Half a million local public workers across the country could lose their jobs without legislation to support city and county services, a report issued (pdf) by groups of local officials said this week.
New survey research announced today shows that local governments are now facing a fiscal crisis that will force job losses approaching 500,000 and significant cuts in much needed public services. Representatives from the National League of Cities (NLC), United States Conference of Mayors (USCM) and the National Association of Counties (NACo) jointly released the survey results at a press conference on Capitol Hill earlier today and were joined by several members of Congress offering their support to cities and counties during these difficult economic times.
“For local governments, unemployment and foreclosures resulting from the Great Recession translate into too few revenues making it increasingly difficult to fund or satisfactorily maintain many basic services — not only parks, libraries, and public works projects but also public safety, police and fire services,” said Ron Loveridge, NLC President, Mayor of Riverside, California.
Loveridge continued, “Cities are not only the engines of their local communities, they are also the backbone of their regional economies, where investments in infrastructure and services provide a platform for private sector investment and growth. And cities are the wealth of nations. We are where economic recovery must take place… we are where jobs are increased, or more commonly lately, are lost. We must change that equation.”
The groups renewed their call for Congress to pass the Local Jobs for America Act. The bill would help local governments save as many as half a million public service jobs and fund an additional half million new local jobs for two years. First introduced last spring by Rep. George Miller (D-CA), the bill now has 163 House co-sponsors. In the Senate it is being sponsored by Senators Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Al Franken (D-MN) and Mark Begich (D-AK).
At a press conference led by Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter, representing the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the groups also warned of the domino-like impact of widespread local service layoffs, saying that every public sector job lost can result in an equal number of local private business layoffs. Mayor Nutter was joined by several early co-sponsors of the Local Jobs for America Act, including (left to right) Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA), Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL).
The Jobs for America Now coalition, which includes Working America, the AFL-CIO and more than sixty other national organizations, will be organizing support for the legislation during the August Congressional recess.
The author is the winner of the 2010 CREDO Mobile/Netroots Nation award for Blog Activist of the Year.
Tags: Jobs, layoffs, Local Jobs for America Act, unemployment
A big round of teacher layoffs is coming. From the NY Times:
School districts around the country, forced to resort to drastic money-saving measures, are warning hundreds of thousands of teachers that their jobs may be eliminated in June.
The districts have no choice, they say, because their usual sources of revenue — state money and local property taxes — have been hit hard by the recession. In addition, federal stimulus money earmarked for education has been mostly used up this year.
As a result, the 2010-11 school term is shaping up as one of the most austere in the last half century. In addition to teacher layoffs, districts are planning to close schools, cut programs, enlarge classes and shorten the school day, week or year to save money.
Arizona:
Tolleson Union High School District is laying off 207 employees, including 34 classroom teachers, to balance a budget hit by state funding cuts, climbing expenses and the March failure of a crucial budget override election.
That’s nearly 19 percent of the district’s workforce.
Iowa:
Dozens of Cedar Rapids School employees learned on Friday they will no longer be with the district.
The school board approved cutting 60 positions earlier this week, including 23 teachers.
Ohio:
The Cleveland school board appears ready to lay off more than 650 teachers union members.
Michigan:
The cash-strapped Flint school district will lay off 261 teachers at the end of the year.
The Flint Community Schools Board of Education approved the layoffs Wednesday night.
These cuts are also affecting state colleges and universities. In New Jersey:
Facing record deficits, Gov. Chris Christie has proposed cutting $173 million in state aid to universities, a nearly 8 percent reduction. New budget language released last week also included a surprise cap on tuition proposals, further squeezing the bottom lines at state colleges and universities.
The first battle will take place Wednesday afternoon in Trenton, during an Assembly budget hearing on the governor’s proposals. The stakes are high for the universities, which have endured cuts in state aid for seven of the past 10 years, according to union officials.
“Immediate effects include larger class sizes, fewer faculty hires, fewer class offerings, cutbacks in services and hours, and cutbacks in technology purchases and facilities renovations,” the New Jersey Association of State Colleges and Universities said.
Georgia:
As universities across the nation face budget shortcuts, Georgia is trying to meet the demands of a $385 million budget cut from the state’s higher education budget.
Chancellor Erroll B. Davis, responsible for the 35 public colleges and universities in Georgia, says that in order to meet this budget cut, the colleges and universities would have to increase tuition by 77 percent. Chancellor Davis, along with other university presidents in the state of Georgia, is attempting to discuss specific budget cuts, rather than have the state House-Senate joint budget committee make budget cuts wherever they choose.
A survey of community college presidents finds that as unemployment rises, so does the enrollment at community colleges. At the same time, these schools are facing significant budget cuts.
It’s all grim news on the education front. That’s why the Local Jobs for America Act is so important.
Tags: budget, budget cuts, Education, Local Jobs for America Act
Support is growing from the grassroots for more substantive action to create jobs, and it’s breaking through on Capitol Hill with a major push for House passage of the Local Jobs for America Act.
Introduced last month by House Education and Labor Committee Chairman Rep. George Miller (D-CA), the bill would provide direct funding to municipalities, counties and states to support the creation and retention of an estimated one million full-time, good-paying local jobs.
With communities across the country facing persistent high unemployment coupled with severe state and local budget crises, the Local Jobs for America Act represents the most substantial direct job creation plan yet proposed in Congress. The plan quickly gained support from the National League of Cities and the U.S. Conference of Mayors as well as Jobs for America Now, the nation’s largest jobs coalition with more than sixty national organizations including Working America and the AFL-CIO.
Within three weeks of its introduction, the bill had garnered 105 co-sponsors in the House of Representatives.
Then the grassroots organizing behind the bill gained increasing momentum. During the recent Congressional recess, groups supporting the new jobs plan contacted scores of Representatives in their districts and expanded the effort to gain additional organizational backing.
Last Friday, working through coalition partner Half in Ten, a letter of support signed by more than 300 local, state and national organizations was sent to the House leadership urging swift passage of the Local Jobs for America Act.
Here’s the text of the letter:
Dear Speaker Pelosi, Majority Leader Hoyer, Majority Whip Clyburn, Democratic Caucus Chair Larsen, Assistant to the Speaker Van Hollen and Chairman Miller:
The undersigned organizations write to express our strong support for the Local Jobs for America Act (HR 4812), which would create a million public and private jobs in local communities. We applaud Congressman Miller for the introduction of this critical legislation.
Since the recession began in December 2007, the economy has lost over 8 million jobs, including many providing critical services in communities across the country. The current crisis of unemployment is devastating families all across America. March’s unemployment report revealed an overall jobless rate of 9.7 percent; among African-Americans the jobless rate was a staggering 16.5 percent, among Latinos, 12.6 percent, among women who head families, 11.3 percent, and among youth, 26.1 percent.
We need bold Congressional action in order to put Americans back to work and prevent more layoffs and cuts in crucial services. The Local Jobs for America Act will not only provide employment for hundreds of thousands of jobless workers, it will create and save jobs for workers who are providing services that our communities badly need.
The Local Jobs for America Act provides $100 billion over two years to create or save 750,000 jobs providing local services, and to save 250,000 education jobs. The funding will also keep 5,500 law enforcement officers on the beat, allow localities to hire additional firefighters, and provide on-the-job training slots to help local businesses create employment opportunities. These jobs in turn will put money in the pockets of families, spurring demand in the economy and creating additional private-sector jobs and tax revenues.
Projections of a slow recovery in the labor market underscore the urgent need to create jobs now. Job-creation must precede short-term deficit reduction as lost tax revenue from joblessness is significantly exacerbating our nation’s fiscal problems. As local and national organizations who are witnessing firsthand the current crisis of unemployment and the increased need for services in the face of deep budget cuts, we believe that a bold response cannot wait.
We support quick passage of the Local Jobs for America Act to immediately put Americans back to work, in addition to meeting pressing needs in our communities.
Also last Friday, the U.S. Conference of Mayors reported the number of House co-sponsors had reached 141. Click here to see a current official list of co-sponsors.
If you don’t see your House member listed, you can call toll-free 888-254-5087 and urge them to become a co-sponsor of Rep. Miller’s Local Jobs for America Act (H.R. 4812). If your Representative is already a co-sponsor, call to thank them for their support.
The urgency of taking large-scale direct action to create jobs couldn’t be clearer. The statistics of massive job loss and persistent unemployment are well known: 15 million officially unemployed; 11 million more underemployed or discouraged from looking for work; higher unemployment rates among lower-income communities; more than 6.5 million out of work for six months or longer.
But new information provided by the non-profit National Priorities Project shows that without substantial additional job creation investments, it will take a startlingly long time to return to pre-recession employment levels. Combining local and state data on budgets and unemployment with national recovery estimates, they have produced state-by-state and metropolitan area projections. The results are a shocking testament to the need for immediate large-scale job creation.
For example, in Ohio it is estimated that, without substantial added jobs investments, the metropolitan areas of Akron, Cleveland and Toledo can expect the following employment recovery times:
Akron 2018 Quarter 2
Cleveland 2024 Quarter 2
Toledo 2034 Quarter 1
In Connecticut:
Bridgeport-Stamford 2020 Quarter 1
Hartford 2018 Quarter 3
New Haven-Milford 2015 Quarter 3
In California:
Los Angeles-Long Beach 2013 Quarter 4
Redding 2016 Quarter 2
San Francisco-Oakland 2012 Quarter 4
You can use NPP’s tool to look up your state and its major metropolitan areas.
Wherever you look, though, one thing is clear. We can’t wait any longer. We need jobs now!
Read more about the Local Jobs for America Act here.
Tags: Jobs, Local Jobs for America Act, unemployment
The March employment summary showed a net jobs increase of 162,000 for the month, the best result reported by employers since October 2007, raising hopes that the deepest jobs recession since the Great Depression is at least stabilizing.
Source: Calculated Risk
But there was little change in overall unemployment, still stuck at 9.7 percent. The number of people officially unemployed increased by 134,000 to more than 15 million. Another 2.3 million wanted work but were not counted in the labor force. And the number of people working only part-time, but wanting full-time work, increased by a seasonally adjusted 263,000 to more than 9 million.
The biggest story hidden in the latest jobs report, though, is the continuing massive increase in long-term unemployment, with the number of those jobless for 6 months or longer increasing by more than 400,000 in March to more than 6.5 million.
A small increase was reported in construction jobs, after nearly three years of continuous declines. But how much of that was due to a bounce after February’s snowstorms is difficult to gauge. Modest job gains were also reported for durable goods manufacturing, retail, education and health care.
But more than half of the total jobs increase was in temporary hiring, with private employers adding 40,000 temporary jobs and the federal government adding 48,000 temporary census workers. Fully one-third of private employer jobs added in March were temporary jobs.
“It’s not a great picture, but at least things are not getting worse,” economist Dean Baker told me in an email. Baker’s Jobs Byte from the Center for Economic and Policy Research noted that nominal wages fell in March for just the sixth time since 1964, something that is “not a good sign for future income growth.”
Persistent high jobless rates not only continued but increased slightly again for African-Americans, Hispanics and teenagers. Unemployment for all teens increased 1.1 percent to 26.1 percent. The jobless rate for blacks increased 0.7 percent to 16.5 percent. Hispanic unemployment was up 0.2 percent to 12.6 percent in March.
But the worst and most troubling news by far was in the data for the longer-term unemployed.
While the number of people unemployed for less than 15 weeks and less than 5 weeks both declined, those unemployed for more than 26 weeks increased dramatically.
Seasonally adjusted, those unemployed for 27 weeks or more increased by 414,000 to more than 6.5 million.
The not seasonally adjusted numbers are even worse: those unemployed for 27 weeks or more increased 425,000 to more than 6.7 million.
The percent of the unemployed who have been jobless for 6 months or more continued to increase, to a seasonally adjusted record of 44.1 percent and to 42.8 percent not seasonally adjusted.
The average duration of unemployment hit another record at 32.1 weeks.
Source: Paper Economy
A set of interactive historical charts is available by clicking on the graphs here from Paper Economy.
Long-term unemployment has reached catastrophic proportions. The number of net jobs being created is nowhere near the 400,000 per month baseline that is needed to begin to bring employment levels back to even pre-recession levels in the next few years. When we need millions of new full-time jobs, most of the small number of jobs being created are either temporary or part-time. And even those are not being filled by the long-term unemployed.
Meanwhile, with Congress having failed to overcome the Republican obstruction of extended unemployment insurance and COBRA benefits, one million long-term jobless are at risk of losing benefits this month, with more than 200,000 set to lose their benefits in the next week alone before Congress reconvenes.
Tell your Senators they must restore extended unemployment and COBRA benefits retroactively as the first order of business. And tell your member of the House of Representatives that you need them to co-sponsor the Local Jobs for America Act to support one million good-paying full-time jobs.
Tags: jobless benefits extension, Jobs, jobs report, Local Jobs for America Act, long-term unemployment, unemployment
Right again, Mr. Herbert:
With the marathon effort to overhaul the health care system behind us, it is time for the Obama administration to move quickly and powerfully to the monumental task of putting Americans back to work.
Bob Herbert’s column today, titled The Magic Potion, is worth a full read. But here are some snips:
The just-say-no crowd will insist that we can’t afford a real effort to revitalize employment, that budget deficits are too high, that the economy will recover without additional government stimulus, that the president has used up most of his political capital, and that there isn’t much that government can do under any circumstances to create jobs.
- snip -
The recession is not over for the nearly 15 million people who are unemployed. Many of them have been out of work for longer than six months, a seeming eternity. Widespread joblessness and underemployment are threatening to become permanent features of the American landscape, corroding not just our standards of living but the very vibrancy of the American way of life.
- snip -
You can’t get back to a robust economy without putting Americans back to work. The economy needs to be rebuilt on a solid foundation of good jobs at good pay, and many of those jobs will have to come from thriving new industries. This is a long-term project that demands big-time government involvement. It will require the kind of commitment — over an even longer period of time — that President Obama and the Democrats in Congress gave to their health care initiative.
- snip -
What is needed are bold new initiatives on several fronts.
- snip -
The United States is a rich nation. To say that we cannot afford to do the things necessary to shore up the quality of our lives and establish a brighter future for coming generations is absurd. We always seem to have money for warfare and to bolster the interests of the monied classes.
One specific jobs plan Mr. Herbert does not mention is the Local Jobs for America Act introduced by Rep. George Miller (D-CA), the chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, which would immediately support one million public and private sector local jobs. Perhaps Chairman Miller should give Mr. Herbert a phone call on it — I’d imagine he’d be rather receptive.
Tags: Bob Herbert, Jobs, Local Jobs for America Act
In less than three weeks the Local Jobs for America Act, introduced by House Education and Labor Committee chairman Rep. George Miller (D-CA), has obtained 105 co-sponsors and more are expected as a national coalition effort reaches out to House members during the current two-week Congressional recess.
The bill, hailed as the most significant new piece of a Congressional jobs agenda, would provide direct funding to local governments to create, restore or save up to one million public and private jobs for the next two years. It has already received the strong support of many national organizations and policy advocates.
Following the historic passage of health care reform, the Congress will next need to turn its attention to jobs and the economy. With the Senate likely to focus first on financial regulatory reform, the House should be free to turn its attention to jobs legislation.
With the economy still weakened by persistent high rates of unemployment, and with state and local governments facing increasingly severe revenue shortfalls, endangering both public jobs and services, and many private sector jobs as well, the Local Jobs for America Act would:
Specifically, the Local Jobs for America Act invests:
* $75 billion over two years to local communities to hire vital staff
* Funding for 50,000 on-the-job private-sector training positions
The bill also includes provisions already approved by the House:
* $23 billion this year to help states support 250,000 education jobs
* $1.18 billion to put 5,500 law enforcement officers on the beat
* $500 million to retain, rehire, and hire firefighters
More specifics on the bill are detailed here by the House Education and Labor Committee.
The complete, current list of co-sponsors is available here.
If you don’t see your U.S. Representative listed as a co-sponsor yet, and you want to help support this legislation while Congress is in recess until April 12, go to this state-by-state House Member web page and follow the links to find your Representative and his or her home district office contact information. Ask them to join the growing list of co-sponsors of H.R. 4812, Congressman Miller’s Local Jobs for America Act.
Tags: Jobs, Local Jobs for America Act
A new House bill to directly fund up to one million local jobs is gaining support less than twenty-four hours after it was announced by Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller.
The Local Jobs for America Act, the largest job-creation plan yet proposed in Congress this year, would provide $100 billion to fund wages and benefits for a million workers who would otherwise be unemployed.
The presidents of the bipartisan National League of Cities and U.S. Conference of Mayors were on hand for Chairman Miller’s announcement yesterday, and voiced their immediate support for the plan.
From CivSource:
“Our research at the National League of Cities shows the ability of cities to meet their financial needs is now in jeopardy and will most likely worsen substantially through the rest of 2010,” Ronald Loveridge, mayor of Riverside, Calif. and President of the NLC, said in a statement. “The economy cannot recover quickly if cities falter, and so federal action now is essential.”
“Mayors know from experience that investment in metropolitan economies with direct funding to cities can create and save jobs and can do it quickly,” said Burnsville, Minn, Mayor and USCM President Elizabeth Kautz.
Jobs for America Now, the coalition of more than sixty national organizations including Working America, quickly endorsed the bill:
Jobs for America Now, the nation’s largest jobs coalition, today endorsed legislation by Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., and chair of the House Committee on Education and Labor, that would help put America back to work. Alan Charney, campaign manager of Jobs for America Now, issued the following statement:
“Besides passing health care reform, the most important thing Congress can do right now is to enact legislation that addresses the unemployment crisis in this country. We know that the economy remains weak and the private sector cannot generate enough jobs to put us on a safe and sure path to recovery. With this legislation, Congress is finally taking action to create jobs. We thank Chairman Miller for introducing legislation that will directly fund one million jobs. This is an important step to putting our country back to work.”
The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) applauded the bill for its support for local communities and schools:
As local, state and school district budgets are being decided for next year, this jobs bill will provide the vital help that communities need to keep teachers teaching, police fighting crime, and firefighters battling blazes. Local governments’ budget situations are dire, and this initiative is both a smart investment for our children and a boost to our economy.
The AFT is especially grateful that the proposal includes $23 billion to help school districts keep 250,000 education jobs. It will preserve the lifeline thrown to states in last year’s Recovery Act.
A child’s life moves on no matter the circumstances—there is no pause button on his or her education. Students need their teachers in classrooms, not on unemployment lines, and this new jobs measure will help keep educators in schools, where they belong.
By focusing assistance grants at the community level, the bill will help retain and create local jobs—increasing demand for the goods and services of local small businesses and spurring the recovery on America’s Main Streets.
The Economic Policy Institute’s Vice President Ross Eisenbrey wrote:
The Local Jobs for America Act is exactly the kind of bold response we need to address the worst jobs crisis since the Great Depression. Chairman Miller estimates that the legislation will directly save or create 1 million jobs, though the total impact will likely be even higher because of indirect job creation that happens when people have more money to spend at local businesses. The legislation would act quickly, creating jobs in counties across the country with a minimum of red tape.
The Local Jobs for America Act is an aggressive effort to help put Americans back to work. The House and Senate should act to quickly pass it and get it to the President’s desk for his signature, along with the full-year extension of unemployment compensation and Cobra health benefits that the Senate is poised to approve. We were pleased to have been able to help Chairman Miller develop this legislation, which is similar to proposals included in our American Jobs Plan.
At the Campaign for America’s Future Isaiah J. Poole posted This Jobs Bill Could Work:
The legislation acknowledges a fundamental truth that conservatives refuse to face: You cannot put the economy back on a stable growth path without significant direct government spending on jobs. That’s particularly true for urban areas, where the private sector job base was weak even before the current recession, and social services, which are facing devastating cuts in much of the country as state and local tax receipts dwindle.
Miller deserves credit for introducing legislation that at least elevates the jobs conversation where it should be, at a time when 15 million Americans, and especially the 6.1 million who have been out of work for more than six months, can’t afford to wait for the ephemeral promise of a private sector revival.
Tags: Jobs, Local Jobs for America Act
