Fed Officials Push Back Against Calls to Overhaul Central Bank’s Structure
Fed Officials Push Back Against Calls to Overhaul Central Bank’s Structure
Federal Reserve bank presidents are pushing back against a rising chorus of voices saying the central bank’s century-...
Federal Reserve bank presidents are pushing back against a rising chorus of voices saying the central bank’s century-old structure needs to be overhauled to reduce bankers’ influence over its operations and policies.
Presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and the party’s draft platform have echoed calls for change by left-leaning activists, a drive that could gain new attention this week during the party’s convention in Philadelphia.
At issue is the role played by private banks in the Fed’s 12 regional reserve banks, which supervise financial institutions, provide financial services and participate in the central bank’s monetary policy-making.
By law, private banks elect six of the nine members of each Fed bank’s board of directors, choosing three to represent the banks and three to represent the public. The other three are appointed by the Washington-based Fed Board of Governors to represent the public.
Critics say the setup creates an inherent conflict of interest, akin to the proverbial fox guarding the henhouse, and has resulted in too little diversity among the leadership of the Fed system.
“Common sense reforms—like getting bankers off the boards of regional Federal Reserve Banks—are long overdue,” Mrs. Clinton’s campaign said in May.
Fed leaders in recent public comments and interviews have defended the status quo as effective, though Chairwoman Janet Yellen said during congressional testimony in February “it is of course up to Congress to consider what the appropriate structure is of the Fed.”
Meanwhile, regional Fed bank officials have played down the potential for conflict of interest, noting that the directors aren't involved in bank supervision, and the directors who represent private banks don’t participate in choosing the Fed bank presidents. The officials also see value in having close ties to the banking community. Patrick Harker, president of the Philadelphia Fed, said most of the bankers in his district are from small firms, not the big financial institutions that can worry regulators.
“The banker from a small town in Pennsylvania provides incredibly important insight” about local conditions, and “I worry about losing that insight,” Mr. Harker said. He agreed bankers could provide input through advisory groups, but he said having them on his board, meeting every 15 days, provides a level of instant insight into the economy and financial system that would be hard to replace.
William Dudley, president of the New York Fed, told reporters in May, “The current arrangements are actually working quite well, both in terms of preserving the Federal Reserve’s independence with respect to the conduct of monetary policy and actually leading to pretty, you know, successful outcomes” in terms of hitting the Fed’s goals of maximum employment and low, steady inflation.
Another issue for some advocates of change is the regional Fed banks’ status as quasi-public, quasi-private institutions. The Fed board in Washington is a wholly government entity that ultimately oversees the regional Fed banks. But when private banks become members of the Federal Reserve system, they are required to buy stock, and in turn receive dividends from the Fed. So the private banks in a sense own the regional Fed banks, though they can’t transfer or sell the stock.
“It’s pretty indefensible for the Fed to be the only regulatory institution” in the U.S. “that’s owned by the industry it regulates,” said Ady Barkan, of the Center for Popular Democracy’s Fed Up Campaign.
Fed officials say the critics misunderstand the Fed’s ownership structure. Cleveland Fed President Loretta Mester said in an interview the quasi-private status of the regional Fed banks helps ensure the independence that is needed for good policy-making in an economically diverse nation. If the regional banks were made fully part of government, she worried, Washington’s power would grow, raising the risk of politics influencing the policy debate.
Ms. Mester said “yes, the banks have stock” in the Fed. “But that’s not owning the Fed in the sense of a corporation, right? It’s making sure that there’s representation from the district as part of the Fed structure,” she said.
Richmond Fed leader Jeffrey Lacker also worried making the regional Fed banks pure governmental entities might promote short-term thinking that would lead to bad policy outcomes.
Fed Up worked with former senior Fed staffer Andrew Levin, now a professor at Dartmouth College, on a proposal to make the Fed banks wholly government institutions, as are the central banks in all the major economies. His proposal also would eliminate the regional Fed board director slots reserved for bankers and have all the directors selected in a public process involving the Washington governors and local elected officials.
Mr. Levin said he’s somewhat mystified Fed officials appear to be rejecting almost all the major reform ideas now being debated. They “might not have much influence on the outcome if they wait too long to engage in the debate,” he warned.
Mr. Harker, the Philadelphia Fed president, worried “there are always unintended consequences anytime you make a change.”
But Mr. Barkan countered “it’s true the system could be made worse than it is now, but we think it could be made better.”
By MICHAEL S. DERBY
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Central Banks Wage War on Markets: Bill Bonner Says They Will Lose; Fed Up Yet?
Central Banks Wage War on Markets: Bill Bonner Says They Will Lose; Fed Up Yet?
This article is published in collaboration with Scutify, where you can find real-time markets and stock commentary from...
This article is published in collaboration with Scutify, where you can find real-time markets and stock commentary from Robert Marcin, Cody Willard and others. Download the Scutify iOS App, the Scutify Android App or visit Scutify.com.
Daily Reckoning founder Bill Bonner thinks central banks are waging war on the markets. He also believes they will lose.
I wholeheartedly agree with Bonner's rationale. Let's tune in.
This is a guest post courtesy of Bill Bonner and the Daily Reckoning.
Why the Feds Will Lose Their War on the Markets
The markets continue to dawdle. Not much conviction in either direction.
We've already looked at the War on Poverty, the War on Drugs and the War on Terror.
So let's move on...using our new lens to look at another of the feds' fake wars.
Dirty War
No war was ever officially declared against the markets.
But for four decades the feds conducted covert operations...a dirty war in which they've tried to mislead, obstruct, and suppress market forces.
They used fake money, fake savings, and fake interest rates to confuse investors, businesses, and consumers.
They didn't say so directly, but their purpose was to give out false signals so that people would change their behaviour.
'Demand' was too weak, they said. What to do about it?
They flooded the system with phony savings (credit).
Price signals were distorted. Credit limits seemed to disappear. Debt limits were eased.
Then, in 2008, the war turned hot...with the feds actively and overtly holding down interest rates to push up stock and bond prices.
In response to the crisis they caused - by encouraging too much debt in the housing sector - they claimed that the 'free market' had failed.
They were just responding to the 'emergency', they said.
Soon, everybody got in on the act - expressing an opinion about how high (or low) interest rates should be.
Force and fraud
Believe it or not, an activist group called 'Fed Up' argues that raising rates is...you guessed it...racist!
Institutional Investor magazine reports that a group funded by 32-year-old Facebook cofounder Dustin Moskovitz is lobbying against rate increases on the grounds that higher rates are bad for US workers. From the website:
'The truth about the economy is obvious to most of us: not enough jobs, not enough hours, and not enough pay - particularly in communities of color and among young workers.
'Some members of the Federal Reserve think that the economy has recovered. They want to raise interest rates to slow down job growth and prevent wages from rising faster. That's a terrible idea.
'We stand with millions of workers and their families in calling on the Federal Reserve to adopt pro-worker policies for the rest of us. The Fed can keep interest rates low, give the economy a fair chance to recover, and prioritize full employment and rising wages.'
What? Who are these people? Do they have tails? Horns?
They're right about one thing: When the Fed tries to control the economy, it is politics, not markets, at work.
Markets work by persuasion and voluntary exchange. Politics works on force and fraud. Fed Up is a political organisation trying to influence how the force and fraud is applied.
But let's look at the feds' War on Markets through our now-familiar scope.
Victory is impossible
First, is this a war the feds can win?
No. Of course not.
Markets can be suppressed, delayed, and denied...but never eliminated.
Markets do not stop working just because you try to bend, distort, and even outlaw them. Victory is impossible.
The market for drugs does not stop just because the feds make them illegal. Instead, they reprice illegal drugs, taking into account the increased cost of doing business.
Nor does poverty disappear just because the feds make war on it.
'The poor will always be with you,' said Jesus, wisely.
Wealth and poverty are relative; there will always be some rich and some poor. Passing laws will not change that.
And 'terrorism'?
Those who do not have access to conventional armies always resort to unorthodox attacks.
That's what American colonists did when they launched their war against the British in 1775.
It's what the Jews did when they launched their 'insurgency' against the British in Palestine in 1939.
And it's what the Maquis did during the occupation of France by the Nazis during the Second World War.
Terror won't stop any time soon. Nor will markets cease to function.
Bubbles, bankruptcies, and misery
Second, does the enemy gain strength from the 'war' against it?
Well, yes and no.
Markets work perfectly well whether you make war on them or not. Governments can put any price on anything they want. But only markets can tell you what they are worth.
Just look at what happened in the Soviet Union. Or China, pre-1979. Or Venezuela.
Who bought anything from China when the communists were setting prices?
Who goes to Venezuela to do his shopping today?
We visited Russia soon after the Soviet Union was disbanded. Markets were just opening up. But after 70 years of price fixing, there was almost nothing to buy. Almost everything that was being sold had been pilfered from the army. We bought a pair of boots for $1.00. We still have them. The soles are so stiff they barely bend.
There are really only two types of economies - command economies and market economies. The latter work for everyone - but you never know who the real winners will be. The former work only for the commanders. Then, when they have stolen everything there was to steal, markets reassert themselves.
Economies are price-discovering, information-generating learning systems. On the world market, every economy has access to the same resources, more or less. It's what you do with them that counts.
Dictating prices is like teaching students that Japan won the Second World War...or saying that two plus two equals five...or rounding off Pi to three just to make it easier to remember.
But the more fake information you give out, the more valuable real information becomes.
A war the feds will ultimately lose
Third, did it create a new, corrupt Deep State industry? And fourth, do the combatants on both sides gain as the public loses?
Not exactly.
This is different from other 'wars' announced by the Deep State. This is how the insiders fund their other wars...and how they shift trillions of dollars from the public to themselves.
The War on Markets distorted almost all industries and corrupted the entire economy.
As reported here many times, suppressed interest rates alone probably cost savers as much as $10 trillion since 2008. Goosing up asset prices probably shifted another $10 trillion or so to the people who own them (typically, the elite).
As in all of these fake wars, the casus belli is phony.
Markets do not hurt people; they help them. Price signals, set by markets, are essential. Otherwise, you don't know whether you're adding wealth or subtracting it.
Trying to suppress free markets or abolish them always leads to confusion, bubbles, bankruptcies, and misery. Economies weaken; people grow poorer.
Since 2008, wages have been stagnant or falling for most people...GDP growth has declined and is now probably negative...productivity growth has declined more than any time in the last 40 years...world trade levels are back to 2009 levels...and the bounce-back from the Great Recession was the weakest on record.
For now, the war serves its real purpose: to increase the power and wealth of the Deep State insiders.
But it is a war that the feds will ultimately lose.
Trying to suppress markets is like putting a giant cork in the mouth of a volcano. It doesn't stop the eruption; it just makes it more violent.
Regards,
Bill Bonner,
For The Daily Reckoning, Australia
End Bonner - Mish Start - Fed Up
Let's start with three truths by Bonner.
By Scutify
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‘Look at me when I’m talking to you!’: Crying protesters confront Jeff Flake in Capitol elevator
‘Look at me when I’m talking to you!’: Crying protesters confront Jeff Flake in Capitol elevator
After Sen. Jeff Flake’s announcement that he would, in fact, vote to confirm Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh to the U.S....
After Sen. Jeff Flake’s announcement that he would, in fact, vote to confirm Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court, the emotional debate over the confirmation spilled into the halls of Congress — on live television — as two women loudly and tearfully confronted the Arizona Republican in an elevator Friday, telling him that he was dismissing the pain of sexual-assault survivors.
“What you are doing is allowing someone who actually violated a woman to sit in the Supreme Court,” one woman, who said she had been sexually assaulted, shouted during a live CNN broadcast as Flake was making his way to a Senate Judiciary Committee meeting. The Center for Popular Democracy, a left-leaning advocacy organization, later identified her as the group’s co-executive director, Ana Maria Archila.
“This is horrible,” she told Flake. “You have children in your family. Think about them.”
Read the article and watch the video here.
LA is Taking On the Fair Workweek Fight - It Could Change Your Life
LA is Taking On the Fair Workweek Fight - It Could Change Your Life
The Center for Popular Democracy did an extensive national study of retail workers in 2017, surveying over 1,000 people...
The Center for Popular Democracy did an extensive national study of retail workers in 2017, surveying over 1,000 people working in retail and finding that despite statewide minimum wage gains and some voluntary reforms by employers, many people struggle to achieve economic stability due to significant income volatility and wage stagnation.
Read the full article here.
Coalición defiende ley que protege a trabajadores de la construcción
El Diario - April 16, 2014, by Mariela Lombard - Más de una veintena de organizaciones comunitarias y sindicatos se han...
El Diario - April 16, 2014, by Mariela Lombard - Más de una veintena de organizaciones comunitarias y sindicatos se han unido en una coalición para presionar para que no se reforme una legislación que protege la seguridad de los 1.5 millones trabajadores de construcción del estado de Nueva York.
Este mismo lunes un obrero cuya identidad aún no ha sido divulgada murió después de caerse de un andamio situado en una zona de construcción cercana a Penn Station, en Manhattan. Es la segunda muerte de este tipo que sucede este mes en la ciudad, después de que otro trabajador falleciera el pasado 2 de abril por la misma causa mientras laboraba en unas obras en el New York Dream Hotel de la calle 55.
“Estos trágicos accidentes demuestran por qué se deben mantener los más altos estándares de seguridad para los trabajadores de construcción”, dijo Valeria Treves, directora de la organización pro inmigrante NICE, que funciona también como centro de jornaleros. “La seguridad es especialmente importante para los trabajadores inmigrantes, porque muchos de ellos nos reportan que les encargan las tareas que más riesgo conllevan”.
De acuerdo a la Oficina de Estadísticas Laborales, el 60% de los obreros del estado que murieron por caídas en el trabajo entre 2003 y 2011 eran hispanos y/o inmigrantes. En la ciudad de Nueva York la cifra fue aún mayor, llegando al 74%.
Peter Ward, presidente de HTC, sindicato que agrupa a los trabajadores de hoteles, criticó a contratistas y compañías de seguros “sin escrúpulos” por estar cabildeando en Albany para reformar la conocida como “Ley de Seguridad del Andamio” (Scaffold Safety Law), alegando que eleva demasiado los costes de construcción y va en perjuicio de la creación de puestos de trabajo.“
Quieren que sea la responsabilidad de los trabajadores el mantener un lugar de trabajo seguro. La actual ley pone la responsabilidad donde corresponde: en los contratistas, que deben asegurarse que todo trabajador tenga el equipo correspondiente”, enfatizó Ward.
La ley obliga a empleadores y compañías de construcción a proveer equipamiento y entrenamiento de seguridad a todos sus empleados. Eso pretende evitar casos como el del obrero Cresencio Pantoja, quién hace siete años salvó la vida de milagro cuando se precipitó al vacío desde una altura de 23 pies mientras renovaba la fachada de una escuela de El Bronx, por no contar con un arnés de seguridad.
“Mi jefe estaba más preocupado de que se hiciera rápido el trabajo que de la seguridad de sus empleados. Muchos otros trabajadores tampoco tenían arneses de seguridad”, dijo Pantoja, que estuvo cuatro días en coma después del accidente y aún no ha podido volver a trabajar por las heridas. Se mantiene desde entonces con la indemnización que recibió de la constructora, uno de los derechos que garantiza la actual ley.
Otro participante en la coalición es el sindicato SEIU 32BJ, que representa a 120,000 trabajadores de servicios.
“Decenas de miles de hombres y mujeres, muchos de ellos inmigrantes, arriesgan su vida construyendo y reparando nuestra ciudad. Limpiar ventanas o trabajar en un andamio es muy peligroso”, señaló el presidente de la unión, Héctor Figueroa. “No entendería que nuestros funcionarios convirtieran este trabajo en algo aún más peligroso quitando las protecciones de la Ley de Seguridad del Andamio”.
Gary LaBarbera, presidente del Concejo de Construcción de Nueva York, apoya otra legislación introducida en la Asamblea y el Senado Estatal, denominada Ley de Transparencia de Seguros para Construcciones de 2014, que también dice ayudaría a mejorar la seguridad de los obreros.
“Esta ley deja abiertos los datos de los asegurados que nos permitirá analizar de forma transparente esta situación y encontrar soluciones para reducir los costos sin dejar de mejorar la seguridad”, señaló.La coalición ha lanzado una página web para llamar la atención sobre su causa: www.scaffoldsafetylaw.com.
Qué es la Ley de Seguridad del Andamio y qué protecciones ofrece a los trabajadores de construcción
La ley tiene su origen en 1885, cuando se empezaron a construir los grandes rascacielos en la Ciudad de Nueva York. Especifica que los contratistas y los dueños de las propiedades deben asegurarse de que los andamios, montacargas y otros dispositivos utilizados en laconstrucción y reparación de edificios, sean montados y operados de manera que se proteja la integridad de las personas empleadas para la tarea.
Cuando se producen heridas y muertes por la violación de estos términos, la ley dice que los contratistas y dueños son los únicos responsables y deben indemnizar a los perjudicados.Aquellos que quieren reformarla reclaman que se incluya una enmienda para que un jurado o árbitro judicial decida en cada caso si el pago por daños tiene que ser menor si se determina que también ha habido negligencia por parte del trabajador a la hora de seguir los procedimientos de seguridad. Estos opositores denuncian que la formulación actual de la legislación dispara los costos de los seguros.
Denuncie la falta de seguridad
Si un trabajador de la construcción observa fallos en las medidas de seguridad, el primer paso que recomiendan las organizaciones laborales es hablar con otros compañeros y reportarlo en grupo al supervisor. Si el supervisor no hace nada por solucionarlo, el siguiente paso es presentar una queja a la Administración de Seguridad y Salud Ocupacional (OSHA) para que lleve a cabo una investigación.
La queja se puede presentar en español rellenando un formulario online (www.osha.gov) o llamando al 1-800-321-OSHA para localizar la oficina más cercana.
Todos los empleados de construcción, independientemente de su estatus migratorio, tienen derecho a la seguridad en el lugar de trabajo.
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Starbucks employees still face ‘clopening,’ understaffing, and irregular workweeks
Starbucks employees still face ‘clopening,’ understaffing, and irregular workweeks
Starbucks employees say their schedules aren’t nearly as sweet as those pumpkin spice lattes they’re serving up this...
Starbucks employees say their schedules aren’t nearly as sweet as those pumpkin spice lattes they’re serving up this fall.
In a new report from the Center for Popular Democracy, a nonprofit that works with community groups, Starbucks workers said the coffee company has failed over the past year to make good on a promise to improve employees’ schedules. Instead, employees said they still face unpredictable workweeks, obstacles to taking sick leave, insufficient rest and staffing, and a failure to honor their availability.
“Starbucks’ frontline employees bear the brunt of the management imperative to minimize store labor costs, which takes precedence over attempts to stabilize work hours, provide healthy schedules, and to ensure employees have real input into their working conditions,” the report states.
The issues detailed in the report are familiar to anyone to many who work on “non-standard” schedules common among low wage jobs.
Starbucks first came under fire after a New York Times article from August 2014 described the struggle of a Starbucks barista and single mother, whose irregular work schedule caused turbulence in her personal relationships, other jobs and parental routine. The source of such chaos was supposedly Starbucks’s sophisticated scheduling software that cuts labor costs by arranging workers’ weeks based on sales patterns.
While this technology can boost a business’s profits, it can also leave workers working back-to-back shifts (also known as ‘clopening’), or not receiving enough hours to make ends meet. Sometimes, as the Timesarticle pointed out, employees would commute to work just to find their schedule changed.
After the public backlash, Starbucks promised to revise its policies and end the irregular scheduling practices for its roughly 130,000 baristas in the U.S.
To achieve this, Starbucks said it would post all work hours 10 days in advance, and give any baristas with more than an hour long commute the option to transfer to a more convenient location. Starbucks also said it would revise the scheduling technology and kill the clopening shift.
But much has remained unchanged, according to the 200 workers across 37 states the Center for Popular Democracy interviewed.
Nearly half of the surveyed Starbucks employees said they received their schedule one week or less in advance, and one in four workers said they still had to work clopening shifts.
Employees also reported feeling as though managers disregarded their availability, and denied them more hours when they needed additional work. Finally, 40 percent of employees said they faced barriers to taking sick leave when they were ill.
None of this seems to fit with Starbucks’s reputation as a “fabulous company” to work for, as jobs and recruiting website Glassdoor described it in its annual ranking of the 50 best places to work in 2014. Starbucks came in at No. 39.
The Center for Popular Democracy’s report did have some suggestions for improvement, however, recommending that Starbucks guarantee minimum hours and full-time work for those who want it. It also said the company should mandate that managers provide predictable schedules so working families can have a more stable work-life balance, in addition to taking the pressure off sick employees to find a replacement for a shift.
Source: Boston.com
Las más grandes corporaciones de EEUU contribuyen al plan de gobierno de Trump
Donald Trump ha dejado en claro que pretende gobernar exactamente como prometió durante su campaña: poniendo en...
Donald Trump ha dejado en claro que pretende gobernar exactamente como prometió durante su campaña: poniendo en práctica una serie de nocivas medidas de política concebidas para perjudicar a los inmigrantes, trabajadores y sus familias.
Sin embargo, el gobierno no puede implementar por sí solo este plan de odio. Por ejemplo, respecto a inmigración, necesitará la ayuda de corporaciones para operar prisiones privadas y centros de detención de inmigrantes que puedan dar cabida al gran número de inmigrantes que ya se está deteniendo para deportación; firmas de Wall Street que proporcionen fondos para ellas; compañías de software que ganan miles de millones en contratos con las agencias del gobierno que deportan a inmigrantes y militarizan la frontera, y constructoras que edifiquen el muro fronterizo.
Lea el artículo completo aquí.
Yellen Meets Activists on Economy
McClatchy Washington Bureau - November 14, 2014 - Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen met Friday with leaders of groups...
McClatchy Washington Bureau - November 14, 2014 - Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen met Friday with leaders of groups that want a voice in the selection of future presidents at the Fed’s 12 district banks.
“The focus was making sure that working families’ voices were heard,” Connie Paredes of Dallas, who represented the Texas Organizing Project, told McClatchy after meeting more than an hour with Yellen.
Paredes was one of 30 activists from the Center for Popular Democracy, a nationwide network of liberal and faith-based organizations who want more Fed attention on returning the nation to full employment, and for a more public process of selecting Fed presidents.
Unlike most central banks, the Fed has a dual mission. It must guarantee price stability, and it does that with the goal of keeping inflation in a range between 1 percent and 2 percent. But it also has the mission of promoting full employment, and that’s the string activists pulled on Friday.
“The Federal Reserve should publicly commit to building an economy with genuine full employment … promising to keep interest rates low until the economy has reached full speed and is producing millions of new jobs and higher wages for workers across the economic spectrum,” said The National Campaign for a Strong Economy, another group that met with Yellen and issued a statement afterwards.
A pressing concern for the activists was creating a mechanism by which ordinary people can have some input in the selection of presidents at the Fed’s 12 district banks. The presidents of the Philadelphia and Dallas district banks, Charles Plosser and Richard Fisher, have announced their retirement next year.
Traditionally, Fed presidents are appointed by the board of directors of each of the 12 banks, with the approval of Fed governors in Washington. The terms are for five years, and they can be reappointed. Critics of the Fed argue that Wall Street and Corporate America get unusual sway because they make up the boards of directors at the Fed banks, and there hasn’t historically been input from the public.
“We need a (Dallas) Fed president that is very aware of the community that he or she represents. Not just the corporate banking community but the entire community,” said Paredes, who applauded Philadelphia’s creation of a feedback process but still wanted more public participation in the Fed’s selection process.
The Fed had no immediate comment on Friday’s meetings.
Source
Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/11/14/246944_yellen-meets-activists-on-e...A Budget for the City of Immigrants
In recent years, New York City has taken major strides forward in its engagement with immigrant communities. Under the...
In recent years, New York City has taken major strides forward in its engagement with immigrant communities. Under the leadership of Mayor Bill de Blasio, City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, and the Council as a whole, our city has adopted and invested in new initiatives to welcome and protect immigrants and embrace their tremendous economic, cultural, and political contributions.
Now, with the 2017 budget process in final negotiations, our leaders have a key opportunity to further address the barriers to opportunity and equity that immigrant communities continue to face. That’s why today, five leading immigrant organizations are releasing a new report, “A Budget for the City of Immigrants,” which identifies key policy areas in which immigrant communities need further investment.
Despite path-breaking initiatives like IDNYC (the municipal identification card program), ActionNYC (one of the nation’s first large-scale municipal navigation and outreach programs to connect people to free immigration legal screenings), and the New York Immigrant Family Unity Project (the nation’s first program to guarantee counsel to low-income immigrants facing deportation), immigrants still face enormous challenges in accessing public services, getting the support to succeed in the workforce, and being informed of their rights.
The new report highlights key priorities across various issue areas, ranging from adult education to youth programs to health care access, but a few priorities bear particular mention.
First, our City must expand its investment in adult literacy to a baselined $16 million per year.
Adult newcomers who have come here to work and support their families often struggle with limited English proficiency (LEP). Despite enormous demand for adult literacy classes, supply has lagged—less than three percent of those in need can access community-based adult education programs. A recent Make the Road New York and Center for Popular Democracy report, “Teaching Toward Equity: The Importance of English Classes to Reducing Economic Inequality in New York,” highlights how meeting the language needs of LEP New Yorkers would both further immigrant integration and generate billions of dollars in new earnings. New York City can lead again by making sure that adult immigrants can learn English and develop the tools they need to thrive.
Second, our city must direct $13.5 million for immigration legal services for complex cases.
Currently, New York City provides few resources for complex immigration legal cases where an individual is facing imminent deportation yet cannot be served under most existing funding streams. This leaves thousands of immigrants on waiting lists. A survey by the New York Immigration Coalition of the city's legal services providers noted that 60% of immigrants seeking their services had complex cases that need intensive representation. Further resources must focus on these complex immigration cases—especially for families who are on the verge of being torn apart without adequate legal representation.
Third, our city must expand its investment in Access Health NYC to $5 million.
This new City Council initiative has shown tremendous promise by working with community organizations like the Coalition for Asian American Children and Families to educate immigrants about health care options and enroll them for coverage, wherever possible. Health care access is another area where our city has shown leadership, and it should expand its commitment in this budget year.
Fourth, our city must move forward with the investment of $868 million in capital funding for the construction of new classrooms and schools to combat overcrowding and pursue additional means to meet the more than 100,000 school seats needed citywide.
The 2017 budget must include strong investment to address this widespread problem, while our leaders explore further action in future years to fix it once and for all.
Finally, New York City must take further steps to strengthen the landscape of grassroots, immigrant-led nonprofit organizations that are the backbone of our communities yet often struggle, as the Asian American Federation and the Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies have noted, to operate on a level playing field with larger organizations.
By increasing the Nonprofit Stabilization Fund to $5 million and amending municipal contracting policies to open new opportunities for these smaller organizations, the city can go a long way to strengthening immigrant communities as well.
The priorities outlined in A Budget for the City of Immigrants, of which these are just a few, show concrete opportunities to consolidate the progress our city has made with respect to immigrant communities and ensure that we continue to move forward. With immigrant communities at the heart of our global city, we must use this budget cycle to continue to lead the way in welcoming and protecting immigrants.
What is good for immigrant communities is good for New York City, the city of immigrants.
***
By Javier H. Valdés is the Co-Executive Director of Make the Road New York. Steve Choi is the Executive Director of the New York Immigration Coalition.
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FEMA acknowledges poor preparation for 2017 hurricane season that devastated Puerto Rico
FEMA acknowledges poor preparation for 2017 hurricane season that devastated Puerto Rico
Julio López Varona, an organizer at the Center for Popular Democracy, told ThinkProgress on Friday morning via email...
Julio López Varona, an organizer at the Center for Popular Democracy, told ThinkProgress on Friday morning via email that FEMA’s acknowledgement of the “inadequacy of their response” was a “welcome change” but that for Puerto Ricans, the admission may be cold comfort.
2 months ago
2 months ago