Blog - Articles Tagged 'Employment'

• S.1 – American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009

A bill to create jobs, restore economic growth, and strengthen America’s middle class through measures that modernize the nation’s infrastructure, enhance America’s energy independence, expand educational opportunities, preserve and improve affordable health care, provide tax relief, and protect those in greatest need, and for other purposes.

• S.2 – Middle Class Opportunity Act of 2009

A bill to improve the lives of middle class families and provide them with greater opportunity to achieve the American dream.

• S.3 – Homeowner Protection and Wall Street Accountability Act of 2009
  
  A bill to protect homeowners and consumers by reducing foreclosures, ensuring the availability of credit for homeowners, businesses, and consumers, and reforming the financial regulatory system, and for other purposes.

• S.4 – Comprehensive Health Reform Act of 2009

A bill to guarantee affordable, quality health coverage for all Americans, and for other purposes.

• S.5 – Cleaner, Greener, and Smarter Act of 2009

A bill to improve the economy and security of the United States by reducing the dependence of the United States on foreign and unsustainable energy sources and the risks of global warming, and for other purposes.

• S.6 – Restoring America’s Power Act of 2009

A bill to restore and enhance the national security of the United States.

• S.7 – Education Opportunity Act of 2009

A bill to expand educational opportunities for all Americans by increasing access to high-quality early childhood education and after school programs, advancing reform in elementary and secondary education, strengthening mathematics and science instruction, and ensuring that higher education is more affordable, and for other purposes.

• S.8 – Returning Government to the American People Act

A bill to return the Government to the people by reviewing controversial “midnight regulations” issued in the waning days of the Bush Administration.

• S.9 – Stronger Economy, Stronger Borders Act of 2009

A bill to strengthen the United States economy, provide for more effective border and employment enforcement, and for other purposes.

• S.10 – Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2009

A bill to restore fiscal discipline and begin to address the long-term fiscal challenges facing the United States, and for other purposes.

TAPPED broke this list on Tuesday, and they have some more information on some of these bills from a Democratic aide on the hill.

The full text of these bills hasn’t been published by the Government Printing Office yet, but it should be available within the next 24 hours or so. Check back at the “see full bill text” link on the OpenCongress bill pages. In the meantime, you might want to start tracking some of these with your “My OpenCongress” account (login or register) to be alerted to any legislative action that is taken and every new blog post or news article is published about them.

These first 10 Senate bills are mainly symbolic. They’re a statement of the Democrats’ legislative priorities at this point for the next two years, but any legislative action that’s taken on these measures could very well come in a different form. The first ten Senate bills of the last session included some measures that were enacted (minimum wage increase, ethics reform), some that were vetoed by President Bush (funding for stem cell research) and some that were hotly debated but never passed Congress (comprehensive immigration reform).

UPDATE: Way more info on all these bills from the Democratic Policy Committee. Be sure to check it out.

The House Committee on Rules has just concluded their epic hearing to lay out the ground rules for Wednesday’s debate of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. Here is a complete list of the amendments that will receive votes on Wednesday by the full House of Representatives, as determined tonight by the Rules Committee (sponsors listed in brackets):

>* #178 – Would amend the aviation, highway, rail, and transit priority consideration and “use-it-or-lose-it” provisions to require that 50 percent of the funds be obligated within 90 days. [Rep. James Oberstar [D, MN-8]]


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>* #199 – Would require that the Secretary require, as a condition of receiving funding under Title XIII of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, that the demonstration projects utilize Internet-based or other open protocols and standards if available and appropriate, and would require that grants recipients utilize Internet-based or other open protocols and standards. [Rep. Edward Markey [D, MA-7]]


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>* #95 – Would clarify that federal funds received by States under the bill for highway maintenance shall not be used to replace existing funds in place for transportation projects. [Rep. William Shuster [R, PA-9]]


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>* #70 – Would increase transit capital funding by $3 billion. [Rep. Jerrold Nadler [D, NY-8], Rep. Peter DeFazio [D, OR-4], Rep. Daniel Lipinski [D, IL-3], Rep. Michael McMahon [D, NY-13], Rep. Keith Ellison [D, MN-5]]


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>* #109 – Would strike the appropriations provisions from the bill. [Rep. Randy Neugebauer [R, TX-19]]


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>* #172 – Would provide that job training funds may be used for broadband deployment and related activities provided in the bill. [Rep. Maxine Waters [D, CA-35]]


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>* #132 – Would strike funding for Amtrak. [Rep. Jeff Flake [R, AZ-6]]


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>* #198 – Would expand the Berry Amendment Extension Act to include DHS to require the government to purchase uniforms for more than one hundred thousand uniformed employees from textile and apparel manufacturers. [Rep. Larry Kissell [D, NC-8]]


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>* #22 – Would insert the text of the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act (H.R. 985 in the 110th Congress) regarding protections for federal employees who report waste, fraud, and abuse. [Rep. Todd Platts [R, PA-19], Rep. Christopher Van Hollen [D, MD-8]]


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>* #89 – Would require that the Recovery.gov website contain links and other information on how to access job information created at or by entities receiving funding under the bill; including links to local employment agencies, state, local, and other public agencies receiving recovery funds, and private firms contracted to perform work funded by the bill. [Rep. Harry Teague [D, NM-2]]


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>* #195 – Amendment in the Nature of a Substitute. (REVISED) Would strike everything after enacting clause and adds income tax rate deductions for bottom two income tax brackets, alternative minimum tax relief, small business deduction, bonus depreciation, small business expensing, expanded carryback of net operating losses, improved home buyer credit, unemployment benefit tax exemption, health insurance premium deduction, repeal of 3 percent withholding requirement for government contractors, extension of unemployment benefits, and a Sense of Congress against tax increases to offset outlays. [Rep. David Camp [R, MI-4], Rep. Eric Cantor [R, VA-7]]

These amendments will each get 10 minutes of debate (except the last one, which will get 60) and will be adopted to the bill if they receive a majority vote.

Also included in the rules package is a five-part amendment that will be considered adopted to the stimulus bill by the House when the package is approved. It removes a couple of items from the bill – family planning money, National Mall revitalization – that President Obama had personally asked congressional Democrats to remove because of GOP criticisms:

>The amendment (1) requires that not later than 45 days after the date of enactment, funds provided to any State or agency thereof, the Governor of the State, or the State legislature by means of a statement submitted by its leadership, shall certify that the State will request and use funds provided by this Act. Funding to the State will be for public and private entities within the State either by formula or at the State’s discretion; (2) waives the local matching requirements and the salary caps for the COPS hiring program in fiscal years 2009 and 2010; (3) designates $15 million for the Historic Preservation Fund within the National Park Service for the renovation and preservation of buildings on Historically Black Colleges and Universities campuses and waives the institutional match for projects under this provision; (4) strikes funding for the National Mall Revitalization Fund; and (5) strikes section 5004 regarding family planning.

Before signing the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 into law on Tuesday, the Obama administration released an assortment of fact sheets on the its estimated impacts in several areas. One of those fact sheets outlines the bill’s impact on employment by congressional district.

CongressDaily ($) notes that, according to that document, seven of the ten districts projected to gain the most jobs under the bill are represented by Republicans in the House. The Representatives for those districts are:

Rep. Jason Chaffetz [R, UT-3]

Rep. Rob Bishop [R, UT-1]

Rep. Dean Heller [R, NV-2]

Rep. Michael McCaul [R, TX-10]

Rep. Jeff Flake [R, AZ-6]

Rep. Trent Franks [R, AZ-2]

Rep. John Linder [R, GA-7]

…all of whom nonetheless voted against the bill.

The Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) passed the House last session with all but two Democrats voting in favor. Of course, the bill never stood a chance getting through the Senate or being signed into law by Bush. But now that the Senate may actually have the votes and the President in office is an original co-sponsor of the bill, there are some strange grumblings coming from the moderate section of Democrats in the House.

Arkansas News columnist David J. Sanders reports that the Blue Dog Caucus, a 47-member strong moderate/conservative arm of House Democrats, have some serious misgivings about the bill this time around:

>Last week, at the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce headquarters, chamber officials briefed nearly 100 members of a coalition opposing card check about their efforts to lobby members of Arkansas congressional delegation.
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>According to individuals who attended the meeting, they were encouraged by what they heard, especially what was relayed to them regarding conversations between chamber officials and 1st District Congressman Marion Berry, a Democrat.
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>An official informed the group that Berry recently had told him that he thought the bill was a piece of junk and that he only voted for it because he knew then-President Bush would veto it.
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>The official then told the group that Berry recounted to him a recent discussion the Blue Dogs had with House Democratic leadership. According to Berry, the Blue Dogs told House leadership that card check wasn’t a free vote for them anymore and that their constituents were giving them a lot of grief over the issue.
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>The Blue Dogs strongly urged House leadership not to bring this bill back up on the House floor until the Senate had passed something first, because they look like idiots for continuing to pass it and then it dying in the Senate.
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>The official claimed that Berry had ensured him that this time around, the business community had stepped up its game and he was hearing from a lot of people in his district about how bad this bill really was.

Real quick, here’s what the bill would do: EFCA would change the rules governing the formation of unions so that unions would be certified once a majority of employees have signed union authorization cards. The current rules require a final ballot vote on the union to be taken after a majority has signed off on the cards. It also establishes a timeline for first contracts to be drawn up and refers any outstanding disputes to an arbitration panel for a legally binding decision.

Okay, back the Blue Dogs’ new position. Democrats in the House hold a 38-vote margin of error for getting legislation passed this session. With 47 members, if the Blue Dogs can stick together, they can block just about anything they want to (as could the Progressive Caucus, the New Democrats, the Congressional Black Caucus, etc.). With the Blue Dogs being in an ideological position to reasonably oppose this bill (the two Dems who voted against it last time were Blue Dogs), Matt Yglesias sees this as a perfect chance for them to pander to wealthy potential donors:

>What’s happening is that even though the Republican Party lost the last election, the wealthy business interests who’d been financing the Republican Party can’t be defeated at the ballot box. And they hate the Employee Free Choice Act. EFCA would make it easier to form unions. And the evidence indicates that unions flatten the compensation structure at unionized firms—more money for folks at the low end, less for folks at the top. If I were a corporate manager, I wouldn’t want that to happen to me. And if, as a manager, I was able to use the company’s resources to advance my interests by fighting EFCA, I would want to do that. And that’s what they’re doing. And they have a lot of money to spend on that cause. Which means that if you can be the guy who blocks this legislation, you’ll be a hero to a lot of rich people prepared to spend a lot of money rewarding their hero. It’s a great opportunity for a moderate House Democrat.

Greg Sargent at the Plum Line is reporting that the Democratic leadership has agreed to let the Senate take up EFCA first so that Blue Dogs don’t have to vote on it twice.

>“Their concern is that the House will pass something, then the Senate will take up the bill and do something different,” the senior leadership aide tells me. “The Blue Dogs don’t want to end up voting on something that won’t even become law. They’re saying, `See what can get through the Senate first, and then we’ll vote on it.’”

There have been rumors that EFCA could come out of the Senate without the card check provision; if that were the case, the Blue Dogs would be able to vote with House Democrats for the weaker bill and effectively block the version of EFCA that the business interests oppose.

A commenter, sgwhiteinfla, at the Plum Line has a different take:

>This is actually smart policy in light of what happened with the stimulus bill. The EFCA is actually going to be more contentious than the stim bill fight was because the gang of three won’t see any pressure to get something done now. And if the House passed their bill first then you would have the Scarboroughs and Hannitys of the world claiming again that Nancy Pelosi wrote the bill. At least this way they know what they are dealing with before hand and can set their sights appropriately. I will also point out that this move lights a fire under Harry Reid’s a$$ to force a filibuster for once. The EFCA bill won’t need 60 votes to pass unlike the stim bill did so if Reid forces and breaks a filibuster the Dems in the Senate can pass it with a simple majority. I bet Harry Reid is pissed though. I for one am ecstatic! And when the labor unions realize whats going on they will be too.

Today, Democrats in both the House and Senate will officially introduce organized labor’s chief legislative priority – the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) – for the 111th Congress. Normally, the introduction of a bill into Congress isn’t big news, but the battle over EFCA has been especially epic. The bill would be a huge boost for the formation of new unions, and probably the most significant change to US labor law since the 1950s. By taking away employers’ powers to demand a secret ballot elections for union certification after a majority of employees have already signed union authorization cards, EFCA would tip the scales significantly in the union organizers’ favor.

EFCA has been introduced in Congress every year since 2003. This is the first year that Congress has a real chance of passing it. The key to its passage is in the Senate. Republicans there will undoubtedly stage a filibuster, which will require a 60-vote majority for the Democrats to break. The Democrats currently occupy 58 seats in the Senate, which means they’ll have to hold all of their own party together on the vote, plus win support from a couple Republicans.

As the bill gets officially introduced, here are some relevant EFCA tidbits from the news, blogs and elsewhere:

• Elana Schor at Talking Points Memo has a rundown of which senators in both parties are currently on the fence on EFCA.
  
  

• On a similar beat, the WSJ reports that “at least six Senators who have voted to move forward with the so-called card-check proposal, including one Republican, now say they are opposed or not sure.” In the article Sen. Blance Lincoln (D-AR) called the bill “divisive and distracting.”
  
  

• Media General News Service – "Labor advocates and business leaders are turning up the heat on freshman Sen. Mark Warner, a self-described ‘radical centrist.’”
  
  

• Politico’s Ben Smith writes that EFCA creates jobs—for Republican political operatives who are being hired in hordes by business interests to lobby against the bill on Capitol Hill.
  
  

• On CNBC’s Squawk Box, Billionaire investor Warren Buffet came out unequivocally against EFCA:
  
  

“I think the secret ballot’s pretty important in the country. I’m against card check to make a perfectly flat statement.”

Related: Media Matters notes that secret ballot elections are not actually required under current law.

• The Workforce Fairness Institute released a new web video blasting the AFL-CIO for holding its annual meeting recently at the ritzy Fontainbleau resort in Miami:
  
  

• AFL-CIO launches announces the contestants for the first-ever “Chicken Little Sky Is Falling Bizarre Corporate Panic over Workers’ Rights Award.”
  
  

• Bloomberg News:
  
  

Senator Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas defied her state’s largest private employer, Wal-Mart Stores Inc., in 2007 by voting to make it easier for workers to join unions. This year, she may spurn organized labor. […]


Deborah Weinswig, a Citigroup Inc. analyst in New York, today downgraded Wal-Mart to hold from buy, saying the retailer would be the primary target of union organizing efforts if the card-check measure passes. That would increase labor costs and may limit expansion, she said.

• Brurger King, who labor leader thought they had won over this year, is actually going to continue to fight against EFCA.
  
  

• The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee held a hearing this morning on the EFCA, which is now archived (here).

As I’m sure you have heard, the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) was re-introduced into the 111th session of Congress today. It’s expected to be brought to a vote by Congress sometime this summer, and the PR and lobbying leading up to the vote is going to be both dramatic and expensive.

OpenSecrets has info on the special-interest money fueling the debate:

Sen. Thomas Harkin [D, IA], who introduced the bill in the Senate today, has collected more money from the labor sector than any other senator since 1989, at $1.7 million.

And,

Business PACs not only gave nearly five times more in campaign contributions than labor PACs did in the last election cycle ($365.1 million versus $77.9 million, including contributions to leadership PACs) they are backed by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which spent $144.4 million on lobbying efforts in the 2007-2008 election cycle, or more than $400,000 for every day Congress was in session.

Card check, EFCA, whatever you want to cal it, here’s the bill as re-introduced into the 111th session of Congress on March 10, 2009:

S. 560 – Employee Free Choice Act of 2009 (Senate version)

H.R. 1409 – Employee Free Choice Act of 2009 (House version)

We’ll have the full bill text up in the next day or so. Full bill text is up for the House version, Senate text coming soon (it will be identical to the House version). For now, you can Leave comments, vote “aye” or “nay,” and add the bills to your tracked items with your “My OpenCongress” account (register or login).

If Al Franken is seated in Minnesota, it looks like Senate Democrats will still be one vote short of breaking an inevitable Republican filibuster of the Employee Free Choice Act. There is only one Senate Republican who might possibly side with the Democrats. Sen. Arlen Specter [R, PA] voted for the bill last year, and he’s on the fence as to whether or not he’ll vote for it again this year. If he does, he’ll likely enable the Democrats to get the bill, which would make it easier for workers to for unions, signed into law.

It just so happens that Sen. Specter is going to be facing a very difficult primary race challenger in 2010, and his best chance at staying a U.S. Senator beyond this session likely involves him switching parties and running as a Democrat. But would Democrats in Pennsylvania Specter over a likely more progressive Democratic primary challenger? Winning full-fledged support from organized labor couldn’t hurt:

This is big: Senior officials with the powerful AFL-CIO have privately assured GOP Senator Arlen Specter that they’ll throw their full support behind him in the 2010 Senate race if he votes for the Employee Free Choice Act, a senior labor strategist working closely with the AFL on the issue tells me.

This is significant, because it represents a big incentive for Specter to switch parties — and to support Employee Free Choice. Specter may be facing a serious GOP primary challenge from Club for Growth head Pat Toomey. If he loses that — or pulls out of the GOP first and becomes an Indy or a Dem — supporting Employee Free Choice could give him the organizational muscle from labor and Democratic support he needs to prevail in a general election and hold his seat.

The labor strategist tells me that top AFL-CIO officials have told Specter they’ll back him to the hilt if he supports their top priority.

“If Senator Specter supports working people — particularly voting with us on Employee Free Choice — the AFL-CIO will support him 100 percent of the way, whether in a primary or a general election,” the strategist says.