Support U.S. jobs, tell Congress to fully reauthorize the Export-Import Bank which provides vital financing for U.S. manufacturing — particularly the aerospace industry, export growth, and good paying jobs.

Many states are shortchanging the unemployed by distributing unemployment benefits on debit cards loaded with extraneous fees.

Prepaid bank cards provide the jobless easy access to their beneifts and can help those without a bank account avoid check cashing fees and the risk of carrying cash. However, Big Banks are stinging too many unemployed Americans with unnecessary and poorly disclosed fees - per use fees, ATM fees, balance inquiry fees, customer service fees, overdraft fees, denied transaction fees and others. Some banks have even been known to place monetary holds on benefits that last for up to a week!

The fees are being charged by some of the very same banks responsible for the economic crisis.

Big Banks should not be allowed to turn unemployment benefits into a profit center. The unemployed should have access to every penny they get.

Tell your state lawmakers to stop unemployment insurance debit card fees today!
 

Last year Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) introduced H.R. 494, the 21st Century Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Act, a bill to reinstate the 1933 New Deal program put in place during the Great Depression. However, the bill is just sitting in the House Education and Workforce Committee.

The $16 billion proposal envisions a renewed emphasis on putting unemployed and underemployed Americans to work immediately planting trees, ending erosion, preventing forest fires and massive flooding and improving rural communities.

The former CCC program is credited for putting more than 2.5 million unemployed Americans back to work conserving and developing America’s natural resources. A modern-day CCC would put millions of unemployed and underemployed Americans back to work immediately and help get our country on the road to recovery.
 

The House-approved Ryan Budget aims to slash $33 billion in food stamp funding - at a time when Americans need them most.

Food stamp usage has reached historic levels as more and more people find themselves without work, and, consequently, no means for feeding their family. One in every seven Americans now rely on the program, now known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), to survive.

The Ryan Budget would also change SNAP to a block grant. The problem with a block grant is it's a fixed amount; it doesn’t expand as the need for emergency food increases – in times like these, for instance. If the fixed amount fails to meet state needs, states may be forced to ration the benefit.

Job-creating legislation to increase funding for harbor dredging and maintenance is awaiting final changes by U.S. House and Senate conferees.

Both chambers have approved H.R. 4348, an overall transportation bill that includes the Realize America’s Maritime Promise (RAMP) Act. The RAMP Act is an amendment to ensure funds designated for commercial harbor dredging and maintenance are used for that purpose. But both chambers must agree on a unified version before final passage.

The Harbor Maintenance Trust Fund currently has enough money to dredge all of the nation’s deep-draft ports and waterways. But only half of the $1.6 billion in taxes collected each year is utilized for the original intent of the fund.

Send a letter to Congress urging final passage of the RAMP Act today!
 

Senators Frank Lautenberg, Tom Harkin, John Reed, Bernie Sanders and Richard Blumenthal have introduced S. 1517, the 21st Century Works Progress Administration (WPA) Act, a bill to reinstate the 1935 New Deal program which provided 8.5 million jobs during the Great Depression.

However, the bill is just sitting in the Senate Finance Committee.

S. 1517 authorizes $250 billion to employ individuals who have been unemployed longer than 60 days. Workers would be hired for a host of public works projects, including residential and commercial building weatherization; highway, bridge and rail repairs; school, library and firehouse construction; and manufacturing projects. The program would be paid for through an excise tax on millionaires of 5.4 percent.

A 21st century WPA is the answer to putting millions of unemployed Americans back to work immediately and getting our country on the road to recovery.

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) has introduced new sweeping legislation to restore the U.S. economy, revitalize the middle class, put unemployed and underemployed Americans back to work and help our nation compete globally.

The Rebuild America Act includes a litany of pro-worker measures including a provision to save and create jobs, modernize our nation’s infrastructure, create a national manufacturing strategy, pursue fair trade, give more workers the right to join a union, increase the minimum wage and make sure it rises with the cost of living, require employers offer paid sick days, improve the private retirement system, strengthen Social Security and support great teachers.

The Rebuild America Act is intended to do exactly that - rebuild America. Tell Congress to pass the Rebuild America Act today!
 

The time has come for a modern day revamp of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's 1935 Works Progress Administration (WPA), a public works program enacted during the Great Depression.

 

At a total cost of $10.5 billion - the equivalent of $130.9 billion today - the WPA rescued a nation from the Great Depression and saved 8.6 million Americans from the pangs of poverty and destitution.

 

We did it once. Let's do it now!

Tell the White House and Congress to enact a 21st century WPA immediately.

Unemployment benefits were extended until the end of 2012 – but not without adding insult to injury.

Congress passed the extension as part of a larger payroll tax cut deal, but included in the legislation Republican-led measures to cut the duration of benefits by 26 weeks and drug test the unemployed.

The GOP's ruthless attack on people - jobless through no fault of their own - has got to end. Tell Congress to restore the maximum weeks of unemployment benefits and repeal the newly-passed provisions to drug test the unemployed today!

Congress is threatening to withhold funding for the US Export-Import Bank. At stake is a deal for $3.4 billion in loan guarantees that will allow Air India to finance the purchase of 27 U.S.-built Boeing 787s.

The Invest in American Jobs Act of 2011 (H.R. 3533) strengthens Buy America requirements for investments in U.S. transportation and infrastructure projects. The bill ensures that the steel, iron, and manufactured goods used to construct projects financed by U.S. taxpayers are produced in the United States.  Democrats are calling on Republicans to include the stronger Buy America requirements in a long-term surface transportation reauthorization currently being crafted.

If Congress fails to act, DoD will be forced to take a meat-axe to procurement, health care, pensions and personnel costs. Already, deficit hawks in Washington are pressing for 301 fewer F-35 Joint Strike Fighters, terminating the Littoral Combat Ship, stopping production of 16 planned DDG-51 destroyers, cutting 236,000 civilian personnel, and increasing premiums for TRICARE, the department’s health care system.

Policymakers must focus on creating jobs, hiring workers and investing in our industrial base - not chipping away at the very programs that have made this nation so great.

The Regulatory Accountability Act (RAA) calls for drastic changes to the Administrative Procedure Act, a cornerstone of the U.S. legal system that has served Americans well for more than 60 years. The bill acts as a kind of "super-mandate," overriding decades of labor, health, safety, and environmental laws by putting corporate bottom lines ahead of public and worker safety.

Without immediate legislative action, the U.S. job market will continue to spiral, as will our country's economic sustainability. JOBS Now! is a comprehensive strategy for creating jobs - immediately - through the passage of a national jobs package focused on the U.S. manufacturing and transportation sectors.

Hire US, America demands policies that discourage the outsourcing of American jobs, creates a national industrial policy, creates a Works Progress Administration-style jobs program, extends unemployment insurance benefits, uses discretionary funds to create emergency job creation programs in communities with the highest levels of unemployment and builds a revitalized, green economy by investing in green jobs.

President Obama's American Jobs Act includes proposals to prohibit employers from discriminating against the unemployed, revive U.S. infrastructure by putting construction workers back to work, and extend unemployment insurance benefits. Relief for the economic pains that trouble the jobless is long overdue.

The Mica-Shuster "Competition for Intercity Passenger Rail in America Act", would not only privatize the Northeast Corridor. It also would encourage private operators to replace Amtrak on long distance and state supported services. It would also foster contracting out of existing Amtrak services, like ticketing and on-board dining. It would result in the elimination of most, if not all, medium and long distance routes, since there would be no funding if the new operator couldn't run the service cheaply.

The end of America's Space Shuttle shouldn't mean unemployment for the dedicated space program workers. America needs a fully-funded successor to the Shuttle program that keeps America a leader in space.

The American Jobs Act includes payroll tax cuts, tax credits and tax relief for businesses. Meant to increase consumer demand next yar,. these $253 billion proposals don't affect the unemployed. That $253 billion would be better spent hiring unemployed Americans in a modern day version of Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) or Works Progress Administration (WPA).

Ask your Representative and Senators to sponsor a joint resolution creating new rights for all Americans -- a right to a job, a right to earn a living, a right to a decent home, a right to a secure retirement and a right to a good education. Let's start to make FDR's Second Bill of Rights a reality.