CPD IN THE NEWS

Bloomberg Businessweek - November 13, 2014, by Josh Eidelson - In the midterm elections, four red states—Alaska, Arkansas, Nebraska, and South Dakota—passed minimum wage increases. Those votes mean that, starting next year, a majority of states will have minimum wages higher than the federal rate. The last time that happened, in 2007, Democrats newly in control of Congress used their power to pass the first national increase in a decade, from $5.15 to $7.25 an hour. It’s extremely unlikely the Republicans who took back the Senate in the midterm elections will do the same. “Waiting for Congress to act is frustrating and, at this point, pointless,” says Ed Flanagan, a former Alaska labor commissioner who spent a year campaigning for his state’s new increase, from $7.75 to $9.75.

Already, labor organizers in Oregon are considering a ballot initiative for 2016 that would raise the state minimum to $15 an hour, matching the leap taken this year by Seattle and San Francisco. In Los Angeles, where Mayor Eric Garcetti signed an ordinance mandating a $15.37 wage floor for some hotel workers in October, 6 of the 15 members of the city council have asked for a vote in early 2015 on a proposal to increase the city’s rate to $15.25 across the board by 2019.

Voters in most states shouldn’t expect to see pushes for higher rates than that anytime soon. Labor activists say they want to end the exclusion of tipped workers such as restaurant wait staff from minimum wage laws and add worker protections, like requiring employers to give workers advance notice of schedule changes or offer paid sick days. That approach worked this year in Oakland, where voters approved a referendum on Nov. 4 that lifts wages only to $12.25 but requires employers to offer paid leave above what the state requires. “When you combine them together, it’s actually more popular,” says Brian Kettenring, co-executive director of the Center for Popular Democracy, a union-backed community organizing group. “People appreciate that you are trying to actually solve the problem.”

Not all the coming fights will be put directly to voters. In California, Democratic Governor Jerry Brown signed a compromise bill last year increasing the statewide minimum from $8 to $10 by 2016. Some Democratic state lawmakers say that’s not enough to help workers make ends meet. “It will still allow the legal payment of a poverty wage,” says Mark Leno, the state senator who sponsored a bill that would have increased minimum pay to $13 by 2017 and then indexed future wage levels to inflation. That passed the state senate in May but failed by a single vote in an assembly committee. Leno plans to revive the issue in the next legislative session.

In some cities, Democrats are pitting themselves against the Republicans who control their state governments. Louisville has held hearings about raising wages to $10.10 after a statewide increase died in the Republican-controlled state senate. City officials in other states are hamstrung by laws prohibiting municipal governments from raising minimum wages above state levels. In June, business-friendly Democrats in Rhode Island’s statehouse killed efforts by the Providence city council to raise hotel pay to $15 an hour with a budget rider barring cities from setting their own minimum wages. In New York, where state law denies cities authority over pay rates, Governor Andrew Cuomo agreed to support changing that statute, along with a statewide increase to $10.10, to win the endorsement of the progressive Working Families Party in the November gubernatorial election. “He made a promise on this,” says Bill Lipton, the party’s New York director. “We expect him to fulfill it.”

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The Charlotte Post - March 6, 2015, by Herbert White - America’s economy may be in recovery, but Simone McCray can’t see it.

McCray works at a Charlotte warehouse where she earns $8.10 an hour and lives with family to stretch her budget. A 2010 UNC Charlotte graduate with a degree in psychology, she has yet to land a job in that field.

“You don’t think you’re going to make $8.10 when you go to college,” she said. “That is not what they tell you.”More Americans are working than before the Great Recession of 2008, but African Americans are lagging. Figures released by the U.S. Department of Labor Friday showed the national unemployment rate fell to 5.5 percent in February, an improvement over the previous month.“With another strong employment report, we have now seen 12 straight months of private-sector job gains above 200,000 -- the first time that has happened since 1977,” said Jason Furman, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers. “Moreover, 2014 was the best year for job growth since the late 1990s and 2015 has continued at this pace. But additional steps are needed to continue strengthening wages for the middle class.”But for African Americans, the jobless rate is double that of whites and the wage gap between the ethnic groups is getting wider.The Federal Reserve, which sets national policy on interest rates, is debating whether to boost the rate as a hedge against inflation. Progressive activists, however, are pushing the Fed to hold the line, arguing low rates will spur a jobs rebound, especially for low-income Americans.“Don’t put any brakes on the economic recovery,” said Pat McCoy, director of Action NC, which held a press conference Thursday to press the Fed. “Not only has it not yet been a full recovery, but in community of color, particularly in the African American community, unemployment rates, underemployment rates remain extremely high.”A study authored by the Center For Popular Democracy found that women and people of color are more likely to struggle to find work that pays a living wage. African Americans are especially hard hit with unemployment rates double the nation as a whole and plummeting wages.“Creating a strong American economy must include prioritizing a genuine recovery for the African American community,” the report summarizes.McCray wants to get in on the recovery. Saddled with debt from student loans, she’s looking for work that will allow her to meet financial obligations. Until then, she’s struggling to make ends meet.“My student loans are going to start going back into repayment and you have to have a way to repay them,” she said. “With jobs that are just above minimum wage, it’s kind of hard to stay afloat and pay your student loans, so you have to stay with family longer and not be out on your own and be independent sooner.”The Fed can help, activists insist, by resisting calls to raise interest rates. Corporate America and conservatives are pushing for an increase to prevent inflation, which is the simultaneous increase in consumer prices and devaluation of currency.“We need to continue to stimulate the economy through low-interest rates in order to serve these communities that need recovery,” McCoy said.As the Fed wrestle with the pros and cons of raising rates, Americans struggling to find work with a living wage are yet to be part of the nation’s limited recovery. Without a robust economic program, millions will be left out.“Only by pursuing genuine full employment will the Fed ensure that the recovery reaches Main Street and Martin Luther King Boulevard – and communities of working people throughout the country,” the CPD report’s authors wrote. “As the Fed makes crucial monetary policy decisions in the months and years to come, it must ensure that all communities can share in the prosperity of a functional economy.”

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Times Union - September 3, 2014, by Casey Seiler - SUNY's Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government has released a second draft of its controversial report on New York's Scaffold Law. According to the Institute's Deputy Director for Operations Robert Bullock, it's the only remaining version of the report that was shared with the report's funder, the state Lawsuit Reform Alliance.

The business-backed group, which opposes Scaffold Law, paid $82,800 to fund the report — sponsorship that has led critics to attack the study as advocacy in the guise of research. Its authors, however, insist the research was conducted in good faith.

Scaffold Law, which places "absolute liability" on employers for gravity-related workplace injuries, is supported by labor unions but opposed by business groups that claim it needlessly drives up construction costs — a thesis backed up in part by the report. Opponents would like to see New York follow other states by adopting a "comparative negligence" standard that would make workers proportionately responsible when their actions contribute to an accident.

The Center for Popular Democracy, a labor-backed group that supports Scaffold Law, lambasted the report upon its release last winter and requested copies of all communications between the institute and the Lawsuit Reform Alliance. That FOIL request produced a series of emails between researchers and LRA Executive Director Tom Stebbins, including Stebbins' suggested edits to a June 25, 2013, draft copy of the report that was not initially released by the institute.

The center appealed to SUNY, which ultimately released the June 25 draft. A comparison of the draft and the final report suggested that some of Stebbins' suggestions were reflected in the final version. Researchers, however, said any changes were the result of their efforts to sharpen their analysis, and not made due to pressure from the funder.

The newly released draft, dated Aug. 7, 2013, closely resembles the final report.

The center's Josie Duffy claims the six-week gap between the first and second drafts suggests that the institute moved quickly to follow the alliance's edits.

"SUNY says it has now disclosed everything it has, but given that LRANY and the authors held weekly conference calls to discuss the report's progress, we may never know the full extent of their influence over the final version," she said.

In an email, Bullock said the institute "has been open and honest about its contacts with funders and its research has been and will continue to be immune from influence."

"It is unfortunate," he added, "that a research organization known throughout the nation for the quality and character of its work should have to defend itself from accusations leveled by the Center for Popular Democracy, an organization well known for its partisanship."

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We’re in the thick of the second post-Citizens United presidential campaign, and it’s already clear that allowing unlimited funds to influence political elections was a terrible idea. 

Half of the funds supporting presidential candidates from both parties comes from a mere 158 families — a miniscule percentage of America’s 120 million households — as documented by a recent New York Times investigation. Largely white, older, male, and Republican, they are also unrepresentative of what our multicultural society looks like.

As a result of this narrow group of donors controlling what’s on the political agenda, America has a fundamentally undemocratic system in which working class people and people of color are left on the margins, silenced in a political debate, they can’t gain access to — because they don’t have millions to share.

America has become a tyranny of the few, and Americans are fed up with the broken system. Last week, voters in Maine elected to increase funding from $2 million to $3 million for the Clean Elections Fund, which provides government grants to candidates who agree to limit their spending and private fundraising. It might be a long time before Citizens United is overturned. In the interim, it’s important that other states introduce similar legislation challenging existing financing models.

The tyranny of the few is two-pronged, however. Not only are our elected leaders being held accountable to wealthy donors instead of the people of our nation, the least privileged of this nation are simultaneously facing strong barriers to voting. 

Our antiquated voter registration system results in roughly 62 million eligible voters not registered, either because they never registered or their registration information is incorrect. In a 2008 Current Population Survey, blacks and Latinos cited “difficulties with the registration process” as their main reason for not registering to vote. Whites disproportionately reported not registering because they were “not interested in elections or politics.” Barriers to voting registration are in many states especially well in place for people of color, workers and youth, who are targeted by voter suppression laws.

We could put an end to the error-ridden old-fashioned manual voter registration and step into the 21st century with automatic voter registration. Other states could follow the example set by California and Oregon, which are linking voter registration to the Department of Motor Vehicles. Through linking voter registration with public offices such as the DMV, revenue agencies, the Postal Service and others, the United States could secure over 56 million more voters, as a report from Center for Popular Democracy shows. 

So to sum up: people of color and working class Americans aren’t just unable to place millions of dollars with politicians who will take care of them in Congress, they aren’t even able to vote for leaders who might serve their interests.

The outcome? Our America has become an oligarchy run by a tiny and overly privileged section of its population, whose lives and wishes for our nation are in stark opposition to the lives and dreams of the average American. 

This is borne out in our legislation. Despite overwhelming public support for policies such as taxing those who earn more than $1 million a year, and laws that address inequality, workers’ rights, and protection of the middle class, we see the footprints of corporate powers all over our legislation. 

We need to act fast by passing laws that disrupt this undemocratic cycle. We must break Congress’ dependency on big money and return the power to the people, but we can’t only rely on our lawmakers to change our nation. 

It will take a lot of work, but we can’t allow for this undemocratic oligarchy to go on. Let’s not leave the future of our country in the hands of the wealthiest, let’s instead bring back democracy to our nation.

Source: Common Dreams