau and media booking operation for those underappreciated fat cats. The group’s 17 featured business leaders say they aim to “shape the national agenda,” according to the JCA website. Read the rest of this entry »
Overtime Rule Proposed For Home Care Workers
Home care workers will have a measure of justice if a rule proposed by the Dept. of Labor goes into effect.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka applauded the proposed rule, which will extend federal minimum wage and overtime protections to the growing home care workforce:
“The Department of Labor’s proposed rule is a long-overdue matter of basic justice for the hundreds of thousands of workers who do the vital work of providing at-home care for our nation’s elderly and disabled citizens. Every person deserves fair pay for a hard day’s work. This rule ensures home health care workers receive the same minimum wage and overtime protections as virtually all other working people.”
Home care workers have been excluded from wage and hour protections since 1974 due to over-broad regulations and a hostile Supreme Court decision. As reported in USA Today, more than 90 percent of home care workers are women, while 50 percent are minorities. Some 40 percent rely on Medicaid, food stamps and other benefits to stay afloat.
Home care workers’ services will be increasingly critical as the population ages, yet they earn an average $17,000 to $20,000 a year.
Added Trumka:
“The proposed rule is a win-win for consumers and the home care workforce. Improved working conditions will attract new workers to this quickly-growing industry while reducing turnover among existing employees. This will allow more families the choice of home-based care as a long-term care option.”
House Plan Attacks 99%, Benefits 1%
House Republican leaders unveiled a budget plan today in which “once again rushed to the rescue of the 1 percent” by insisting that millionaires should not have to pay one penny in taxes, according to AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka. Instead,
the House Republican proposal would cut benefits for jobless workers, cut pay for public employees, cut preventive health services, reduce premium assistance for low- and middle-income individuals buying health insurance, and raise premiums for many Medicare beneficiaries. House Republicans obviously have more sympathy for millionaires than for the jobless.
AFGE President John Gage also blasted the Republicans leaders” Middle Class Tax Relief and Job Creation Act, introduced by House Speaker John Boehner.
This is just another attack on the 99% on behalf of their good friends—the 1%. They are targeting a small segment of people who make $30,000 to $70,000 a year, rather than asking their millionaire and billionaire supporters to pay a little more. It’s not right, and the American people should be outraged.
Unions Take Up White House $4 Billion ‘Better Buildings Challenge’
At a White House event today featuring President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton, AFT President Randi Weingarten represented labor leaders in joining university presidents and corporate executives in support of the presidential Better Buildings Challenge initiative.
President Obama announced that nearly $4 billion of investments have been committed already, including $2 billion by workers’ pension funds, CEOs, mayors and university presidents for energy-saving upgrades. The labor movement committed to work to invest $150 million in energy-efficient retrofit projects in the coming months.
The goal of the initiative, which builds on work begun by the AFL-CIO earlier this year with the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), is to spur job creation by harnessing private sector investment in energy upgrades in commercial and industrial buildings.
Working with the AFT, a broad coalition of public-sector unions, and the Read the rest of this entry »
Esquire Profiles Trumka as American of the Year
The latest edition of Esquire magazine features an in-depth look at AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka. Named as one of the Americans of the Year by the magazine, the article examines Trumka’s past, current role and vision for the future.
Looking toward the union movement’s future, Trumka tells author John H. Richardson:
I don’t care how steep the hill…We won’t end until we have an America where every worker can support their family and have some dignity and some retirement security, where every kid gets a chance at a great education and a better way of life.
The issue is now on the newsstands and you can click here to read.
DC Union Members Join OWS Marchers from NYC
 |
| AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker and Don Mathis, executive director of the U.S. Community Action Partnership, rallied to support the Occupy movement in McPherson Square. |
Occupy Wall Street marchers arrived in Washington, D.C., today after walking for 10 days from New York City to deliver the message that Congress should stand with the 99 pecent, not the 1 percent.
Despite the abysmal weather, AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker led a contingent of union members to McPherson Square to meet the marchers and rally in support.
Holt Baker joined Don Mathis (left), executive director of the U.S. Community Action Partnership, in sending a message to Republican presidential wannabee Newt Gingrinch, who yesterday said Occupy members should “go get a job after you take a bath.” Gingrich, who has attacked mortage companies Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, turns out to have raked in at least $1.6 million while under contract to Freddie.
As Mathis’s sign says:
Hey, Newt! I had a bath today. When will you come clean?
