Obama’s jobs plan is too small, but it’s a vital first step

Union chiefs praise Obama jobs proposal, warn against GOP blockade

Going up: trades build second story above first at VA hospital

GOP leader targets teachers for right to work

State AFL-CIO president steps down

PLA-killer law leads to suspension of CUB agreement

Insulators’ party wraps up 100-year anniversary

NEWS BRIEFS

Obama’s jobs plan is too small, but it’s a vital first step

By Robert Borosage
OurFuture.org

On Sept. 8, President Obama powerfully called on the Congress to end the “political circus” and act on jobs. His agenda featured proposals that have traditionally gained bipartisan support. He indicted the failed conservative notion “that the only thing we can do to restore prosperity is just dismantle government, refund everybody’s money, and let everyone write their own rules, and tell everyone they’re on their own –  that’s not who we are. That’s not the story of America.”

Republican presidential front-runner Texas Gov. Rick Perry immediately scorned the need for action, calling for “smaller government, less spending and a president with the courage to offer more than yet another speech.” Republicans seem intent on championing more job-killing cuts in government, more tax breaks to companies already sitting on a trillion in profits, more deregulation of banks and corporations even as we struggle to get out of the mess caused by Wall Street excess.

The president has drawn the line. If he fulfills his promise to take this agenda across the country, Americans will begin to understand the choice that only they can make.

A modest proposal. The president’s American Jobs Act is bold enough to draw a stark contrast with conservatives. But it is worth noting just how modest it is, how cautious in conception and conservative in substance.

Size matters: The White House cleverly surprised observers with the size of the program – $450 billion over one year, a faster spending rate than the original Recovery Act. But no one should be confused; this is a modest plan, a first step at best. It is too small to have much effect on unemployment, and too limited to help put the economy on track.

More than half of the money follows the wisdom of the Hippocratic Oath: first do no harm. $175 billion goes to extend – and somewhat deepen – the payroll tax cut that would otherwise expire in December. $49 billion extends unemployment insurance. $35 billion is provided to save the jobs of teachers and cops who are targeted for layoffs in the coming year.

These are good things to do, and will reduce the drag that government cuts and austerity would otherwise have on the economy. But they keep things from getting worse, and do little to make them better.

A significant part of the agenda consists of measures designed to appeal to conservatives but that will have little effect. Over $70 billion goes to a range of tax breaks for employers that hire workers – the employer payroll tax reductions, a tax break for hiring veterans, subsidies for hiring the long-term unemployed, etc. The overwhelming bulk of these tax breaks will reward companies for jobs that they would have created without them. Few companies will decide to add new employees in a lousy market because of a one-year tax break.

The jobs plan includes over $100 billion for investment in infrastructure – in repairing schools, rebuilding roads, seeking an infrastructure bank. This will put people to work.

But we will never have a better opportunity to launch a major multi-year initiative to rebuild America, to equip our country with a modern infrastructure for the next century. We can borrow money for virtually nothing. The construction industry is flat on its back, with workers and machines idled. The needs are staggering, as the president suggested. Our decrepit infrastructure is increasingly not just a burden on our competitiveness; it is a danger to health and lives. The president’s plan is likely to be rejected by the Republican Congress as “big spending.” But in fact, it is too small to be a down payment on the initiative that we should be launching.

The White House suggests that the plan may add 1 percent to 2 percent to GDP growth next year – but that’s in contrast with the hit the economy would take if the payroll tax cut and unemployment insurance aren’t extended. In an economy that has stalled, this is but a first step.

Cribbed conception. Obama does better than any political leader in challenging the know-nothing conservatism of our time, and contrasting it with the public investments and public policies that have been essential to America’s prosperity and to building a broad middle class.

But it is striking how cribbed his agenda is. This is a moderate, corporate Democrat struggling to address the economic meltdown. In the face of a right-wing majority in the House and public concern about deficits, the president embraces a conservative framework.

For example, the President returned to his most powerful theme – that we must build a new foundation for growth; we can’t simply recover to the old economy that was built on debt and bubbles – and didn’t work for working people in any case. This requires a serious focus on reviving America’s manufacturing prowess, a new strategy for the global economy, a concerted effort to capture a lead role in the green industrial revolution that will sweep the world.

The president referred to this challenge last night. But his call for passing traditional bilateral trade deals, too small to be anything but symbolic of the old failed corporate trade strategy, reveals his establishment caution.

Keynes is dead; long live Keynes. At the Republican debate, Texas Governor Rick Perry goofily announced that the crisis – caused by a financial wilding and bipartisan conservative disarming of the cops on the beat – proved that “Keynes was dead.” (John Keynes was an economist who advocated the use of fiscal and monetary measures to mitigate the adverse effects of economic recessions and depressions).

The president’s call for action indicts Perry’s belief that you are on your own. But, he too abandons Keynes by announcing that his program will be paid for in fiscal cuts and tax hikes beginning in 2013. As Martin Walker of the Financial Times has written, the financial markets are telling policy makers to borrow and spend – with interest rates near record lows. Yet policymakers, abandoning Keynes, remain fixated on deficits and debt.

Worse, the president went out of his way once more to put Medicare and Medicaid on the table for a grand bargain with Republicans for dramatic deficit reduction over the next decade. He promised to detail this in another presentation, threatening to once more deflate the debate we need over jobs with a return to a debate that is utterly divisive over deficit reduction.

Progressives are demanding action on jobs. An inspired president on the stump is vital to making that case. His agenda is a first step, designed to attract bipartisan support. If Republicans oppose this, they will be turning their backs on working people either out of misguided ideological extremism or for partisan political advantage. The president is right. It is time to act.

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Union chiefs praise Obama jobs proposal, warn against GOP blockade

By Mark Gruenberg
PAI Staff Writer

WASHINGTON (PAI) – Union leaders generally praised Democratic President Barack Obama's proposed $450 billion multi-year jobs creation plan, the American Jobs Act, with several warning congressional Republicans against obstructing it.

But whether the GOP will listen to Obama, or anyone else, is unlikely. Rep. Gerry Connolly, D-Va., and other Democrats praised it. He cited Obama’s proposals to help create jobs, notably helping “to repair our crumbling infrastructure.” A typical GOPer, Radical Right Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., panned it as another “failed stimulus.”

Kline, who chairs the House Education and Workforce Committee, also said the government should get out of the way of business, by dumping regulations.

None of the union leaders cited Obama’s endorsement of collective bargaining, in the middle of his half-hour speech on Sept. 8. And the GOP reaction didn't stop the union leaders from backing Obama – and challenging Republicans to put up or shut up:

AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka:

“The president took an important and necessary step tonight: he started a serious national conversation about how to solve our jobs crisis. He showed working people he is willing to go to the mat to create new jobs on a substantial scale. Tonight’s speech should energize the nation to come together, work hard and get serious about jobs.

“We can no longer delay putting Americans back to work and rebuilding our nation's schools, roads, bridges, transit, ports, rail, communications and energy systems. And we need to help state and local governments avoid layoffs that are dragging down the economy – rejecting the pernicious myth that the only way to address Wall Street's crisis is to punish firefighters, teachers and others who perform critical public services. We call on Congress to act and look forward to working with the president and Congress on all elements of this proposal.”

Trumka expects other job proposals will be offered. Obama said there will be at least one more. The president “understands this economic crisis was not created overnight, and it will not be solved overnight. The middle class has been under attack for decades. He understands we need to rebuild our economy for the 21^st century and rebuild our middle class. Doing this will require a revolution in the way Washington takes on these questions. Republicans are going to have to stop blocking bills that sustain or create millions of jobs and start offering credible solutions. We don't have time to waste on the same old failed policies of deregulation and lower taxes that drove our economy off the cliff in the first place.”

AFL-CIO Building Trades Department President Mark Ayers:

“America's building trades unions are encouraged that after so much recent attention on deficit reduction, President Obama has challenged Congress to address the crisis facing our members, their families and so many Americans by presenting a series of proposals aimed at turning our struggling economy around and putting us back to work.  Nowhere is the jobs crisis being felt more than in the construction industry, where the lack of jobs remains at historical highs and where investments in commercial and industrial construction as well as transportation infrastructure remain at generational lows.

“Estimates by state highway officials conclude that for every $1 billion spent on infrastructure projects, 35,000 to 40,000 construction jobs are created. Equally important are the tremendous multiplier effects in engineering, manufacturing and virtually all aspects of employment, both private and public.  It’s good for workers, it’s good for business and it’s good for the nation. 

“Our members are tired of politics and demand action.  President Obama has put forth a plan that will help restore confidence in our economy in both the near and long term.  We call on Congress to act and look forward to working with the Administration and Congress on all elements of this proposal.  This isn’t the President’s burden to carry alone.   It’s long overdue for Congress to put political motivations aside and answer the call for leadership put forth by their constituents. Short of action by Congress which the American people so desperately seek, we strongly encourage the President to continue to explore and utilize every possible avenue within his Executive authority to create jobs.”

Teamsters President James Hoffa: "Congress must pass President Obama's plan now. The jobs crisis is an American problem. It isn’t President Obama's problem and it isn’t a Republican or Democratic problem. All Americans need to come together to create good jobs for the good of our economy and the good of our country.

“This plan will immediately increase economic activity and generate more tax revenue. That's how you fix the deficit. Good jobs are good for the economy,” Hoffa added, particularly praising Obama's emphasis on infrastructure improvements and extension of jobless benefits.”

Service Employees President Mary Kay Henry also put the responsibility on the Republicans, especially since they control the House. “The American people are watching today to see whether the Republicans will play politics as usual with the president’s proposals simply because of the messenger, not the merits,” she stated. But she was the only union leader to cite the GOP’s alternative, further corporate tax cuts. Those “will do nothing to put America back to work,” Henry said.

AGC chief Sandherr: ‘Investing in infrastructure is the most effective way to create good jobs’

The conservative media is full of pundits who say flat-out that the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act – aka the federal stimulus –  didn’t create a single job. They didn’t talk to Associated General Contractors CEO Stephen Sandherr. His reaction to President Obama’s latest jobs plan:

“As the president made clear last night, too many Americans are out of work or underemployed. Nowhere do we see that problem more severely than within the construction industry. Although construction represents only 4.5 percent of the U.S. workforce, construction workers have accounted for over 20 percent of the jobs lost. Today the industry’s unemployment rate is 13.5 percent – significantly higher than the national average.

“If it weren’t for the stimulus and other public investments in infrastructure projects, however, that unemployment rate would be much worse. Indeed, employment levels in heavy and civil construction – the type of construction funded by the stimulus – have remained stable and even grown slightly since the stimulus first kicked in, while the rest of the industry continued to shed jobs.

“Should Congress fail to enact the desperately needed infrastructure investments the president proposes, too many construction workers will remain unemployed, the private sector will suffer, and taxpayers will end up paying more, later, for infrastructure. Infrastructure projects don’t just create construction jobs. New construction activity boosts demand for steel, concrete, construction equipment and countless other services and supplies.

“Construction projects boost sales at everything from the lunch wagon near the job site to the truck dealership across town. Improved highways and transportation systems also help businesses turn commodities into cash by cutting shipping times and improving their efficiencies. And investing in infrastructure projects saves taxpayers money over the long run, because it costs more to rebuild broken roads and deteriorated structures than to maintain them.

“Investing in infrastructure is the most effective way to create good jobs, deliver great roads, build a strong economy and protect taxpayers. That is why the Associated General Contractors of America stands with the president and everyone else who is willing to make the investments needed to revive our industry and rebuild our economy.”



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Going up: trades build second story above first at VA hospital

By Marty Mulcahy
Managing Editor

IRON MOUNTAIN – More room(s) are in the works for medical patients at the Oscar G. Johnson VA Medical Center.

Gundlach Champion, its subcontractors and the building trades are adding about 14,000 square feet of second-level of space above the existing ground-floor outpatient wing. The existing outpatient wing was built about a decade ago, and can also accommodate a third level, if it’s ever needed.

“Of course, building atop the existing wing is what makes all this a challenge,” said Project Supt. Scott McMyler. “We’re operating next to an operating hospital.” He’s working for Gundlach Champion, which is acting as general contractor/construction manager on the project along with Alfredson Bros.

The new space will contain treatment space for neuro/mental health examination rooms, chemotherapy, and eye exams, among others.

Primarily a facility devoted to health care administration for veterans, the $6 million project, when it’s complete in November, will shift its mission more towards patient care.

Much of the existing space below the second-floor addition was emptied out and relocated in the facility beginning last February to allow the building trades to do their work. At peak employment, about 35 Hardhats were on the job.

“They have been an excellent crew,” McMyler said. “No complaints at all. They’ve been very professional.” The site, he said, is very tight, with patients, visitors and hospital staff using the hospital on a daily basis. He said weekly safety and security meetings with hospital staff and construction foremen are aimed at ironing out any potential problems.

According to the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs, the hospital campus also included a separate building for a garage and heating plant, a four-apartment complex which provided housing for staff, a home for the hospital administrator, and nurses and attendants quarters.

The VA says while the staff apartments and the administrator’s home continue to be used for their original purpose, the attendants and nursing quarters are being used for administrative offices. 

Ground was broken on the original hospital building in 1948 – in a ceremonial event watched by a crowd of nearly 5,000. The building’s price tag was $6.5 million, and at the time it was the largest building project ever undertaken in the Upper Peninsula, with 300 construction workers employed at its peak period.

The buildings initial mission was primarily the delivery of health care, providing more than 250 patient beds. There were 360 employees. The hospital’s service area was designed to include the entire Upper Peninsula of Michigan and 11 counties in northeastern Wisconsin. The first veteran patient was admitted on March 20, 1950.

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GOP leader targets teachers for right to work

Organized labor in Michigan has received its share of body blows this year from state Republicans, who control all levers of power in state government.

Now comes word from Senate Majoritity Leader Randy Richardville (R-Monroe) that he favors a right-to-work law for Michigan teachers. He made the bombshell revelation during a Sept. 9 taping of “Off the Record” with Tim Skubick.

Richardville and Republican Gov. Rick Snyder earlier this year both expressed a lack of interest in pursuing a broader right-to-work law for all of Michigan. Now, it appears that teachers, at least, will be the target for the anti-union legislation – dubbed “right-to-teach” – and that may just be the start.

As reported in Gongwer News Service, Richardville told reporters after taping the show: “There’s probably nobody in the Legislature, especially a Republican, that has stood up for workers’ rights and workers in general over the last decade (more) than me. I’ve come to a point where I’ve seen that I do not believe that the teachers union represents teachers well at all, nor does it represent the students. What they’ve been doing is working hard, twisting arms and putting us in places that we can’t afford to be.”

Gongwer reported that a reporter then told Richardville he had effectively declared war on Michigan’s teachers’ unions. Richardville reportedly only stared back at the reporter and said nothing.

Adopting a right-to-work bill against teachers or any other worker in Michigan is seen by the union movement as a declaration of war against workers’ rights. Right-to-work laws exist in 22 states, mostly in the South and West, and allow workers in collective bargaining groups to opt out of paying dues, but still enjoy the benefits of dues-paying members.  

The effect of RTW laws is that they weaken unions, as well as unions’ ability to organize and stand up for workers’ rights. And workers in right-to-work states earn less, are less likely to have health insurance and have lower job safety standards.

Most of the ruling Republicans are far to the right of Richardville and Snyder, and organized labor in Michigan has been anticipating a nasty fight over an anticipated statewide RTW bill expected to be introduced this fall. But perhaps the Republican strategy will be along the lines of divide and conquering, picking on select groups (public workers were targeted for higher health care costs earlier this year) instead of everyone.

There’s plenty of speculation that Richardville’s new anti-union stance is in retaliation for the numerous recall efforts against Republican lawmakers spawned this year, in part by the Michigan Education Association, over the litany of anti-union bills introduced this year.

MEA President Steven Cook responded this way to Richardville’s volley:

“Sen. Richardville is seriously misguided in his proposal to attack school employees by introducing a bill that would apply so-called “Right to Work FOR LESS” rules to school employees only.

“Republican leaders have slashed school funding, increased taxes, stripped collective bargaining rights from teachers and other school employees, forced them to pay more out of pocket for retirement and health insurance and, in general, completely undermined and demoralized the educators of this state.

“For Sen. Richardville to say that school employees, unlike other unions, have not recognized the state’s tough economic times is ridiculous. Teachers and support staff have been laid off, taken wage and benefit cuts, and seen critical services for students in their districts disappear because of the Republican cut of more than $1 billion from public education.

“MEA members are fed up. That’s why thousands have been engaged, alongside thousands of other Michigan citizens, in recall efforts designed to stop these constant attacks on public education and the middle class.”

David Holtz, Executive Director of Progress Michigan, said:  “Sen. Richardville was correct when he said he’s not taking up right-to- work legislation and he should apply that same standard and logic to teachers the same as other workers. Right-to-work is about politics, plain and simple.  It’s the usual suspects making a power grab – extreme, anti-union politicians who are trying to cut benefits earned by hardworking teachers, nurses, firefighters, police officers and bridge inspectors.”

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State AFL-CIO president steps down

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PLA-killer law leads to suspension of CUB agreement

One of the first casualties of the new state law banning project labor agreements is one of the oldest building trades labor-management pacts in the U.S.: Washtenaw County’s Construction Unity Board (CUB) agreement.

On Sept. 7, the Washtenaw County Board of Commissioners gave initial approval with a 6-4 vote to suspend the use of CUB agreements on county construction projects. The CUB agreement, established in 1968, spells out various terms for the hiring of contractors on county-funded work, and requires contractors to abide by the terms of local collective bargaining agreements. A final vote by the board was expected Sept. 21.

Driving their action was Gov. Rick Snyder’s July 19 signing of the Republican-backed Public Act 98, which prevents local communities from entering into project labor agreements on taxpayer-funded projects. The action was clearly another anti-union law by a state Republican Party that has had unions in their crosshairs all year. The anti-union Associated Builders and Contractors wasted no time in sending a letter to Washtenaw County officials and those in other municipalities around Michigan, informing them that any project labor agreement law on their books is invalid under state law.

“We anticipated that this could happen in Washtenaw County, and it did,” said Greg Stephens, business manager of Ann Arbor-based IBEW Local 252 who serves on the Board of Directors of the Construction Unity Board. “I think a positive is that they didn’t take out language regarding PLAs, it was suspended and can be put back in at any time. Now we just have to wait to see what happens with the lawsuit by the Michigan Building Trades.”

That lawsuit, filed in the Eastern District of Michigan federal court by the Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council, seeks to overturn the PA 98 state law banning PLAs. PLAs are labor agreements between private companies or municipalities, and contractors about to let construction work, that seek to set language regarding things like wages, benefits, collective bargaining, safety and shift hours. The agreements are sought by some owners because they bring a level of certainty regarding cost and worker skill to projects.

Michigan Building and Construction Trades Council attorney John Canzano said the federal court has not ruled on his request for a fast-track, permanent injunction that would bar enforcement of the state law. He said he has also requested a speedy ruling from the court. “We’re expecting to get a ruling relatively soon,” Canzano said.

Canzano said the building trades are questioning the legality of the law based on two factors. The first involves the landmark Boston Harbor case, where the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously decided in 1993 that PLAs by municipalities were legal. A key to that ruling, Canzano said, was that the high court indicated that it is legal for a government to enter into a PLA on a case by case basis, but it’s not necessarily OK to use PLAs as a mandatory, blanket policy. Michigan’s Public Act 98, however, is a blanket policy that excludes PLAs, and doesn’t allow local communities to consider them on even a case-by-case basis.

“It interferes with union rights to collectively bargain when a community may want a PLA,” Canzano said.

The second factor sought by the trades to halt enforcement of the law is an obscure “impairment of contract” clause, that prevents governments from ending an existing contract between parties.

Canzano said he has heard of a handful of other municipalities that have sought to suspend their PLA language. “And we’re hoping they choose to suspend their PLAs, rather than to end them completely, because most of the places that have PLAs sought to get the agreements in the first place, and because they know it’s a good way of doing business,” he said.

 Stephens said that’s been the case in Washtenaw County.

“The CUB agreement has served the county very well over the years,” Stephens said. “It’s a very good deal. But the ABC did a very good job with their scare tactic of sending out the letters.”

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Insulators’ party wraps up 100-year anniversary

DETROIT – Heat and Frost Insulators Local 25 celebrated its first 100 years of existence on Sept. 10, with union leaders vowing to make the gains won in wages, pensions and health care the basis for a second century of service.

More than 600 members, guests, international union and contractor representatives attended the milestone anniversary during a celebration at the MGM Grand Hotel. During the dinner celebration, the local honored members with 20-year through 65-year anniversaries of service

“You look at all the past members and we say, that’s our history,” said current Local 25 Business Manager Tim O’Connell, who acted as master of ceremonies. “One thing I tell our apprentices, this is not my local union, this is your local union. We cannot let gains we’ve won, like the pension program and  hospitalization, fall by the wayside.”

On hand to help mark the occasion were International Union President James Grogan and General Secretary-Treasurer James McCourt.

“One hundred years is a major milestone,” Grogan said. He urged members to “respect the hard times the founders of the union experienced in building what we have today.”

Local 25 was founded in the spring of 1911 by George Martens, Thomas Beasley and Nathan Metcalf. Martens became the union’s first business agent. Ed Brinker was a leader in several strikes at the Cleveland local, then moved to Detroit and became its second business agent.

Building on the focus on the founders, McCourt said “only a handful of people started the union, and over the years they worked through wars and the Great Depression. But they did their best to organize, they stayed in business and they grew.”

Using an example of advice he learned in childhood from his father, McCourt said in today’s world of politics, “let no man take away from you what is rightfully yours, because if they do, shame on you. So we have to do what is asked of us in political campaigns, so that we can enjoy what we have inherited for the next 100 years.” 

Speaking on behalf of Local 25’s contractors, Jeff Pethke, president of the Master Insulators Association, noted that he has strong family ties to the union, with his father working as an insulator for 35 years. He hailed the “pride and the heritage” of Local 25.

“You’ve come a long way,” he said. “At the end of the day be proud that you have contributed to this country’s gross national product, be proud that you built something. Congratulations.”

LOCAL 25 Business Manager Tim O’Connell was the party’s M.C.

INTERNATIONAL President James Grogan makes a point.

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NEWS BRIEFS

Unions praise new NLRB posting rule

WASHINGTON (PAI) – Unions praised the National Labor Relations Board’s new rule that requires employers to put up posters informing workers of their rights under the National Labor Relations Act – including the right to organize – starting in November.

The rule became final Aug. 30, despite opposition from around 20 congressional Republicans, led by Rep. Aaron Schock, R-Ill. It takes effect Nov. 14. Violating the rule, after warnings, will considered an unfair labor practice, NLRB said.

The rule was the first one pushed through to a conclusion by the NLRB in years. It also represents the closing curtain on the 12-year board service of Chairman Wilma Liebman. Her term ended Aug. 27. Board member Mark Pearce succeeded her.

“We applaud the rule requiring employers to post a notice in their workplaces notifying employees of their rights,” said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka. He called it “a responsible and much-needed step.”

Since employers must tell workers of their job safety and health rights, wage rights and right to non-discrimination on the job, “This rule gives clear information to employees about their rights under this fundamental labor law so workers are better equipped to exercise and enforce them,” Trumka pointed out.

The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) didn’t waste any time filing a lawsuit to stop the from implementing the regulation. In a statement, Jay Timmons, NAM's president and CEO, said the rule is “just another example of the board's aggressive overreach to insert itself into the day-to-day decisions of businesses – exerting powers it doesn't have.”

Teamsters President James Hoffa said: “The new rule requires large companies to post an 11-inch x 17-inch poster that notifies workers of their rights under the National Labor Relations Act. Employers must already inform workers about health, safety, wage and discrimination rights. This is a reasonable reform that gives workers clear guidelines about their basic rights under federal labor law.

“Employers have only one reason to oppose this rule: They don’t want their workers to know about their legal protections and fundamental right to organize into union,” Hoffa stated.

The NLRB, in its formal announcement, said it issued the rule precisely because of that reason: Many workers do not know their rights under the law, and employers must tell workers of their rights only when the firms break the law – unlike the case in other federal workplace laws. But the agency, in a concession to employers’ comments, said firms don’t have to send workers a notice about their rights by e-mail, even if that’s the primary way they communicate with their workers.

Hoffa noted the rule omits small mom-and-pop businesses, and excludes agricultural, railroad and airline employers. Federal labor law does not cover farm workers and a separate law covers the rail and airline workers. The notice must be posted in a second language if at least 20 percent of workers speak it.

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