By CAP Action War Room

These And Ten Other Giant Companies Make The Business Case For Addressing Climate Change

We are getting excited about next week’s expected release of the Clean Power Plan from the Obama administration. And it looks like we are not the only ones. Yesterday, thirteen of the world’s biggest and most powerful companies committed $140 billion in low-carbon investments and joined the Administration’s “Act on Climate” initiative.

This pledge, ahead of next week’s announcement and the United Nations climate talks in Paris at the end of the year, shows that tackling climate change is not just a moral and public health issue, it’s also an economic issue. The companies committed to a range of actions to help curb their contribution to climate change: Apple will build 140 MW of renewable energy; Bank of America will increase green investment from $50 billion to $125 billion; Google will continue on its path to 100 percent renewable energy; Berkshire Hathaway Energy, of Warren Buffett’s investment conglomerate, will close 75 percent of its coal-fired power plants in Nevada by 2019.

The full list of companies is as follows: Alcoa, Apple, Bank of America, Berkshire Hathaway Energy, Cargill, Coca-Cola, General Motors, Goldman Sachs, Google, Microsoft, PepsiCo, UPS, and Walmart. Click here to read more about the announcement.

The companies’ announcement also further marginalizes conservative opponents who continue to deny man-made climate change, claim they are “not scientists,” and refuse to take action to combat the warming of the climate. Since many of these self-proclaimed pro-business politicians have not yet taken to the overwhelming evidence already presented proving that climate change is real, maybe the folks running some of the world’s most successful businesses can help change their minds. But we aren’t holding our breath.

BOTTOM LINE: Over a dozen multi-national corporations announced their commitment to address climate change yesterday. The public pledge comes at an important time in the efforts to stop man-made climate change: it is just days before the Obama administration issues its final version of the Clean Power Plan to limit the levels of carbon emissions in states. And the announcement is just another piece of evidence to demonstrate that conservatives are being disingenuous by ignoring the climate reality – and are being dangerous by failing to act.

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By CAP Action War Room

The Gap Between Rhetoric and Reality of Republican Prescriptions for the Economy

In recent decades, dramatic changes have squeezed the middle class, making it harder and harder for middle-class families to feel economically secure. In response to these changes, GOP candidates have shifted their rhetoric and begun decrying stagnant wages, inequality, and rising middle class costs. For example, in his campaign launch speech Jeb Bush said we need to “make opportunity common again.” Meanwhile, Sen. Marco Rubio introduced his tax plan in an op-ed with Sen. Mike Lee saying, “Too many Americans believe the American dream is slipping away.”

But a new report from CAP Action finds that despite its new rhetorical shift, the GOP continues to propose policies that would undercut economic security for working- and middle-class families. Even as Republican candidates talk about restoring the American dream and expanding opportunity to all Americans, they continue to embrace the same, failed policies that have led to middle class Americans being squeezed by rising costs and stagnant wages.

Here are a few of the key facts on how the middle class is at risk and how Republican policies would only make things worse:

• Republicans continue to support tax policies that favor the wealthy but do little for middle class families. Many of the GOP candidates favor eliminating capital gains taxes, which would do nothing for middle-class Americans. Middle-class families receive very little income from capital gains and dividends: Only 6 percent of market incomes for households in the middle quintile come from business income, capital income, and realized capital gains. The top 1 percent of households, on the other hand, receive more than half of their incomes from these sources. Eliminating capital gains taxes is nothing more than a massive tax cut for the wealthiest few.

• Republican governors are blocking bills that help families juggle the demands of work and home.Of the 12 states with laws preempting localities from taking actions like increasing the minimum wage or offering paid sick leave, 11 were passed by a GOP governor and legislature since 2011. In particular, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker signed a preemption bill that nullified Milwaukee’s paid-sick leave law which would have helped 120,000 Milwaukeeans–or 47 percent of the city’s private sector workforce.

• Despite the rhetoric, GOP economic policies favor the wealthy. In 2014, 41 Republican senators with an average net worth of $8.1 million, including several eventual presidential candidates, voted against giving low-income Americans a $6,000 raise.

• Instead of investing in working Americans, Republicans have been slashing key pillars of opportunity, such as education. More higher education cuts have occurred under Republican leadership than under Democrats. Between 2007 and 2014, real state funding for public education grew under Democrats and fell 10 percent in states led by Republicans. This also led to higher tuition increases.

• Republicans still oppose a minimum wage. If a Republican president spent two terms in office continuing to block a minimum wage increase, like each of their positions today, the value of the minimum wage would fall below $6 in today’s dollars, lowest in 70 years.

BOTTOM LINE: Decades of failed, trickle-down economic policies have left middle-class Americans struggling. Disguising old, top-down policies with new rhetoric is as disingenuous as it is dangerous.