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April 7, 2009 |
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Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Tell
your State Representatives: Support SSB 5963... as is!
The Washington State House of Representatives is about to vote on SSB 5963, an Unemployment Insurance reform bill granting employers billions of dollars in tax breaks. The bill was recently amended with some pro-worker language to make it acceptable to advocates for this recession's real victims: people who've lost their jobs through no fault of their own. But business lobbying groups are pressuring State Representatives to strip those positive changes, so they get their billions in tax breaks, while unemployed workers get nothing. Urge your legislators to resist those lobbying efforts and pass SSB 5963 without further amendment. Read more.
Legislative news:
►
In today's Tri-City Herald -- Bill
in state House targets 90,000 more jobs --
HB 2334, the Washington Works Act, is introduced by Rep. Hans
Dunshee. It is intended to create up to 90,000 jobs while modernizing public
buildings and making them healthier and more energy efficient. "This is
about jobs and schools," Dunshee said. "We as legislators ought to
be able to do more than one thing. We are balancing the budget, but I think
most people out there really care more about the economy and jobs, about
their own jobs. Let's do what the (Works Projects Administration of the
Great Depression) did and put people to work."
► In today's News Tribune -- $3 billion stimulus plan to make public building energy efficient -- Energy cost savings wouldn't be enough to cover the full cost of the debt, so voters would be asked to approve the new taxes for it. Also, the state treasurer says borrowing so much more would jeopardize the state’s excellent bond rating and could lead to higher interest rates.
► At SeattlePI.com -- Senator: A state income tax would hold up in court -- Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles (D-Seattle) has introduced a measure to enact a state income tax applying to people who earn more than $500,000 a year. Gov. Chris Gregoire has come out against it and others say such a levy would be found unconstitutional. But Kohl-Welles isn't backing down.
► In today's News Tribune -- In Olympia, public safety is in for a beating (editorial) -- One proposal trades early prison release for greater monitoring of ex-convicts in the community. The other attempts to preserve truth in sentencing, but at the expense of probation and supervision for supposed “low- risk” offenders. The question is which strategy will do the least damage.
Local news:
► In today's Everett Herald -- Tanker becomes more crucial for Boeing -- Several of Boeing's defense projects would be cut or scaled back under a budget proposed by Defense Secretary Robert Gates. But Gates said he plans to go forward with a $35 billion contest between Boeing and Northrop Grumman-EADS to replace the Air Force's aging tankers.
► In today's Seattle Times -- Boeing "hit harder" by than rivals by defense budget cuts -- Big defense cuts proposed Monday by the Pentagon delivered a budgetary airstrike to Boeing's defense division, which employs almost 9,000 people in the Puget Sound region.
► In today's Seattle Times -- City of Seattle expects $43 million shortfall -- The city will consider major cuts to its budget and capital-project plans because of the expected shortfall.
► In today's Seattle Times -- King County's heady benefits for employees (editorial) -- The council should adopt a resolution setting COLA minimums on future contracts at zero during a revenue shortfall. We would go further, but that is at least a step. (After yesterday decrying state employees' luxurious health benefits, the corporate toadies on the Times Editorial Board today suggest that county workers' health benefits be brought in line with those of state employees.)
Employee
Free Choice Act news:
► Today at Politico -- Blow to EFCA: Sen. Lincoln says she's a "no" -- If Republican Sen. Arlen Specter's blunt opposition to the Employee Free Choice Act was a blow to organized labor's top legislative priority this year, Sen. Blanche Lincoln's (D-AR) announcement that she, too, will oppose EFCA may be a final nail.
National news:
► In today's NY Times -- A public plan for health insurance? (editorial) -- One of the most contentious health care reform issues is whether to include a new public plan to compete with private insurance plans. Many Republicans deride it as “government-run health care” and a step toward “socialized medicine.” Democrats find the notion appealing -- even of vital importance. A new public plan -- to offer consumers greater choice, keep the private plans honest and restrain the relentless growth in health care premiums and underlying medical costs -- is worth trying.
► In today's Press-Enterprise -- AT&T-union negotiations hit health care obstacle -- Negotiations continued Monday between AT&T and thousands of the telecommunications giant's employees, but union representatives and company officials seem far from an agreement.
►
In Sunday's NY Times -- Farmworkers'
rights: 70 years overdue (editorial) --
More than 70 years ago, the Roosevelt administration denied
farm and domestic workers overtime and disability pay, days of rest and
union organizing. That inequality is a perverse holdover from the Jim Crow
era. Segregationist Southern Democrats could not abide giving
African-Americans, who then made up most of that labor force, an equal
workplace footing with whites. Roosevelt’s compromise simply wrote those
workers out of the New Deal. They were thus sidelined from the labor
movement, with predictable results. Though the Dixiecrats have all long
since died or repented, the injustice they spawned has never been corrected.
Poverty, brutal working conditions and legally sanctioned discrimination
persist for new generations of laborers, who are now mostly Latino
immigrants.
TUESDAY,
APRIL 7, 2009
Tell Representatives: Support SSB 5963... as is!
The State House of Representatives is about to vote on SSB 5963, an Unemployment Insurance (U.I.) reform bill recently amended to make it acceptable to advocates for this recession's real victims: people who've lost their jobs through no fault of their own. But business lobbying groups are pressuring State Representatives to strip those positive changes, which would make the bill a permanent multi-billion dollar tax break for employers with little or no benefit to unemployed workers.
BACKGROUND: On March 27, the House Commerce and Labor Committee made significant improvements to SB 5963. The new SSB (Substitute Senate Bill) 5963 restores a measure of fairness to people who have lost their jobs. It still saves Washington businesses hundreds of millions between 2010 and 2015. Over the long run, employers will save billions in taxes, and in the short run the system will save $300 million in fines by bringing our tax system into federal compliance.
But this comes at a cost. At the beginning of the year, the state projected that the U.I. Trust Fund was sufficiently funded for 21 months of benefits. The tax cuts in SSB 5963 -- combined with the cost of the temporary economic-stimulus benefit increase that expires at the end of this year -- will lower the Trust Fund to a balance of between 12 and 15 months. That significantly lower cushion is acceptable ONLY IF the House substitute retains the following improvements included in SSB 5963:
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Maintaining limited discretion by the Employment Security Dept. Commissioner to determine "good-cause" quits, as decided in a 2008 Supreme Court decision. This commissioner discretion is used so infrequently its cost to the system is negligible, but business lobbying groups are fighting to strip the Commissioner from having court-awarded discretion to allow benefits in unusual circumstances.
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Restoring the U.I. benefit multiplier to 4.0, where it was for decades before being lowered in 2005. In the four years since, workers have lost $68 million in benefits. For a worker earning $30,000 a year ($7,500 per quarter), restoring the multiplier from 3.85 to 4.0 would increase weekly benefits from $288.75 to $300. This permanent benefit increase would not occur until 2010 after the temporary economic-stimulus increase expires, and would cost the system a small fraction of what the employers' permanent tax cuts will cost.
One of these SSB 5963 improvements merely maintains what unemployed workers have today. The other restores something they had for decades until just a few years ago. This is not too much to ask for the real victims of this recession compared to the billions in permanent tax breaks that employers will get.
An extra $11.25 a week may not sound like a lot of money, but to a family that just lost its source of income, it means a few loaves of bread. It means a week's worth of school lunches for their kid. It means five gallons of gas. It means several more résumés printed and mailed to prospective employers.
And it also means more money immediately spent at local businesses in communities hard hit by layoff and recession, so it benefits businesses and has a far greater economic stimulus impact than cutting unemployment benefits in hopes that employers will get even more tax breaks in the future.
Click here to TAKE ACTION and send your state Representatives an email urging them to SUPPORT SSB 5963 without further amendment, and to OPPOSE corporate lobbying efforts to strip benefit improvements from the bill.
Thank you for taking action.
Copyright © 2009 -- Washington State Labor Council, AFL-CIO