Campaign News

Sunrise Movement is a youth climate organization that aims to “stop climate change and create millions of good jobs in the process.” It has been taking the lead on efforts to combine climate protection with a federal jobs guarantee. Other groups like the Sierra Club, Demos, 350.org, the Center for Popular Democracy, the Labor Network for Sustainability, and the US Climate Action Network have also been discussing the climate jobs guarantee (CJG).

Read the full article here.

For nearly 30 years, Juan González used his column in the New York Daily News to expose massive corruption scandals and further the cause of social justice. He retired his column last year, but has continued his work at Democracy Now! and as a journalism professor at Rutgers. In his new book, Reclaiming Gotham: Bill de Blasio and the Movement to End America's Tale of Two Cities, González argues that Mayor de Blasio, who is likely to win a second term, is the leader of a nationwide movement for progressives to take back municipal government, and recently wrote that de Blasio has presided over a $21 billion infusion of progressive benefitstargeted at the New Yorkers who need it most.

We spoke with González about Mayor de Blasio's first term, how he fits into the progressive movement nationwide, and whether the mayor is doing enough to fulfill his initial campaign promise to end the tale of two cities.

Read the full article here.

EFEUSA – September 17, 2013 -

Nueva York, 17 sep (EFEUSA).- Un grupo de trabajadores inauguró hoy una exposición de pinturas, fotografías y vídeos en la que plasmaron sus experiencias personales como inmigrantes y sus reflexiones sobre el valor de la ciudadanía, con motivo del Día de la Ciudadanía.

La exhibición “¿Qué significa para mi la ciudadanía?” realizada en la sede del sindicato Workers United en la ciudad de Newark (Nueva Jersey), es una mezcla ecléctica de dibujos, pinturas y fotografías en blanco y negro y a color, representativo de la diversidad de los propios miembros, que provienen de lugares tan lejanos como Europa del Este, América Latina, América del Sur y Asia.

Entre éstos está la ecuatoriana Naja Quintero, empleada de una guardería, quien participa con dos pinturas, y en una de ellas plasmó lo que sintió cuando llegó a Nueva York por primera vez, hace 14 años.

“Eran las doce del mediodía cuando llegué al aeropuerto John F. Kennedy y crucé Manhattan a pleno sol. Me deslumbró la ciudad. Creo que a todos nos pasa, es la primera impresión, majestuosa y colorida. Me sentí como una estrella”, dijo a Efe Quintero.

La ecuatoriana pintó a un grupo de inmigrantes de diversos países mirando hacia el agua y al otro lado un barco, la Estatua de la Libertad y de fondo, los rascacielos de Nueva York, entre ellos el imponente edificio Chrysler.

“Pinté un bote porque cuando cruzaba Manhattan veía el agua y a gente contemplando la belleza del paisaje”, agregó Quintero, quien llegó a nueva York para reencontrarse con su madre, a quien no vio ni tuvo contacto con ella durante 38 años.

“Tenía tres años cuando ella vino a Nueva York y me dejó con mis abuelos que luego compraron casa en otro lugar y perdimos el contacto con ella”, recordó Quintero, que localizó a su progenitora a través de amistades con los que ésta mantenía contacto en Ecuador.

La emigrante, que era maestra en su país, destacó además que se esforzó por aprender inglés para tomar su examen de ciudadanía.

“Cuando me informaron que había aprobado el examen me dije ‘Naja, esto es como una gran escalera’ donde el siguiente paso fue obtener la ciudadanía”, destacó Quintero, quien expresó en su segunda obra precisamente esa experiencia.

Para ella, la ciudadanía es una planta y su semilla, es el momento en que los emigrantes llegan a Estados Unidos, explicó mientras agregaba que la ciudadanía también significa poder votar e integrarse a una nueva vida.

“A mi me gusta estar integrada en la política, votar, es un deber cívico. Estudié durante un año para ese reto (para el examen de ciudadanía). Yo decía ‘yo puedo, yo puedo’”, dijo emocionada la ecuatoriana, quien preside el comité de arte del sindicato 32BJ, que representa a empleados de mantenimiento, porteros, encargados de edificios privados de vivienda y de guarderías, entre otros, la mayoría latinos.

“Este proyecto de arte pone un rostro a los 11 millones de inmigrantes indocumentados que son una parte indispensable de nuestras comunidades y que necesitan que el Congreso actúe ahora” (por una reforma migratoria), dijo Kevin Brown, director de la 32BJ en Nueva Jersey.

“Los inmigrantes son los estadounidenses. Son nuestras madres y padres, hermanos y hermanas, socios, hijos, abuelos, compañeros de trabajo, vecinos y amigos. Como miembros de la comunidad creativa, tenemos el compromiso de ver y mostrar la humanidad de la historia de la inmigración”, agregó.

Brown destacó que a través de la música, el teatro, la literatura, el cine, la televisión, la danza y otras expresiones de arte, los “inmigrantes y refugiados artistas visuales han definido y redefinido nuestra cultura estadounidense y la historia. Ellos ayudan a renovar nuestra historia nacional”.

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WASHINGTON — The Federal Reserve raised its benchmark interest rate Wednesday for just the second time since the financial crisis of 2008, saying the American economy is expanding at a healthy pace and setting itself up as a counterweight to President-elect Donald J. Trump’s push for considerably faster growth.

The Fed cited the steady growth of employment and other economic measures, and signaled that it expects to raise rates more quickly next year to prevent the economy from growing too quickly.

“My colleagues and I are recognizing the considerable progress the economy has made,” Janet L. Yellen, the Fed’s chairwoman, said at a news conference after the announcement. “We expect the economy will continue to perform well.”

The widely expected decision moves the Fed’s benchmark rate to a range of 0.5 percent to 0.75 percent, still very low by historical standards. Low rates support economic growth by encouraging borrowing and risk-taking.

The American economy has expanded by about 2 percent a year over the last six years, and the unemployment rate has fallen to 4.6 percent. The Fed’s assessment that the economy is growing at a healthy pace — not too hot, not too cold — is starkly at odds with Mr. Trump, who has promised 4 percent growth and has described job creation as “terrible” and economic growth as anemic.

Already on Wednesday, one Republican member of the House Financial Services Committee, Representative Roger Williams of Texas, criticized the Fed’s move.

“Today’s decision by the Fed to raise the interest rate is entirely premature and will be burdensome to a nation already struggling to pull itself out of this slow-growth Obama economy,” Mr. Williams said in a statement. “By making rates even higher, the Fed is effectively making our hardships even harder.”

Mr. Williams did not object when the Fed raised rates last December.

In announcing the decision after a two-day meeting of the Fed’s policy-making committee, the central bank gave little indication that Mr. Trump’s election had altered its economic outlook. The Fed said it still expected a slow economic expansion and a steady march toward higher rates. In separate forecasts also published Wednesday, Fed officials predicted three rate increases in 2017.

Rising Rate

The Federal Reserve raised its target rate for only the second time in more than a decade.

Note: Graphic shows the Federal Funds Target Rate previous to the December 2008 rate change; since then it is the upper limit of the Federal Funds Target Range.

By The New York Times | Source: Federal Reserve

For the first time in recent years, however, there is a real possibility of significant changes in fiscal policy. Republicans will control the White House and both chambers of Congress, and Mr. Trump has promised to increase economic growth and job creation through tax cuts and infrastructure spending.

Those measures could spur faster growth after a presidential campaign in which Mr. Trump regularly disparaged the economy’s performance under President Obama. But the Fed reiterated Wednesday that the economy is already expanding at roughly the maximum sustainable pace.

Fed officials also see evidence that the labor market is tightening. Several Fed districts reported labor shortages in the central bank’s most recent compilation of economic reports. In the Philadelphia district, construction workers are hard to find. Atlanta reported a shortage of nurses; Kansas City, truck drivers; Dallas, tech workers.

Faster growth, in the Fed’s judgment, would probably lead to higher inflation. As a result, if Republicans succeed in invigorating growth, the Fed is likely to raise rates more quickly. The greater the stimulus, the faster interest rates are likely to rise.

“Your expectation should depend very little on what you think that the F.O.M.C. is thinking and very much on your view of Trump policies and their macro effects,” said Jon Faust, a professor of economics at Johns Hopkins University and a former adviser to Ms. Yellen, referring to the Federal Open Market Committee. “Don’t focus on the Fed. As James Carville regularly reminded the other Clinton on the campaign trail: It’s the economy, stupid.”

Ms. Yellen emphasized that the Fed was not prejudging the likely course of events. She declined several times to comment on the merits of Mr. Trump’s plans or to predict their consequences for the economy.

“We’re operating under a cloud of uncertainty at the moment,” Ms. Yellen said.

Fed officials predicted that they would raise the Fed’s benchmark rate a little more quickly in the coming years, reaching 2.1 percent by the end of 2018. In September, they had predicted that it would reach 1.9 percent by the end of 2018. The new projections, however, reflect a significantly slower pace of increase than last December, when they expected the rate to reach 3.3 percent by 2018.

The combination of steady growth and faster rate increases indicates that some Fed officials expect the central bank to end up offsetting a modest increase in fiscal stimulus. But Ms. Yellen said most Fed officials were reserving judgment.

“Changes in fiscal policy or other economic policies could affect the economic outlook,” she said. “Of course, it is far too early to know how those changes will unfold.”

What Happens When the Fed Raises Rates, in One Rube Goldberg Machine

Exactly seven years ago, the Federal Reserve cut interest rates to almost zero in order to nurse the ailing economy back to health. Recently it changed direction. This is how it works.

The tensions between monetary and fiscal policy will develop slowly. Legislation takes time to write, and any economic impact would generally be felt in coming years. Political pressures, however, may build more quickly.

Mr. Trump has made clear in the past that he likes low interest rates — and some of his plans, like infrastructure investment, will be much easier to fund if rates remain low.

“The Fed is in a tricky place,” said Michael Feroli, chief United States economist at JPMorgan Chase. “They’re trying not to prejudge how Congress and the administration duke it out, but once they see that, I think they will respond.”

There is also uncertainty about the Fed’s leadership. Ms. Yellen’s term as chairwoman ends in February 2018, and Mr. Trump has said he would prefer a Republican.

Ms. Yellen could remain on the board, a possibility she said Wednesday she had not ruled out. But the Fed, under different leadership, might well choose a different path forward. Some conservative economists, notably John Taylor of Stanford University, argue that the bank should already have raised rates above 1 percent.

The economy, for now, keeps plodding along. Steady job growth has reduced the unemployment rate to a level the Fed considers healthy. A little unemployment is natural as people change jobs and businesses close. Ms. Yellen and other Fed officials have said they see some signs of stronger wage growth. Inflation, too, has picked up a little in recent months, although both wages and inflation continue to rise more slowly than the Fed would like to see.

Ms. Yellen described the rate increase as “a vote of confidence in the economy.”

The decision was made by a unanimous vote of the 10 members of the Federal Open Market Committee, the first time in recent months the Fed has acted by consensus.

Some economists argue that the Fed should wait until inflation strengthens before raising rates, to test whether a stronger economy would persuade some people sidelined during the downturn to start looking for jobs. That would expand the labor force. Unemployment remains particularly high among minorities.

That view, however, has found little support among Fed officials, who worry that interest rates will have to be raised more quickly if they wait too long, increasing the chances of pushing the economy into recession.

“Apparently, Fed officials think the economy is growing too quickly,” said Ady Barkan, the director of Fed Up, a coalition of liberal groups that has pressed the Fed to continue its stimulus campaign. “I doubt you can find many other Americans who share that opinion. And it’s a strange conclusion to draw in the wake of an election that was so heavily impacted by voters’ economic discontent.”

By BINYAMIN APPELBAUM

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