HF2399: Iowa's Stifling of Innovation by Paul Deaton
"These
assertions and arguments are bought and sold by MidAmerican Energy and
the electric utilities, reflecting their power to persuade." The nuclear power study bill, HF2399, sped through the Iowa legislature at breakneck speed, passing the Iowa House on March 2 with a vote of 91-7 and passing the Iowa Senate on March 9 with a vote of 37-13. It is “an act requiring (among other things) certain rate regulated public utilities to undertake analyses of and preparation for the possible construction of low carbon emitting nuclear generating facilities in this state.” There were no amendments to the house bill in the senate, so the measure will be heading to the Governor Culver’s desk soon. While Culver has an option to veto the bill, MidAmerican Energy wrote the bill language and was a financial supporter of the Culver-Judge campaign, so he is expected to sign HF2399 into law. The majority rules and powerful interests persuade in politics. I am okay with that because in the end, what choice do we have?
What is disappointing is not that the bill passed or that the legislature sees nuclear power as a viable part of Iowa’s energy future. Where the legislators fell short is in their vision about Iowa’s future. This bill is not only about electricity generation.
Senator Behn of Boone County typified the vapidity of the bill’s supporters. Behn said, “Iowa needs coal. Iowa needs nuclear. HF2399 is one of the best bills we will run this session.” Senator Hartsuch of Scott County asserted that the proposed Yucca Mountain, Nevada site would be a "workable solution" for nuclear waste disposal. Senator Feenstra of Sioux County said that “we shouldn’t bury our head in the sand, we need baseload energy,” asserting that Iowa should work with President Obama, increasing the baseload of electricity generated from nuclear power. These assertions and arguments are bought and sold by MidAmerican Energy and the electric utilities, reflecting their power to persuade. Proponents of the bill had the votes, and were not listening to the arguments of progressives like Senators Bolkcom and Hogg when they argued for a different and better view of Iowa’s future. The majority damned Senator Hogg’s amendments with faint praise.
It is easy to understand why young Iowans are leaving the state in droves. We can see the lack of innovation when our elected officials support a de facto tax to fund a study that offers no long term solutions to Iowa’s problems. We can see the lack of creativity when a majority of legislators fund a study that will create few jobs in Iowa and walk away from the potential of creating new jobs related to meeting the demand for electricity. The majority that supported HF2399 is divided along ideological lines, not party lines.
Why would young people stake their future on a state where the prevailing attitude is one of stifling what is best about being young? The failure of this legislature to foster innovation and creativity in addressing Iowa’s challenges is one more reason for people to seek better opportunities elsewhere. It is one more example of the harshness of living in the post-Reagan era.
~Paul
Deaton is a native Iowan living in rural Johnson County and weekend
editor of Blog for Iowa. He is also a member of Iowa Physicians for
Social Responsibility and Veterans for Peace.E-mail Paul Deaton
**BFIA ACTION ALERT**
Call and ask Governor Culver to stop the legislature from stifling creativity and innovation in Iowa by vetoing HF 2399. His phone # is 515-281-5211.
Is Iowa A Corporate Welfare State? by
Tracy Kurowski
"...the
State of Iowa ’s Economic Development Board celebrated their plan to
extend $6.5 million in forgivable loans so Whirlpool could expand its
Amana, Iowa plant, creating sixty jobs.
Link By my math, that’s $108,000 per
job that tax payers in Iowa will give to Whirlpool, a company whose 4th
quarter 2009 net income rose to $95 million from $44 million a year
earlier."
Link
On Friday, thousands of people demonstrated Evansville, Indiana, against Whirlpool’s announcement that it would close its refrigeration plant there, moving the jobs to Mexico. The first jobs are slated to be cut beginning March 26th, and when the plant is finally shuttered more than 1100 people will lose their jobs in this Southern Indiana town. As the ramifications of the closure begin to take their toll on the local economy, still hundreds more people will lose their jobs as a consequence.
The language companies like Whirlpool use to justify the havoc they wreak on a community is dry, corporate, without victim. Whirlpool is only doing this so they may “consolidate production within our existing North American manufacturing facilities.” The jobs were called “excess capacity.“
As a courtesy, they announced the closure last August as part of a “smooth” transition.
Workers were warned prior to the protest last Friday, that participating in it could, “hamper employees when they look for future jobs," according to Paul Coburn, Director of Operations at the Evansville Plant. The feigned concern is disturbing, not only because, quite obviously, the workers wouldn’t have to worry about seeking employment if managers like Paul Coburn had genuine concern, and sought out ways to keep the plant open. But it is problematic because it further places workers and governments in positions where they have to beg, plead and bribe corporations for jobs. Saying, “We fear that potential employers will view the actions of a few, and determine whether they would want to hire any of (the) Evansville division employees in the future,” Coburn puts a stain on their resumes for one day of practicing their first amendment rights against a ten, fifteen or twenty year career and loyalty to the company.
Just two states west of Indiana, the State of Iowa ’s Economic Development Board celebrated their plan to extend $6.5 million in forgivable loans so Whirlpool could expand its Amana, Iowa plant, creating sixty jobs. Link By my math, that’s $108,000 per job that tax payers in Iowa will give to Whirlpool, a company whose 4th quarter 2009 net income rose to $95 million from $44 million a year earlier. Link
Those profits, however, are made by cutting jobs at plants like the one in Evansville, Indiana. CNN reports, again in language that erases people and communities, that these profits are driven by “aggressive cost reductions…to bolster profits in the past four quarters.”
So, hoping to truly convince Whirlpool that it is profitable to expand in Amana , Iowa County will provide an additional $1.5 million grant for the project. We’re now up to $133,000 per job.
Now I’m not opposed to using public funds to help create or save jobs, but shouldn’t there be some sort of ethical measure for doing so? Should Iowa use its public money to woo a transnational corporation that is abandoning its responsibility to a community just two states east? What is the calculus used, measure for measure, when a company deserves even a penny of taxpayer dollars?
In the case of Whirlpool, according to its own spokespeople, it isn’t because they lack liquid capital or because they are broke. Dan Smith, VP of Whirlpool’s Amana division, admitted Whirlpool would have made the investments in Amana “regardless of whether it received the state and county money.” But he insinuated that closure in Amana in the future was not out of the picture. He said that the grant “gives the Amana division a chance to accelerate improvement and stay competitive against facilities in lower-cost countries.” Link
Shouldn’t Whirlpool’s pattern of abandoning its jobs in the Midwest be of some concern when public dollars are being spent? Is there anything in the language of the grants or forgivable loans that puts some guarantee of jobs in Iowa for the long run?
Shortly after Whirlpool bought the Maytag Corporation in 2006, it closed its Newton , Iowa facility causing 1800 jobs to be lost. Isn’t there anyone asking at what point does the public get to make demands on companies like Whirlpool for the public investment we make?
Certainly, Whirlpool has no shame in asking for public subsidies, even though they arrogantly claim they don’t need them. The company is also seeking a $500,000 grant from the Iowa Office of Energy Independence for the Amana project.
That makes $141,000 per job, for now.
Tracy
Kurowski has been active in the labor movement
for ten years, first as a member of AFSCME 3506, when she taught adult
education classes at the City Colleges of Chicago. She moved to the
Quad Cities in 2007 where she worked as political coordinator with the
Quad City Federation of Labor, and as a caseworker for Congressman
Bruce Braley from 2007 - 2009.
Tracy Kurowski writes a labor update every
Monday on Blog for Iowa
"Residents
understood the influence of prevailing wind, geography and the impact
of the many industrial plants in the area... People seemed resigned to the fact that a life with
middle class problems will go on."
Within the plume of emissions from Grain Processing Corporation and thirteen other Muscatine County point source emitters permitted by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, a group of us met with more than eighty residents yesterday at the Garfield Elementary School Gymnasium to discuss air quality.
HD-80 Representative Nathan Reichert organized the meeting and sent invitations to area residents. The panel consisted of Representative Reichert, Dr. Maureen McCue and myself from Iowa Physicians for Social Responsibility, Patrick O’Shaughnessy from the Department of Environmental and Occupational Health of the University of Iowa, Leland Searles from the Iowa Environmental Council and Jim McGraw of the Iowa Department of Natural Resources Air Quality Bureau. The meeting went from 1:00 PM until 4:30 PM and the audience remained engaged throughout. The corporate media was less engaged, with one local television station covering the meeting. He left after 45 minutes and was apparently not there to cover most of the information presented by the panelists.
My participation was brief, framing the discussion after Representative Reichert made introductions and answering a couple of questions at the end. The residents seemed to understand that the air quality in Muscatine is and has been bad for a number of years. There were no real answers to the question “what can we do about it?”
There were other issues on people’s minds. Residents were concerned that the Garfield Elementary School, where the air quality monitor is situated, would be closed and consolidated by the school board. I was asked whether specific community health problems had been caused by emissions from the GPC plant that locked workers out back in 2008 in a contract dispute. Some residents left during the course of the meeting, and at the end about 35 remained to socialize with the panelists and each other before returning home. Residents understood the influence of prevailing wind, geography and the impact of the many industrial plants in the area. They understood that continuing to live in Muscatine may present health problems because of the air quality. People seemed resigned to the fact that a life with middle class problems will go on.
The area surrounding the school includes industry, railroad tracks servicing industry and small houses with about 1,000 square feet of living space. It is a working class neighborhood that seems to be drifting into poverty, where residents have few options to get out. Representative Reichert encouraged them to organize as a community and hopefully they will. Banding together to deal with poor air quality may be their best hope in a world that easily could forget them after the panelists and the PowerPoint presentations are gone.
Part Three of a series on labor and immigration in Iowa
"I remember looking at the driver’s license photo, looking at the
person and saying to him that the picture on the license looked
nothing like him. The applicant opened his briefcase and laid out half a
dozen different photos and said 'if you don’t like that one, which one do you
like.'"
The front edge of the
struggle for an employer to comply with the United States Citizenship and
Immigration Service rules is where I worked for many years. We had started an
owner operator division for our trucking company and we leased trucks and
drivers from owners to supplement our company employee driver fleet. During
this time, I met people of all backgrounds, and what I noticed was that many
applicants who were immigrants were much better capitalized than most of the
U.S. Citizens we interviewed. We often favored immigrant owner operators
because of their reputation for excellent service and fewer issues during the
conduct of our operations. They wanted to do their work and be left alone, and
for us, that was positive.
Part of our process was to
bring the trucks and drivers to Iowa for orientation. We inspected the trucks,
signed the lease agreement, trained people on our company policy and procedure
and verified their eligibility to work in the United States. During one such
session, I remember looking at the driver’s license photo, looking at the
person and saying to him that the picture on the license looked
nothing like him. The applicant opened his briefcase and laid out half a
dozen different photos and said “if you don’t like that one, which one do you
like.” The implication was that another fake identification card could be easily
obtained and that I would accept it. We sent this fellow and his co-driver back
to California without leasing them on. For us, verification of eligibility to
work in the United States was not some abstract technicality that could be
pencil whipped into compliance. Working with unauthorized immigrants like I did
was just another part of everyday life.
Immigration has already
become an issue in the 2nd Congressional district Republican primary
race. One of the candidates recently laid out his stance on illegal immigration
policy as follows, “No amnesty, our borders need to be
secured, enforce the laws, and throw the employers who hire the illegals in
jail. We have immigration laws for a reason.” While this almost fits on Twitter,
and is full of lightning rod language, it is a throwback to the corporate media
debate on immigration in 2007. It is an example of how some politicians do not
understand the realities of the United States economy or why we should just let
immigrants in. The laws that should be enforced are those like the ones my
company faced regarding verification of immigrant status. If the Rubashkin
family had been held to account on eligibility to work compliance from the
beginning, the word "Postville" would have a much different meaning than it does
today.
According to the Department of
Homeland Security (DHS), there were 31,220,000 foreign born immigrants in
the United States in January 2009. Of these, 20,470,000 people are legally
resident and the remainder is what DHS calls “unauthorized immigrants.”
According to DHS,
the unauthorized immigrant population living in the United States decreased to
10.8 million in January 2009 due to the downturn in the United States economy. Of
all unauthorized immigrants living in the United States in 2009, 63 percent
entered before 2000, and 62 percent were from Mexico. While the corporate media
shows us a constant stream of images of people crossing our border, the truth
is that the majority of unauthorized immigrants have been here for many years.
In being here they make important contributions to the United States economy.
As has been previously reported in Blog for Iowa, unauthorized immigrants
in Iowa pay federal and state taxes estimated between $40 million and $62
million per year. Because of their status, unauthorized immigrants receive
fewer services, being ineligible for Medicaid, Social Security and other social
programs. What this means is that unauthorized immigrants produce a net gain to
the economy by working and paying taxes. This runs contrary to the assertions
of conservative pundits that unauthorized immigrants are a drain on social
services. In fact, they help support it for the rest of us.
In a recently published article in Health
AffairsJim P. Stimpson, et. al.concluded, “that
health care expendituresfor the average immigrant have not been a
growing problem relativeto expenditures among U.S. natives. The one
exception appears to be that non-citizens havea significantly
greater proportion of uncompensated and charitycare than
naturalized citizens or U.S. natives. However, thisfinding likely
reflects non-citizens’ poor access to careand low socioeconomic
status.” In study
after study, the evidence supports the idea that unauthorized immigrants did
not create the drain on health care spending asserted in the corporate media. Ronald
Reagan and George W. Bush understood the benefits of unauthorized immigrants to
the U.S. economy. So does President Obama.
One
of the administration initiatives is to “bring people out of the shadows.”
supporting “a system that allows undocumented immigrants who are in
good standing to pay a fine, learn English, and go to the back of the line for
the opportunity to become citizens.” This policy addresses the issue of long
standing residents who are unauthorized immigrants. We should support this policy,
even if some believe it does not go far enough.
Like with many things, the
solution to dealing with unauthorized immigrants for Iowans is personal. We
must acknowledge that unauthorized immigrants exist in the state and
demonstrate tolerance appropriate to their status as neighbors. We should follow the ideal that seeking the welfare of one is seeking the welfare of all.
Employers should be required to follow the law regarding verification of eligibility to work and government funded social service agencies should continue to comply with eligibility requirements. However; more than anything, we should just
let them in.
Iowans Talk about SJR2001 and the Traditional Family
by Paul Deaton
"This discussion is not
about traditional marriage, it is about the decimation of the middle class
brought on by the policies of President Ronald Reagan."
Last summer, at the lineup for a parade during our town
festival, the local Catholic priest walked up to our state representative and
asked for his position on “protecting the traditional family.” It was a
confusing question, and behind it was the question whether or not the elected
official would support a change in the Iowa constitution to define “marriage”
as “between a man and a woman.” When the representative said he would not
support such a change, the priest said in a loud voice, “Then I will do everything
I can to defeat you in the next election.”
A few minutes later, the priest brought over a member
of the Knights of Columbus to say that he felt he did not have a say in the
Iowa Supreme Court decision to overturn the 1998 law with this definition of
marriage. He explained that enabling the schools to recognize the validity of
what he called “non-traditional marriage” was undue pressure on him as a
working person trying to raise a traditional family.
The irony is that many of the members of the
Knights of Columbus in our town register their party preference as Republican
and it was a Republican president who initiated the social change that puts
pressure on working families of every political party. This discussion is not
about traditional marriage, it is about the decimation of the middle class
brought on by the policies of President Ronald Reagan.
Many of us are familiar with the film Roger and Me,
by the Flint, Michigan native and film maker Michael Moore. The film depicts
the human impact of auto plant closures on Flint natives during the late 1980s.
The closing of Buick City and other automobile manufacturing plants in Flint
was just a small slice of what the Reagan presidency did for working class
people. I experienced Flint, Michigan during the Reagan years first hand.
After the auto plants closed in Flint, I made a trip there to recruit truck drivers
from some of the 25% of the community that was unemployed. While we paid less
than what the auto workers had made, we found many takers for our non-union
jobs.
In that union town, people did not like non-union companies replacing the UAW
jobs. Protesters showed up when any company recruiting non-union workers came
to offer employment. I ran into these protesters more than once. One night the
four tires on my vehicle were slashed while I gave a presentation to a group of
about 25 people. I fixed the tires, went home and came back the next month
because I felt that eventually the bitterness would subside and economic needs
would drive people to take a job with a US company. I was wrong about that. The
way of life for many of the people I met was just plain gone.
We don’t often hear this part of the story of the
Reagan Revolution. It is a story about the internationalization of the auto
industry specifically and corporate America in general. It is a story about
moving production of goods to foreign lands where the cost of raw
materials, labor and government regulation favored making our automobiles,
washers and clothing. It is a story about when Mexico became too expensive, the
jobs moved to China and Southeast Asia, leaving behind a push that brings Mexican
immigrants to the United States to take jobs our citizens don’t want to support
their families. The Reagan years were harsh on families and created the roots
of the world in which we live today.
This week, Iowa SJR 2001, “A Joint Resolution proposing
an amendment to the Constitution of the State of Iowa
specifying marriage between one man and one woman as the only legal union that
is valid or recognized in the state,” failed
to get the support needed to pass in the Iowa legislature. I suspect we have not seen the last of this
debate in our communities.
The sooner we recognize that the debate is not about
the definition of marriage, but about the policies of our government and the
pressure these policies put on the middle class, the sooner we will stop
pointing blame at each other and work together to fix the society that started
breaking, partly as a result of the Ronald Reagan presidency.
If Washington is broken, then this work belongs to each
of us.
A Story of Jobs, Immigration and the Reagan Revolution in Iowa by Paul Deaton
Part One of a series on labor and immigration in Iowa
Because
of the complexity of the labor and immigration relationship, Blog for
Iowa will make regular posts on this issue during the coming
weeks. The relationship between the decline in the number of jobs and immigration is easy to see in Iowa. The state continues to issue permits for workers to come from Mexico to pick melons and strawberries and prune apple trees and grape vines. These jobs have few benefits, but the hourly wage is competitive with factory work in urban centers like Cedar Rapids, Council Bluffs and Sioux City. Many of the same Mexican workers come year after year to places like Conesville and Williamsburg, providing growers with a stable, well trained work force. Most of the money earned is paid through an intermediary, or “job broker” and immigrant workers take most, if not all of their earnings back to Mexico to support their extended families. We will know the Iowa economy is really hurting when someone makes an issue that these well paying, seasonal jobs should be going to Iowans.
Those of us who have worked in the meatpacking industry have witnessed the evolution of workforce in Iowa. I made $4.04 per hour when I worked at Oscar Mayer & Sons in Davenport during my summer break from college in 1971. At those wages, plus overtime, I was able to fund the entire following year of school expenses not paid by my scholarship from Oscar Mayer.
None of my high school friends had difficulty finding factory work that summer if they wanted it, as Davenport was a manufacturing center, and Case, International Harvester, John Deere and many other businesses needed summer help.
My co-workers at Oscar Mayer were people much like my parents: union members and living a reasonable life with their pay and benefits. Even though Iowa is a right to work state, when given the choice at my hiring event, we all joined the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America Local 431.
There were a few Hispanic workers and they were friends and seemed no different from the rest of us, trying to meet our economic needs. In a nation of immigrants, working for a family business, a lot of Oscar Mayer’s workers’ families had immigrated before the 20th century.
We hear a lot these days about the Reagan revolution. During the 1980s, when Ronald Reagan was president, there was a transformation of American business and the meatpacking industry was part of this. This transformation was particularly hard on working families, as companies grew and consolidated their operations.
Meatpacking continued to require a local workforce, but large operators like Iowa Beef Processors were building very large slaughter operations in Western Iowa and in South Dakota. Eventually, slaughter operations for cattle and hogs were consolidated. The plant where I had worked in college later eliminated the kill floor and used swinging (transported by truck on meat hooks) and boxed animal carcasses to make Oscar Mayer products with a reduced workforce. With the Reagan revolution began the exodus of United States jobs to Mexico and overseas, where labor was less expensive and there was less government regulation. This era saw the rise in large, international conglomerates that evaluated costs of production in a global paradigm. What began with the departure of jobs from the United States during the Reagan administration continues today.
In Iowa, the meatpacking industry continued its consolidation throughout the 1980s and eventually large operators had trouble locating an adequate workforce, despite an overall exodus of jobs. The work had not changed, but the pay and benefits had. This gave rise to the immigrant worker issues that are so often associated with the towns Dakota City, Postville, Sioux City, Council Bluffs and Marshalltown. (...to be continued...).
We hope you will read the second post on this timely and
important issue next Sunday.
President Obama Reverses Bush Anti-Labor Policies; Jobs Still Needed by Tracy Kurowski
As I reflect on President Obama’s first year in office, it’s difficult for me to not think about the painful chapter on post-Apartheid South Africa in Naomi Klein’s book analyzing neo-liberal economic policies, The Shock Doctrine.
After Nelson Mandela’s historic victory in abolishing Apartheid, the South African nation and world are in a euphoric state, high on the realization that yes we can prevail over the entrenched racism and colonialism that had been oppressing the aboriginal peoples of the African continent for half a millennia.
However, in the re-building of the South African nation’s socio-economic infrastructure, something went awry. While finally the majority population of black South Africans could now vote and enjoy for the first time many of the rights of citizenry - a policy shift led by Mandela’s election sweep in 1994 and lauded in the press the world over – the economic plan for the country remained in the same hands of the powerful white elite that had ruled the country for decades. And in crushing irony, a decade after Apartheid’s end, by 2005 “economically, South Africa has surpassed Brazil as the most unequal society in the world.” (1)
Yes, I am still thankful for Obama’s historic victory, and yes, I recognize that one cannot undue decades of financial deregulation and labor losses in just one year. I know there is no magic wand to fix the system, that Obama did not cause the financial meltdown. I recall that Obama did sign the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act as his first piece of legislation. He appointed Hilda Solis Doyle as his very labor-friendly Secretary of Labor. And he reversed many of Bush’s anti-labor policies with Executive Orders signed almost immediately after taking office. (5) Yes, there is much to be thankful for.
I also appreciate what must be Obama’s frustration at dealing with a speak – softly Democratic caucus but a carry a big stick Republican caucus in Congress.
Yet I must express my astonishment at comments made by Obama at the December 3rd Jobs Summit which included 130 leaders from both the business community and labor, including AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka.
The AFL-CIO and liberal think tanks like the Economic Policy Institute have suggested that, among other things, what we need to do to provide direct relief to the nation’s millions of unemployed workers is a government jobs program similar to the Works Progress Administration from the 1930’s. That is, if the private sector cannot guarantee jobs, the government must.
This is no foreign concept after all. President Roosevelt’s New Deal of 1935 created 21 million jobs over seven years in the aftermath of the Great Depression. Many of our nation’s roads, bridges, schools, parks and post offices were created by this venture. We did this at a total cost of $160 billion in today’s dollars. (2)
Obama listened to the concerns of Labor and said that while he appreciates the need for federal investment to fight the nation's high unemployment, private business, not government, must lead future job growth. "Ultimately, true economic recovery is only going to come from the private sector." (3)
While I agree that it is the private sector which has historically driven job creation, I find Obama’s use of the word “only” in that statement extremely problematic.
In the course of the past year we have witnessed a government ready, willing and able to do all it can to bail out its banks despite their eponymous failures and bonus blunders. Citibank alone has been guaranteed protection of upwards of $277 billion in losses from its toxic assets. Lots of money to you and me but chump change compared to the $23.7 trillion that Neil Barofsky, the inspector general charged with overseeing TARP, estimates the total cost of Wall Street bailouts to eventually reach. (4)
Obama agreed in theory with point five of the AFL-CIO’s five-point program for job creation, that “we should put some of the billions of dollars in leftover Troubled Asset Relief Program funds to work creating jobs by enabling community banks to lend money to small- and medium-size businesses. If small businesses can get credit, they will create jobs.” (6)
But the administration has been firm in saying it will not spend TARP money – nor for that matter any other funding mechanism – directly on the job-creation, “"Let me be clear, I am open to every demonstrably good idea. And I want to take every responsible step to accelerate job creation. We also though have to face the fact that our resources are limited," Obama said (7)
That Obama suggests our government no longer has the funds to directly create jobs may appease fiscally-conservative critics, but it’s an insult to workers who are already on the hook for a bank bailout that New York University Nouriel Roubini famously characterized as “socializing risk and privatizing gain.” (8)
According to the Economic Policy Institute, to fill in the gap of job loss over the next two years, the private sector would have to create 583,000 new jobs every month over the next two years. (9) This number is far greater than the 127,000 that Obama’s own Department of Labor predicts will be created each month over the next ten years. (10)
My hope is that in Obama’s second year in office, he replaces his Clinton-era Treasury Department officials with a new slate of advisors like the ones he had during his campaign. To better understand what is taking place in Treasury, I suggest reading Matt Tiabbi’s excellent piece on Obama’s Treasury Department “Obama’s Big Sellout.” My favorite quote, the page on which I also hope some young intern leaves open on Obama’s coffee table is this: “Virtually all of the Rubinites brought in to manage the economy under Obama share the same fundamental political philosophy carefully articulated for years by the Hamilton Project: Expand the safety net to protect the poor, but let Wall Street do whatever it wants. ”Bob Rubin, these guys, they're classic limousine liberals," says David Sirota, a former Democratic strategist. "These are basically people who have made shitloads of money in the speculative economy, but they want to call themselves good Democrats because they're willing to give a little more to the poor. That's the model for this Democratic Party: Let the rich do their thing, but give a fraction more to everyone else."
Tracy
Kurowski is currently AFL-CIO Community Services Liaison at the United
Way of the Quad City Area. She has been active in the labor movement
for ten years, first as a member of AFSCME 3506, when she taught adult
education classes at the City Colleges of Chicago. She moved to the
Quad Cities in 2007 where she worked as political coordinator with the
Quad City Federation of Labor, and as a caseworker for Congressman
Bruce Braley from 2007 - 2009.
Tracy Kurowski writes a labor update every Monday on Blog for Iowa
When the Paycheck Stops: A Forum on the Economic Crisis to be Held in the Quad Cities
When the Paycheck Stops: A Community Meeting for the Unemployed, Under-employed and Anxiously-employed
Tues, Dec. 1st, Wed, Dec. 2nd, Thur, Dec. 3rd 5:30-7:30pm each night The Laborer’s Hall 2835 7th Ave, RI, IL
* A meal will be provided each night from 5:30pm-6pm * Speakers will address the economic crisis and potential legislative and community based actions * Health & human service agency representatives will direct people to assistance programs * A resource packet will be available each evening
Due to the large numbers of layoffs and plant shutdowns in the Quad City Area, the Quad City Federation of Labor, Progressive Action for the Common Good, and United Way of the Quad City Area are holding a three-day forum on the economic crisis, When the Paycheck Stops.
Locally, many of the plant shutdowns have resulted in permanent losses of unionized jobs – jobs with benefits like health insurance and pensions. Also, Quad Cities largest employers like Alcoa, John Deere still have hundreds on layoff. For those who have found new jobs, the jobs tend to be part-time positions without benefits like health insurance. For many, replacement jobs are at a lower rate of pay. And yet, despite this reality on Main Street, Wall Street and the banking sector continue to operate unabated.
Legislation to reform the financial sector that caused the economic crisis has yet to be passed, and ten years after the Battle in Seattle – in which tens of thousands of union members, environmentalists and progressive activists fought against the expansion of WTO policies detrimental to labor and the environment – real wages for American workers continue to decline.
For laid-off workers without a union or seniority, the loss of health insurance is another casualty in addition to losing a paycheck. Senate Republicans and a handful of conservative Democrats are blocking passage of meaningful health care reform; meanwhile, Americans continue to suffer at the mercy of health insurance companies. Since we held our rally in support of the public option in front of Senator Grassley’s Davenport office on October 6th, another 5,000 Americans have died for lack of access to health care. This is inexcusable.
Altogether, the Quad Cities labor force shrank by 3,000 jobs since September 2008. Rock Island County ’s unemployment rate is a staggering 9.5 % (up from 5.6% this time last year); Scott County has a rate of 7.3 % (up from 4.4 % last year); and the City of Rock Island has it worst in our area with a 10.8% unemployment rate (up from 6.2% this time last year).
In recognition that for many Americans, the recession is far from over, the Quad City Federation of Labor, Progressive Action for the Common Good, and United Way of the Quad City Area are holding this three-day forum. On December 1, 2, and 3, speakers from health and human service agencies will talk about available assistance from 5:30 – 7:30 each evening. And to get the dialogue started about the larger economic issues, policy speakers will present each night on a different topic.
Tuesday, December 1st will focus on the Home Front: foreclosures, mitigation and rapid re-housing programs, landlord/tenant issues, utility and rent assistance, weatherization programs. Jen Hall DeKock from Citizen Action Illinois will talk about the Consumer Financial Protection Act and legislation curbing the excesses of pay day lenders.
On Wednesday, December 2nd, Money Matters is the topic: Job training and education opportunities, resume building classes, crisis intervention. Ralph Martire from Center for Tax and Budget Accountability will examine the Illinois budget deficit while Iowa Policy Project will have a speaker present on Iowa ’s budget cuts.
Finally, on Thursday December 3rd, Affordable Health Care Options will be discussed: Food vouchers, eating health on a budget, affordable and sliding scale health care options and dealing with unemployment stress. Dr. Alta Price and Karen Metcalf from Progressive Action for the Common Good will give a presentation on the status of the health care legislation passed in the House and pending in the Senate.
Agencies presenting include Salvation Army, Community Health Care, Edgerton Women’s Health Center , Project Now, United Neighbors, Friendly House, Neighborhood Housing, HELP Legal Assistance, Prairie State Legal Aid, Iowa @ Work, Success Network, Angel Food Network, Churches United, and United Way 211.
Dinner will be served each night and a door prize given away at the end of each night. Call Tracy Kurowski for more information 309-738-3196.
Tracy
Kurowski is currently AFL-CIO Community Services Liaison at the United
Way of the Quad City Area. She has been active in the labor movement
for ten years, first as a member of AFSCME 3506, when she taught adult
education classes at the City Colleges of Chicago. She moved to the
Quad Cities in 2007 where she worked as political coordinator with the
Quad City Federation of Labor, and as a caseworker for Congressman
Bruce Braley from 2007 - 2009.
Tracy Kurowski writes a labor update every Monday on Blog for Iowa
*IBLTV is a group of citizens from the Iowa City/Cedar Rapids area who are concerned about the decline in the quality of local television. Fight local media consolidation, as it leads to an unaccountable medium that enriches itself while disregarding the need to serve the public good.
*The rational counter to 'The Point,' 'The Counterpoint' critiques and corrects the daily editorial by Sinclair Broadcasting's corporate vice president, Mark Hyman, that is broadcast on all Sinclair-owned television stations across the country
by Tracy Kurowski
