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Tag Archives: Congress
Help Keep #FixOvertime.org in the News … CAP
The Deadline To Submit Comments Is Tomorrow, Friday, September 4 at 4pm ET
It is crunch time for overtime.
We’ve written a lot about the importance of the Obama administration’s new overtime rule: it will go a long way to making sure that workers get paid for all the hours they work. But it won’t happen on its own. Special interests are trying to weaken the new rule. That’s why the Department of Labor needs to hear your support.
We don’t make many direct calls for action in The Progress Report, so you can rest assured that this one is important. Raising the overtime threshold to $50,440 will benefit millions:
- More money in the pockets of workers leads to a stronger economy. Nearly 5 million workers will have the right to get paid for their extra work under the new overtime rule.
- This rule is absolutely critical for increasing economic security for women and families. 54 percent of the employees newly covered by overtime reform are women. And 44 percent of formerly exempt single mothers will now be covered at the proposed threshold.
- The Latino community would see disproportionately large benefits from the new overtime rule. Latino workers make up 11.6 percent of the salaried workforce but 15.5 percent of workers who would directly benefit from the rule. All in all, more than 2.1 million—or 34.4 percent of all Latino workers—would benefit from the new rule.
- The new overtime rule will more than double the number of millennials who are guaranteed overtime pay. The new overtime rule will directly benefit 4.7 million millennials.
- This is a huge boost for many low- and middle-income workers who need it the most. Pay for black and Latino women could rise by almost $250 per week under new overtime rule:
BOTTOM LINE: This is your last chance. Please go to FixOvertime.Org now to let the Department of Labor know you support the important new rule. Then forward this to your friends and family and ask they do the same!
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The Next Midwestern Assault on Unions
How Illinois And Missouri Are Continuing A Bad Trend For The Middle Class
This week, Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner and the Republicans in the Missouri legislature have both shown that they are anti-middle class. Rauner and the Missouri legislature continue an assault on unions that has been particularly potent in the Midwest, to the detriment of workers across the region.
This Midwestern flavor of anti-unionism really took off back in 2005, when former Indiana Governors Mitch Daniels eliminated collective bargaining rights for public employee unions, which decimated public unions in Indiana. In 2012, Daniels continued his assault on unions by making Indiana a so-called “right-to-work” state, making it illegal for unions to collect dues from non-members, despite the fact that they negotiate employment conditions for all workers, union or otherwise. While conservatives claim that right-to-work creates more jobs, the evidence suggests that this policy costs the average full-time worker, unionized or not, $1,500 a year in lost wages.
A number of Midwest governors took Mitch Daniels’ example and ran with it. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker eliminated collective bargaining for most public employee unions in 2011, while Ohio Governor John Kasich tried, but failed to do the same in 2011 as well. Michigan Governor Rick Snyder mimicked Daniels’ agenda by making Michigan a right-to-work state in 2013. Both Michigan and Wisconsin saw union membership steeply drop as a result.
Now Governor Rauner and the Missouri legislature want to implement these union-bashing policies into their states. Rauner made headlines last year for supporting eliminating the minimum wage as a member of the 0.1 percent. But now, he has exceeded even those anti-worker by signing an executive order that effectively makes Illinois a right-to-work state for public unions.
Meanwhile, emboldened by the 2014 election, Republicans in Missouri are moving a “paycheck protection” bill through the legislature, which would “require some state workers to provide annual written authorization for union dues to be deducted from their paychecks,” according to the Washington Post. In addition to their attempt to slyly undermine unions, the Republican legislature will also attempt to pass a separate right-to-work bill. Instead of working to create a larger middle class, these Midwestern Republicans continue their attacks against unions, which have done so much to improve working conditions and help build the middle class.
BOTTOM LINE: Unions are incredibly important to creating an economy that works for everyone. These Midwestern Republicans have contributed to trends that weaken and shrink unions, even though research shows that unions and are one of the keys to an inclusive prosperity that decreases inequality and builds up the middle class.
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Why The Middle Class Needs Unions
a repost
New Data Shows That Union Membership Continues To Decline
The rate of unionization among wage and salary workers went down in 2014, from 11.3 percent to 11.1 percent, according to annual data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics today. The number of unionized workers, at 14.6 million, was unchanged from 2013.
From the national debate over how to address income inequality, to President Obama talking about “middle class economics” in his State of the Union address, unions are more important than ever. In CAP’s recent report on inclusive prosperity, one of the key recommendations was to expand worker voice by making procedures governing collective bargaining fast and fair and remove the atmosphere of conflict that can surround representation elections and bargaining over initial contracts.
Check out the infographic below to see why the middle class needs unions.
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Weekly Address: Meeting the Global Threat of Climate Change
In this week’s address, the President spoke about his upcoming trip to Alaska, during which he will view the effects of climate change firsthand. Alaskans are already living with the impact of climate change, with glaciers melting faster, and temperatures projected to rise between 6 and 12 degrees by the end of the century.
In his address, the President spoke to ways in which we can address these challenges, including the transition away from fossil fuels to more renewable energy sources like wind and solar, an effort in which America is already leading. And he stressed that while our economy still has to rely on oil and gas during that transition, we should rely more on domestic production than importing from foreign countries who do not have the same environmental or safety standards as the United States.
The President looked forward to his upcoming trip, and promised that while he is in office, America will lead the world to meet the threat of climate change before it’s too late.
Watch the President’s Weekly Address here.
Be a Seed for Change 
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