Report from the Alliance for American Manufacturing

Report from the Alliance for American Manufacturing

During his campaign, the President promised the American people he would implement tax reform, mitigate our unfair trade policies and begin a long-overdue process of repairing United States infrastructure needs.

A new tax policy has been enacted, and the President has taken major steps to change the landscape of unfair free trade by declaring tariffs of 25 percent on imported steel and 10 percent on imported aluminum. This is an ongoing process and it may be many months before we see a definitive result on trade rules.

But, the administration’s infrastructure plan has been left somewhere in a large pothole and will not be addressed until 2019. The President will have been in office for more than two years before even getting to first base on an infrastructure program.

Americans will get a more aggressive look at our failing infrastructure this summer during vacation travels by auto, train and airplane. And these are just the transportation components of our infrastructure.

The one main issue that both Republicans and Democrats agree upon is the dire need to invest in America’s crumbling infrastructure.

Making a major investment in infrastructure would provide a substantial boost to our economy and create jobs especially if Buy America preferences are applied, which the President also pledged he would implement.

A 2014 report by Duke University researchers estimated that a long-term transportation bill worth $114 billion annually would create 2.5 million new jobs.  Since moving into the White House, the President  could have already created more than 900,000 jobs and produced a much healthier economy, if he would have seriously addressed an infrastructure program during his first few months in office.

The next time the President travels to one of his many luxurious golf courses, he should travel by car, train or commercial airline. He would then get a first-hand look at why he needs to quickly try to make America’s infrastructure something he can be as proud of as he is of his many, well-manicured and heavily-funded country clubs.

Jeff Bonior, Staff Writer for the Alliance for American Manufacturing

Let’s Not Have Any More Paul Ryans Keeping Us from a Secure Retirement

House Speaker Paul Ryan has announced that he will retire at the end of his term. His decision to remain in the position until January 2019, means that he will be eligible for his annual Federal Employees Retirement System pension of $84,930 in two years, once he reaches age 50. 

At that time, he will join the 23 percent of all American workers who have a defined-benefit pension plan. 

Ryan’s pension ensures that he will be financially secure in retirement. But, he cares little about the millions of Americans who are not as fortunate. 

The vast majority of retirees rely heavily on their Social Security benefits, averaging $15,983 annually in 2015, to stay out of poverty. And, of course, Paul Ryan consistently fought for “entitlement reform,” which would mean an even less secure retirement for millions of Americans by deeply cutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Instead of helping working families achieve retirement security, he sought to privatize and slash the earned benefit programs we rely on. 

We must not let this Congress or the next Congress further attempts to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. In fact, we should be expanding these programs. We can advance our agenda by supporting candidates who truly understand the challenges facing working people and who will fight to help us.

If we all stand together this November, we can send a strong message to politicians who protect their own retirement security, but threaten ours. 

Robert Roacch, Jr.

Robert Roach, Jr. is president of the Alliance for Retired Americans.  He was previously General Secretary‐Treasurer of the IAMAW.  For more information, visit www.retiredamericans.org.

Yes, Elections and Voting Matters!

There have been some recent activities regarding workers and unions that should concern all workers and retirees.

The Supreme Court recently ruled that employers can require non-union employees to sign mandatory arbitration agreements that, in effect, take away the rights of these workers to file and pursue class actions in court.  Simply put, this means that claims of discrimination and other claimed violations of law, would require the workers to go through private arbitration rather than collective legal action. The President’s recent  appointment of Neil Gorsuch provided the swing vote against workers (Epic Systems v Lewis).

I had mentioned in previous writings that, we must be concerned about the appointment of Federal Court Judges that could erode the rights of workers. Think about it... How many future appointments of the Supreme Court and the lower courts will be open in the coming years?  It is estimated that there may be over 80 lower court openings and possible Supreme Court openings in the near future. The conservatives and big money interests have been and are reviewing the ideology of pending potential candidates for possible Federal Court openings. 

There is another major case pending before the Supreme Court that is expected to be ruled on soon (Janus v AFSCME). This case involves giving public employees, represented by a union, the right to refuse to pay their fair share for the benefit of union representation, in other words, “free riders.” Think about it... The supporters of this action actually support the right to refuse to pay for benefits and rights they are receiving. Let’s hope the court does the right thing and rejects this idea. It is meant to weaken and decrease the financial ability of public employee unions to represent their members and reduce wages and benefits.

Bill Gibbons, PACE Representative

difundiendo las noticias

Del escritorio del Presidente, difundiendo las noticias

Todos tenemos que prestar atención e informar a otros acerca de un anuncio reciente del Tesoro de los Estados Unidos.  Esperan pedir prestado $955 mil millones este año fiscal casi el doble de lo que fue prestado el año pasado.  La CBO dijo que los recibos de impuestos serán más bajos debido a la nueva ley de impuestos.  Esta será la primera vez que el endeudamiento por primera vez saltará tanto en un tiempo sin recesión desde que Ronald Regan fue presidente. El Tesoro pronostica un aumento adicional de más de MIL MILLONES de dólares cada año durante los próximos dos años.

No soy un adivino, pero tengo muy claro que más pronto que tarde, el Congreso se sentirá obligado a tratar con este tema del aumento de la deuda. 
Con el aumento de los préstamos, creo que esta administración está estableciendo a personas de la tercera edad para que sean elegidos como los caídos por el aumento de déficits y querrán venir a buscarnos con recortes a la Seguridad Social y Medicare.

SOAR no puede quedarse sentado y esperar que el Congreso actúe y luego responda. 
Necesitamos comenzar ahora mismo a educar a nuestros miembros, informar al público y comenzar a movilizar a nuestros miembros para que se detengan, lo que estoy seguro sucederá; un asalto a Medicare y Seguridad Social que afectará severamente nuestro nivel de vida y nuestra atención médica también.

Si hacemos nuestro trabajo de informar a nuestros miembros y otras personas mayores sobre esta amenaza verdadera a nuestro nivel de vida, estaremos preparados para defenderlo y poder movilizarnos y trabajar con otros grupos que compartan nuestros intereses. 
SOAR: trabaje para derrotar cualquier intento de echarle la culpa a los déficits a la tercera edad y ponerlo donde realmente le corresponde, con una mala política impositiva.

Bill Pienta, Presidente de SOAR traducción de Dorine Godinez, Presidente Capítulo 30-18

SOAR President Spreading the News

Spreading the News

We all need to pay attention and inform others about a recent announcement from the United States Treasury. They expect to borrow $955 billion this fiscal year (almost double what was borrowed last year.) The Congressional Budget Office said tax receipts will be lower because of the new tax law. This will be the first time borrowing will jump this much in non-recession time since Ronald Reagan was president. The Treasury forecasts additional borrowing of over a BILLION dollars each year for the next two years. 

I am not a fortune teller but it is pretty clear to me that, sooner rather than later, Congress will feel compelled to deal with this issue of rising debt. With the increased borrowing I believe this administration is setting up Senior Citizens to be cast as the fall guy for the increased deficits and will want to come after us with cuts to Social Security and Medicare.  

SOAR cannot sit back and wait for Congress to act and then respond. We need to begin right now by  educating our members, informing the public and to start mobilizing our members to stop, what I am sure will happen, an assault on Medicare and Social Security that will severely impact our standard of living and our healthcare as well. 

If we do our job of informing our members and other seniors about this real threat to our standard of living, we will be prepared to defend it and be able to mobilize and work with other groups that share our interest. SOAR must work to defeat any attempt to put the blame of deficits on the backs of Senior Citizens and put it where it really belongs, on lousy tax policy.

Bill Pienta, SOAR President

You're on Your Own Without a Union

Supreme Court to American Workers: You’re on Your Own Without a Union

In the May 21, 2018 decision in the case titled Epic Systems v. Lewis, the United States Supreme Court, unintentionally, showed that belonging to a union is the only remaining way for workers to fight back against an employer who has violated federal labor laws.  

For nearly 100 years, federal labor laws have afforded all workers the right to collaboratively improve workplace issues and seek redress for mistreatment by their employer.

For union members, this means having a grievance process to address alleged mistreatment by an employer, and the ability to collectively bargain the terms and conditions of our employment.  

For non-unionized workers, “act(ing) collectively” had long included the right of workers to join together and pursue class action lawsuits against an employer who had:  

•    harassed and discriminated against workers based on their race, gender, and  

     sexual identity;

•    intentionally underfunded employee pension plans; 

•    mismanaged employee 401k plans;

•    denied pay to workers they intentionally misclassified, 

•    and more.

However, in their 5-4 decision in May 2018, the Supreme Court dealt a major setback to non-union workers who have been mistreated by their employer.  The court’s decision will allow employers to “bar workers from joining forces in legal actions over problems in the workplace (Supreme Court Deals a Blow to Workers, nytimes.com, 5/21/2018).”

Moving forward, employers can demand that potential employees waive their right to participate in class action lawsuits as a condition of employment.  

Said simply, if you work for an employer who has underpaid, harassed or discriminated against you, or refused to pay you the wages you’ve earned – unless you’re in a union, you are on your own.  

Julie Stein, SOAR Director

Magnus Carlson