Líderes del Congreso reanudarán negociación con la Casa Blanca sobre futuro de “Dreamers”
Líderes del Congreso reanudarán negociación con la Casa Blanca sobre futuro de “Dreamers”
Grupos como “United We Dream”, “Women´s March” y “CPD Action” reiteraron hoy que, en las próximas primarias, apoyarán a candidatos rivales que estén dispuestos a proteger a la comunidad inmigrante...
Grupos como “United We Dream”, “Women´s March” y “CPD Action” reiteraron hoy que, en las próximas primarias, apoyarán a candidatos rivales que estén dispuestos a proteger a la comunidad inmigrante, si los demócratas no cumplen su promesa a los “Dreamers.”
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Transcript: Netroots Annual ConfeCPD and Local Progress Mentioned in C-Span during Netroots Conventionrence
Transcript: Netroots Annual ConfeCPD and Local Progress Mentioned in C-Span during Netroots Conventionrence
...codirector of Local Progress, a national group that unites progressive local officials and allied organizations. It is run by the Center for popular Democracy...
...
...codirector of Local Progress, a national group that unites progressive local officials and allied organizations. It is run by the Center for popular Democracy...
Read the transcript here.
Elizabeth Warren to Help Propose Senate Bill to Tackle Part-Time Schedules
The Guardian - July 23, 2014, by Jana Kasperkevic - Part-time jobs are becoming the source of an...
The Guardian - July 23, 2014, by Jana Kasperkevic - Part-time jobs are becoming the source of an employment crisis in the US, as they take the place of full-time jobs for many Americans. That puts many employees at the mercy of erratic part-time schedules, in which they never know what their hours will be from one week to the next.
Congress is making the rare move of taking action on a major employment issue. Representatives George Miller and Rosa L DeLauro introduced a Schedules That Work Act on Tuesday.
There's another version of the bill brewing in the Senate. Senators Tom Harkin and Elizabeth Warren are the sponsors of the Senate’s version of the bill. Carrie Gleason, co-founder of Retail Action Project, said the Warren will introduce the Senate version in upcoming weeks.
“A single mom working two jobs should know if her hours are being canceled before she arranges for daycare and drives halfway across town to show up at work,” said Warren. “This is about some basic fairness in work scheduling so that both employees and employers have more certainty and can get the job done.”
According to the National Women’s Law Center’s summary of the Schedules That Work bill, it would have several goals: to provide employees with the right to request and receive a flexible, predictable or stable work schedule; ensure that employees who show up for a scheduled shift, only to be sent home, receive at least four hours’ worth of pay; and ensure that if employees’ schedule were to change, they are to be notified with a new schedule at two weeks before it goes into effect. It would also prevent employers from retaliating against employees who ask for schedule changes.
A week before the introduction of the legislation, Miller expressed scepticism over the likelihood of its passing the Republican-controlled House. According to the New York Times, the California lawmaker “acknowledges that his bill is unlikely to be enacted anytime soon – partly because of opposition from business”, but hopes that the bill will bring attention to these unfair scheduling practices. That alone says a lot about the current political climate within the US.
Part-time is the new full-time
The growing scale of part-time work suggests it merits closer regulation, or at least scrutiny. Earlier this month, when the US Department of Labor announced that US had added 288,000 jobs and that the unemployment rate dropped to 6.1%, many were quick to point out that one of the contributing factors was that part-time jobs were on the rise.
Currently, there are 7.5 million “involuntary part-time” workers in the US. These are workers who weren’t able to find a full-time job or whose hours have been cut back. In June alone, about 275,000 of such part-time jobs were created. Struggling to make ends meet, about 1.89m Americans are currently working two part-time jobs.
About 52% of retail workers and 40% of janitors and housekeepers know their schedule only a week or less in advance, according to the National Women’s Law Center. Retail Action Project found that about 20% of workers got their schedule just three days in advance.
Lack of stable, reliable schedules for part-time workers is "a growing national crisis in the American workplace", according to The Center for Popular Democracy. In addition to the weekly schedule changes, part-time workers are often victims of last-minute schedule changes as well.
“Workers need scheduling predictability so they can arrange for child care, pick up kids from school, or take an elderly parent to the doctor," said Miller.
Women and part-time work
"Like too many others, this is a problem that primarily affects women," DeLauro said when introducing the Schedules That Work Act with Miller.
Last-minute schedule changes are especially difficult on mothers with young children that cannot be left on their own. Out of 200 mothers with young children working in the hospitality industry, just 56% had a predictable work schedule, found ROC-United. For those 46% with un-predictable work-schedule, 39% had a schedule that changes weekly. The remaining 5% had a schedule that might change from day to day.
Four out of 10 mothers said last-minute changes affected their child-care needs. Some had to call in a back-up babysitter, like the mother above. Others, at 29%, had to pay a fine to their childcare provider, due to these schedule changes. Another 20% of mothers lost their child care provider because of their erratic schedule.
State laws go a little way
Since it might be a while yet before Congress takes up the issue, states can step up and take the lead on this issue. Seven states and District of Columbia already have a “reporting time pay” laws in place. Oregon has one as well, but it’s applicable only to minors, according to Retail Action Project.
Currently enacted state laws specifically protect workers who were scheduled for work, but were sent home upon arrival. For example, in New Hampshire, such workers must be paid at least two hours’ pay if this occurs. In other states like Massachusetts, Rhode Island and New York, they have to be paid for at least three hours.
Source
America's Worst Employer Pageant Launches Today
America's Worst Employer Pageant Launches Today
Today, Center for Popular Democracy launches the first-ever Worst Employer Pageant asking America to help crown the nation’s worst employer based on how abominably it treats its employees. By...
Today, Center for Popular Democracy launches the first-ever Worst Employer Pageant asking America to help crown the nation’s worst employer based on how abominably it treats its employees. By pitting the two worst employers within four different sector against each other, the site asks visitors to cast their votes in each of the following categories – banks, supermarkets, drug stores, and pizza chains.
The Worst Employer Pageant has gathered extensive information on the companies, allowing voters to make their decisions based on such bad behaviors as a poor CEO to median worker pay ratio, failure to pay minimum wage and overtime, worker lawsuits against companies, or forcing workers to work through breaks, among other egregious practices.
“America’s most recognizable brands are some of our biggest employers and we want to highlight their poor treatment of employees,” said JoEllen Chernow, Director of Economic Justice at Center for Popular Democracy. “Consumers are no longer just judging companies on how much they like their products or the efficiency of their services. In 2016, customers care about how companies treat their workers full stop. Yup, it’s a thing.”
The companies nominated for becoming the Worst Employer are:
· Bank of America
· Wells Fargo
· Sam’s Club
· Whole Foods
· CVS
· Walgreens
· Papa John’s
· Yum! Brands, Inc. (Pizza Hut)
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www.populardemocracy.org
The Center for Popular Democracy promotes equity, opportunity, and a dynamic democracy in partnership with innovative base-building organizations, organizing networks and alliances, and progressive unions across the country. CPD builds the strength and capacity of democratic organizations to envision and advance a pro-worker, pro-immigrant, racial justice agenda
Snowy Protest at Philly Fed
The Inquirer - March 5, 2015, by Joseph DiStefano - Ten cold protesters from a national group called Fed Up gathered at the Federal Reserve of Philadelphia in the storm this afternoon to urge the...
The Inquirer - March 5, 2015, by Joseph DiStefano - Ten cold protesters from a national group called Fed Up gathered at the Federal Reserve of Philadelphia in the storm this afternoon to urge the Fed to pay more attention to boosting employment and listening to groups representing wage workers and poor people.
The group, which includes labor union and church groups as well as local affilates such as North Philadelphia-based Action United, says its national leaders met with Federal Reserve Chairman Janet Yellen in Washington last year, but they have had a tough time getting Fed officials who oversee regional banks and regulatory teams, such as Charles Plosser, the free-market economist who retired in January as the Philly Fed President, to take them seriously. Other Fed Up affilates held protests in New York, Charlotte, St. Louis, and other Fed cities today. More are planned, said Shawn Sebastian of the liberal, Brooklyn-based Center for Popular Democracy, one of the groups supporting Fed Up.
"Plosser never gave us a meeting," said Action United leader Kendra Brooks, who said she's been organziing poor people to press for improved government job, education and housing programs since she was laid off from her management job at an Easter Seals affiliate in 2012. Herb Taylor, a veteran community-development manager for the Philly Fed, and other local Fed officials did meet with a Fed Up delegation last fall, and Philly Fed leaders have also held meetings with labor unions and community groups, Fed spokesman Jim Ely reminded the group.
"But they gave us crumbs," said Brooks, noting that labor and community-group leaders were not part of the inner circle who selected Plosser's replacement, University of Delaware President Patrick Harker, a Philly Fed board member who will take the top Philly Fed job in July.
Under Ed Boehne, Philadelphia Fed President from the 1970s into the 1990s, the Philly Fed forced banks to expand their inner-city direct-lending programs and ensured labor representation on the Fed board.
Brooks questioned whether Boehne's successors share that committment to listening to and serving all sectors. She said corporate executives like Comcast chief financial officer Michael Angelakis and investor James Nevels, who led the committee that chose Harker, don't represent a wide range of residents of the Philadelphia Federal Reserve district, which covers eastern Pennsylvania, South Jersey and Delaware.
"Comcast does not represent our community, the universities do not represent the community. We need our voices to be heard, also," she said.
Group leaders said they are frustrated the Fed has not pushed banks to be more flexible in setting payment terms for stressed homeowners, or show the forebearance banks often show to troubled corporate borrowers.
Action United member Lionel Rice said he's running out of time. He said he hadn't been able to find a job paying more than fast-food wages since he was laid off after 20 years at the Penn Maid dairy plant in Northeast Philadelphia three years ago. He said a housing finance agency is preparing to foreclose on his home in Olney.
Ely said he would bring the group's petition to Fed officials' attention.
Source
Recaudan fondos para Puerto Rico con fiesta en el Museo PS1
Recaudan fondos para Puerto Rico con fiesta en el Museo PS1
El Museo de Arte Moderno (MoMA, por sus siglas en inglés) recibió en su sede en Long Island City a la comunidad artística puertorriqueña, en un esfuerzo de recaudación de fondos organizado por la...
El Museo de Arte Moderno (MoMA, por sus siglas en inglés) recibió en su sede en Long Island City a la comunidad artística puertorriqueña, en un esfuerzo de recaudación de fondos organizado por la sociedad civil en apoyo a la comunidad afectada por el huracán María.
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Still important to let our senators know what we think
Still important to let our senators know what we think
What do Credo Action, MoveOn, Idaho Medical Advocacy, CPD Action, Daily Kos, People’s Action, Elizabeth Warren, Mom’s Rising, Our Revolution, Change.Org, AARP, and the Economic Policy Institute...
What do Credo Action, MoveOn, Idaho Medical Advocacy, CPD Action, Daily Kos, People’s Action, Elizabeth Warren, Mom’s Rising, Our Revolution, Change.Org, AARP, and the Economic Policy Institute have in common?
Well, possibly lots of things — each is an advocacy group working to change America.
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Toys 'R' Us and the Death of Retail
Toys 'R' Us and the Death of Retail
When Debbie Beard found out the company she'd worked at for 29 years, Toys R Us, was closing down, she was shocked--she knew the company had been having financial difficulties for a while, but...
When Debbie Beard found out the company she'd worked at for 29 years, Toys R Us, was closing down, she was shocked--she knew the company had been having financial difficulties for a while, but didn't realize it was that bad. The more she learned, though, about the way the company had been looted by private equity firms Bain Capital and KKR, the more she determined that no one else should have to go through this. Debbie and other Toys R Us workers are organizing to demand severance pay from the company, and beyond that, organizing to stop the kind of leveraged buyouts that saddle viable companies with unsustainable debt. She joins me along with Carrie Gleason of the Fair Workweek Initiative at the Center for Popular Democracy to explain what can be done.
Read the full article here.
If the Fed Raises the Interest Rate, I’m One of the Americans Who Will Lose
When I worked my way through college with a job at Chipotle, I often worked a so-called "clopen shift." I was closing the store I managed at 2 a.m. and returning to open the restaurant at 6 a.m....
When I worked my way through college with a job at Chipotle, I often worked a so-called "clopen shift." I was closing the store I managed at 2 a.m. and returning to open the restaurant at 6 a.m. The work schedule didn't leave much time for sleep, let alone schoolwork. But with graduation around the corner, I figured that soon everything was going to change.
I would graduate, and I would get a job that would allow me to pay the bills, take care of my 8-year old daughter, and sleep at night.
But, since graduating this past spring, I have sent out 75 resumés but have only been invited for one interview. I’m looking for jobs that just aren’t there.
When the Federal Reserve gathers Thursday at their Federal Open Market Committee meeting to decide whether or not they will raise the interest rate, I hope they will keep me and others like me in mind.
Congress created the Federal Reserve with a two-pronged mission: to control inflation andto promote maximum employment. All the data shows that there is no risk of inflation – in fact, inflation is still running well-below the Fed’s own conservative target. But the Fed is still considering raising the interest rates, even though raising rates would do real harm to American workers who are still looking for jobs or working for low-wages, like me.
A higher interest rate means that fewer jobs will be created, and that the wages of workers at the bottom will remain too low to live on. That’s because when the Fed raises rates, they are deliberately trying to slow down the economy. They’re saying that there are too many jobs and wages are too high. They’re saying that the economy is exactly where it should be, that people like me are exactly where we should be.
It was not supposed to be this way – after all, I have a business management degree. If the Fed chooses to slow down the economy I may have to give up on getting a job I'm qualified for – the kind of job that I went to school for. I could find a job at McDonalds or Taco Bell, and go back to a work life that will leave me sleepless and struggling to support my daughter. That would be painful for me and my family and bad for the economy. I cannot imagine that this is what Fed officials are looking to do.
And yet, the Fed is considering a rate increase, even though working families – especially Black and Latino working families –are still struggling. Today, 19.5 percent of Black people are unemployed or underemployed, and 15.8 percent of Latinos are unemployed and underemployed. For Black high school graduates in the 17-20-year-old range who haven’t enrolled in college, the unemployment rate is over 50 percent.
If the Fed raises interest rates, we are ones who lose.
That the conservative powers in the Federal Reserve would even consider raising the interest rates shows us a lot about who they’re prioritizing in their decision. It shows us who the Fed is looking out for: the wealthy, Wall Street, and bankers. They are willing to sacrifice the livelihoods and aspirations of young people like me, whole communities of color, and low-income workers all purportedly to fight an inflation threat that doesn’t even exist.
The Fed’s decision on Thursday should be simple. One of the Fed’s mandates is to foster full employment, and wages still have not shown signs of significant growth since the financial crash. That’s a clear sign that America is far from full employment — and the Fed has not yet fulfilled its mandate.
Many in the Fed are claiming that our economy is in recovery, but for who? For Black and Latino Americans, the recovery hasn’t come yet. This week, we’ll see if the Fed is serious about promoting maximum employment for all Americans or just watching out for the few who are already doing well.
Source: CommonDreams
Jeff Flake announces he’ll vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh — will Collins and Murkowski follow suit?
Jeff Flake announces he’ll vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh — will Collins and Murkowski follow suit?
Republican Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona announced Friday morning that he would vote to confirm President Donald Trump's Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.
...
Republican Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona announced Friday morning that he would vote to confirm President Donald Trump's Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.
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57 minutes ago
57 minutes ago