David Elliot (202) 263-4567

COMPROMISE ON FEDERAL UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE PROTECTS JOBLESS AMERICANS AND THE U.S. ECONOMY 

Although flawed, bipartisan agreement maintains the essential character of America’s seven-decade-old insurance guarantee

Washington, D.C.— Today Congress approved, and President Obama endorsed, compromise legislation that extends federal unemployment insurance as well as the payroll tax “holiday.” This legislation prevents millions of jobless Americans from losing benefits almost immediately, and protects our nation’s economy from an untimely jolt that could have caused the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs, which would have resulted in even higher unemployment.

“This bill is a compromise. Quite frankly, it contains provisions we oppose, such as reducing the number of weeks of eligibility, compared with 2010 and 2011, and such as funding UI extension in part through cuts in federal employee pensions,” said Alan Charney, USAction director of strategy and policy. “But the bill maintains the essential character of an unemployment insurance system created by Congress more than seven decades ago as a nonpunitive way to help Americans who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own. And this bill is substantially better than the measure passed last year by House Republicans, which would have fundamentally undermined the UI system and stigmatized recipients.”

“Hundreds of thousands of Americans, including more than 35,000 USAction members, demanded that Congress act to extend unemployment insurance, without barriers, and Congress listened,” Charney said. “Now we must push for more fundamental, structural changes to our economy in order to create jobs and prosperity for the 99 percent. President Obama’s proposed budget – built on the premise that our country does best when everyone gets a fair shot, does their fair share and plays by the same rules – is a good place to begin.”

Last week USAction, USAction affiliates and allies across the country participated in “Walk in My Shoes: A National Day of Action on Behalf of Jobless Americans.”

USAction affiliates delivered used shoes to congressional district offices around the country and urged members of Congress to walk in the shoes of the country’s nearly 14 million unemployed workers. Now that USAction and allies have won the fight over federal unemployment insurance, we will continue our “Fight for the 99 Percent” campaign, which seeks to build an economy that works for all of us.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform met this morning to continue to play politics with women’s health. Chairman Darrell Issa refused to allow a minority witness to testify at the Committee hearing and the photo to the right of an all-male panel at the hearing tells a succinct story about the GOP war on women.

While Issa’s political circus will finish up today, an extreme measure which would allow any and all insurers and employers to deny employees health benefits and services based on their personal religious or moral objections awaits a vote in the Senate.

Please contact your Senators right now and urge them to stand firm against extremist attacks on women’s health and access to contraceptive care. http://j.mp/ABFLiV

A vote on the Blunt Amendment to the Surface Transportation bill could come as early as TODAY!

Take action and tell your Senator to vote NO on the Blunt amendment today.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, better known as the stimulus, turns 3 this week. Did it work? Michael Linden, Director of Tax and Budget Policy at the Center for American Progress, answers that question in a new video by looking at three broad but important indicators for the American economy. All three were in bad shape before the stimulus began, and all three turned around at almost exactly the moment the stimulus started. Coincidence?

USAction affiliates, joined by the AFL-CIO, Working America and members from AFSCME, CWA and SEIU said, wait a minute.

In more than a dozen states, we came together in coalition and organized Walk in My Shoes: A Day of Action in Support of Jobless Americans. In some cases, we literally delivered old shoes to congressional district offices and asked members to walk in our shoes when it comes to building an economy that works for all of us and promoting economic security – the things that keep our families together and our communities whole.

Check out some of the events below:

• Florida Consumer Action Network, joined by the AFL-CIO, rallied in Lakeland to call on Rep. Dennis Ross to vote to extend unemployment insurance benefits. The event received coverage in the Lakeland Ledger and resulted in FCAN’s recruitment of several new activists.
• United Action for Idaho presented eight pairs of worn-out shoes with stories attached to Senator Mike Crapo’s district office to demand that UI be extended with no barriers. The group met with the senator’s press secretary for 40 minutes, and secured a promise that Sen. Crapo would vote for a UI extension with no barriers.
• Maine People’s Alliance organized out-of-work Mainers to visit the offices of Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe in Portland, Augusta and Lewiston/Auburn. The visitors delivered more than 700 messages from constituents in support of extending UI benefits and opposing barriers.
• Florida Consumer Action Network, joined by the AFL-CIO, rallied in Lakeland to call for an extension of unemployment insurance benefits.
• Michigan Citizen Action, joined by AFSCME and CWA members and several local elected officials, visited Rep. Fred Upton’s district office in Kalamazoo. Several unemployed workers were able to go inside the congressman’s district office and share their stories with Rep. Upton’s district director. The event received newspaper, radio and TV coverage.
• Missouri ProVote, along with Missouri ARA and the AFL-CIO, delivered petition signatures and a pair of work boots to Senator Claire McCaskill’s office to urge her to support extending UI with no barriers. Three unemployed workers shared their very moving stories.
• New Hampshire Citizens Alliance challenged Rep. Charlie Bass to “walk in the shoes” of the 9,000 Granite Staters who stand to lose UI benefits if Congress does not act. “Americans have lost their jobs and their homes and now some in Congress would steal their unemployment insurance,” said Olivia Zink, NHCA community organizer.
• Citizen Action of New York met with Rep. Richard Hanna at his district office in Binghamton. The meeting was covered by all four local TV stations.
• ProgressOhio printed out the stories of unemployed Ohio residents and created storyboards in front of Senator Rob Portman’s district office. Each storyboard was fronted by a pair of shoes. “Rather than play politics with the lives of millions of working people and their families, lawmakers should pass a full extension of unemployment insurance without restriction or delay,” said ProgressOhio Executive Director Brian Rothenberg. ProgressOhio was joined by unemployed workers, activists, Occupy Colombus, Working America, ARA and Communities United.
• Oregon Action and leaders from local labor groups gathered in front of Rep. Greg Walden’s Medford office. The meeting included several unemployed workers who would be hurt by being cut off UI. Walden’s staff said that Walden supports drug testing and other barriers to workers. One local TV news gave pre coverage at noon. Oregon Action also had people call in to support our position before, during and after the event.
• West Virginia Citizen Action Group, joined by AFL-CIO, West Virginia Council of Churches, CWA and the American Friends Service Committee, held a press conference at the state capitol. The event drew radio and TV coverage.

GOP Threatens Extended Unemployment Insurance—Again, and More Intensely

But at least cruel proposed measures are consistent

BY DAVID MOBERG

Despite the recent good news—the unemployment rate and new jobless claims are down, economic and job growth are up, the nation’s 12.8 million unemployed people face two threats from Congress in the next couple of weeks.

First, the House-Senate conference committee may simply fail to reach agreement on full-year renewal of federal extensions of unemployment insurance—along with a continuation of payroll tax deductions, provisions to avoid a cut in doctors’ reimbursement under Medicare, and a means of offsetting the costs of those policies.

If there is no agreement by the end of the month, roughly 4.5 million long-term unemployed people could lose their modest partial income replacement between March and June. And the still fragile but budding economic recovery would lose one of its most effective supports. ”If we don’t renew this extension, nearly 5 million people in this country will lose their last lifeline,” says Rep. Sander Levin (D-Mich.). “We have to act.”

The second threat—almost as bad—is that Congress could approve renewal of extended unemployment with many of the provisions in the House Republican bill, a package of punitive restraints and barriers that the nonprofit National Employment Law Project (NELP) calls “ill-advised and cruel.”

To head off both threats, NELP, USAction and allies are protesting at key Republican politicians’ home offices Friday against their attempt to use unemployment insurance to “blame the unemployed,” USAction strategy director Alan Charney said, not help the jobless or the economy. The protestors will carry shoes (asking politicians to walk in the shoes of the unemployed), red tape (objecting to the new barriers to aid), and hula hoops (symbolizing the hoops Republican policies would force the jobless to jump through).

Overall, says NELP director Christine Owens, Republican plans “would slash benefits in half, hitting hardest the states with the highest unemployment.” Currently, depending on the state unemployment rate, the long-term unemployed—now about 43 percent of all those officially unemployed—can receive benefits up to 99 weeks. Republicans would cut that to 59 weeks; Obama had proposed 79 weeks, and Congressional Democrats offered Thursday to cut the maximum to 93 weeks.

But the “reforms” pushed by Republicans would undermine the foundation of the nation’s wage insurance program for the unemployed, chipping away at policies that now work well, creating “solutions” for problems that don’t exist, and greatly exacerbating existing weaknesses (such as low rates of wage replacement and coverage of only about 40 percent of the jobless in normal times).

For example, Republicans would subject all workers who involuntarily lose their jobs to drug tests. As NELP reports, this measure—like many other Republican proposals—sets new, restrictive conditions for a statutory universal insurance program. It would unjustifiably stigmatize all unemployed workers, possibly hurting their chances for re-employment (especially since many employers already discriminate against the unemployed in hiring), cost state governments mightily, and offer redundant, irrelevant barriers (many states already restrict benefits for workers who lose jobs because of drug use, and many employers test new hires for drugs—even though those policies are deeply flawed).

Republicans would bar unemployment insurance to anyone without a high school or GED equivalent diploma unless he or she is actively pursuing such certification. Beyond violating the program’s role as social insurance, harming roughly 14 percent of UI applicants who are mainly very low-wage, vulnerable and relatively old (about half of UI claimants without a high school diploma are over 45), this unfunded mandate for adult education would add to state financial problems.

Republicans also want to grant states waivers to use UI funds for purposes other than paying UI benefits, supposedly to speed re-employment (though research shows workers receiving benefits are more active in searching for jobs than those who don’t). Beyond undermining and providing states a means to “raid” the insurance system, NELP says, the provision is not needed—states have considerable flexibility already, and many state programs of active assistance speed re-hiring of the unemployed.

The congressional action simply feeds into state-level “ongoing attacks on UI” and promotion of “abusive and ineffective so-called ‘reemployment’ programs,” according to NELP.

In the guise of preventing millionaires from receiving unemployment insurance, Republicans open the door to means-testing of insurance recipients. But millionaires are hardly a drain on UI funds. They received 0.015 percent of UI payouts in 2009. But leave it to Republicans to kick a guy when he’s down: They refuse to consider taxing millionaires when they’re making money and only want to take something away when hardship hits.

And in a related move, Republicans say they want to provide expanded employment services—but the cost would be deducted from people’s meager unemployment checks (averaging $296 a week now).

Finally, unlike past recessions, Republicans insist on offsetting the cost of extended UI, thus undercutting its stimulative effect. Worse, they want to finance the program by continuing to freeze federal workers’ pay. They adamantly reject Democrats’ plan for a small surtax on millionaires. The Republican funding alternative may be cruelly unfair and economically stupid, but at least when viewed in the context of the party’s overall unemployment proposal, it is consistent.

http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/12728/republicans_threaten_extended_unemployment_insurance–again_and_moreso/

Nearly 40,000 of us have already signed on to support Sen. Whitehouse and his bill to tax the super-rich. And we’ll be delivering all your signatures to the Senate in-person.

Right now, Sen. Whitehouse’s “Buffett Rule” has 10 cosponsors. Many more agree, but haven’t signed on yet. That’s where you come in.

Will you write your Senator today and ask them to co-sponsor the “Paying a Fair Share Act”?

Every letter you send helps because whether your Senator is a dead-set 1%’er or a die-hard friend of Occupy, they all know that if you’re willing to write them a letter, you’re willing to talk to friends and family about why the super rich should pay their fair share.

And in an election year, showing politicians that we know their voting record and are willing to speak out is the best tool we have to make change. Send your Senators a personal message asking them to cosponsor the Buffett Rule.

Already taken action? Tell your friends and family about the Buffett Rule today.

As the wars of the past decade recede, we should use this as an opportunity to invest hundreds of billions of dollars that would have been spent on war and weapons into job creation here at home.

But the military-industrial complex will put up a fight over every piece of pork that keeps them fat and happy. Led by defense contractors like Lockheed Martin, defense lobbying increased 10% in 2011. With Pentagon budget cuts scheduled for 2013, their effort will undoubtedly intensify.

But they have a jobs problem, illustrated by the chart below which debunks a main talking point of the defense industry.

As William Hartung writes:

“Plans for cutting the federal deficit have raised an important question: what impact would military spending reductions have on jobs? 

Contrary to the assertions of the arms industry, maintaining military spending at the expense of other forms of federal expenditures would actually result in a net loss of jobs.  This is because military spending is less effective at creating jobs than virtually any other form of government activity.
…
The question is not whether military spending creates jobs – it is whether more jobs could be created by the same amount of money invested in other ways.  The evidence on this point is clear.

• A billion dollars devoted to a tax cut creates 34% more jobs than a billion dollars of military spending ;
• Spending on clean energy production produces one and one-half times more jobs ;
• And, spending on education creates more than two and one-half times more jobs.”

Hartung closes with the most salient point, one we’ve been making for years about budget priorities — “The more money we spend on unneeded weapons programs, the more layoffs there will be of police officers, firefighters, teachers and other workers whose jobs are funded directly or indirectly by federal spending.“

This shouldn’t even be a choice. The workers that serve us in the public sector should not have to pay for the crimes of the 1% that got us in this economic mess. And the 1% defense contractors should not win out over the education of our children or the safety of our neighborhoods simply because they can spend $15 million lobbying Congress for more weapons and war.

USAction co-founded Health Care for America Now (HCAN) and helped lead the field campaign in dozens of states in the historic campaign to make health care a right in our country. Now, when Republicans are campaigning to repeal the new law, a new book dramatically tells the story of our grassroots, coalition campaign that triumphed over the tea party, Chamber of Commerce, health insurance industry and Republican Party.

Written by HCAN Campaign Manager Richard Kirsch, Fighting for Our Health: The Epic Battle to Make Health Care a Right in the United States offers a vivid, first-person account of how health care reform came to be. The book brings readers inside the biggest and most consequential issue campaign in American history. Fighting for Our Health recounts how a reform campaign led by grassroots organizers played a crucial role in President Obama’s signing historic health reform legislation in March of 2010.

The action takes place inside the Beltway — the White House, Congressional anterooms, and the streets of DC — and at hundreds of town meetings, demonstrations, and confrontations in places like Danville, Virginia and Lincoln, Nebraska, where we turned out and raised our voices

Most powerfully, it is the story of the triumph of thousands of people who had seen loved ones die, families go bankrupt, small businesses ruined, and futures destroyed by the health insurance system in the United States.

Check out the book’s website here: http://www.fightingforourhealth.com and on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/#!/ffohbook.

Originally posted on the Milwaukee Public Television website: http://www.mptv.org/video/watch/?id=1121

American health care costs too much and covers too few. The Affordable Care Act is tackling the problems, piece by piece. But how will this law change American health care? Will it help people with poor or no insurance? And will the Act survive the courts, lobbyists, and legislators? With host DENISE CALLAWAY. And with guests, in order of appearance — BILL PETASNICK, CEO, Froedtert Health; PATRICIA McMANUS, PhD, President & CEO, Black Health Coalition of Wisconsin; SUSAN GIAIMO, PhD, Political Scientist, Marquette University, Author, Markets and Medicine: the Politics of Health Care Reform in Britain, Germany, and the United States; and ROBERT KRAIG, PhD, Executive Director, Citizen Action of Wisconsin.

Originally posted on ProgressOhio’s website: New Report Documents Influence of American Legislative Exchange Council in Columbus

COLUMBUS, OH – A new report released today by People For the American Way Foundation, Common Cause, the Center for Media and Democracy and ProgressOhio reveals the deep ties between the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) and Ohio’s legislature.

Through a side-by-side comparison of ALEC legislative models and actual Ohio bills, the report shows how Ohio’s legislators are working in tandem with corporate leaders to deregulate key industries, privatize education and dismantle unions.

The report, ALEC in Ohio: The Corporate Special Interests that Help Write Ohio’s Laws, is available here.