|
Labor Day 2004
IT’S HIGH
TIME FOR TRUTH
IN HIGH PLACES
By Edward Gorham
President
Maine AFL-CIO
Labor Day is traditionally a time to look back at the long history of
organized labor and to recognize our many achievements from the 40-hour
week and overtime pay to improved job safety and pension protection.
Organized labor has, over a century, won many battles that have
improved the lives of all workers and working families – both union and
non-union. We have also been the leaders in a series of major legislative
social achievements that have greatly improved the quality of American
life from free public education to Social Security and Medicare.
Unfortunately, this is not only a time to look back, picnic with our
families and recognize our achievements.
A Time for
Action
This is a time for action.
The years of the Bush Administration, which was installed in office
in 2001 by a 5 to 4 vote of the Supreme Court, have been ones of
unparalleled attacks on workers, working families and unions.
Our national President John Sweeney put it well when he said, saying
Bush has “pulled the rug out from under America’s working people and
rolled out a red carpet for the wealthy and giant corporations.”
AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka has traveled the country
from one end to the other and has remarked the working men and women
nationwide are “very angry.”
Workers Are
Angry
And not only workers and unions are angry. The actions and policies
of Bush and the Bush administration have deeply disturbed Americans in all
walks of life from retired generals and foreign service officers to
economists and even many business leaders.
Beyond the strong American feeling that this country “is going in the
wrong direction” is the growing public knowledge that the Bush and the
Bush Administration are characteristically unable to tell the truth on a
wide range of issues from Iraq to the issues impacting workers. This is,
quite probably, the only Administration in the entire history of the
United States to have an entire database devoted to its untruths, lies and
misleading statements.
On the campaign trail Bush has been and still is bragging about
“calling on Congress to provide more money for job training.” The fact is
that, between 2001 and 2003 Bush made demands to cut $1 billion out
of funding for job training and vocational education.
A Swamp of Deceit
It is not only about worker and labor issues that Bush and
his Administration have created a swamp of deceit.
In pushing Congress to pass its controversial Medicare bill,
President Bush promised that “corporations have no intention to what they
call ‘dump retirees’” from their existing prescription drug coverage. But
according to a report by Bush’s own health officials millions will be cut
off from their existing drug coverage because of the new Medicare law.
According to government documents obtained by the New York Times, the
Bush Administration now estimates “that employers will reduce or eliminate
prescription drug benefits for 3.8 million retirees when Medicare offers
such coverage in 2006.” That represents one-third of all the retirees with
employer-sponsored drug coverage. Medicare’s new benefits are often less
comprehensive than those offered by employers.
Working to
Cut Off Seniors
Even while Bush was reassuring the nation about the Medicare bill, he
was actually working to create an incentive for employers to cut off
seniors from existing coverage. According to the Wall Street Journal, the
Administration quietly added “a little-noticed provision” to the bill that
allows companies to severely reduce - or almost completely terminate -
their retirees’ drug coverage “without losing out on the new subsidy.”
In other words, the President did not just break his promise to sign a
bill that prevents seniors from losing their existing drug coverage. He
actually acted to reward companies who cut off their retirees with a
lavish new tax break. The companies that lobbied for the provision donated
almost $140,000 in hard money and $2.5 million in soft money to Bush and
his party since 2000.
Wages Down
Not Up
For some months the Bush administration has cited recent jobs numbers
to claim that average workers' paychecks are increasing. Vice President
Cheney said, "real incomes and wages are growing." But as new studies
show, wages have actually decreased for the average worker, even as
corporate profits and CEO pay have exploded.
According to the Economic Policy Institute, while corporate profits
have risen by more than 62%, workers' take home pay has dropped by 0.6%.
Jobs Pay 21% Less
This follows an earlier report which shows that industries
currently adding jobs pay 21% less than industries that are slashing jobs.
Despite this wage crisis, President Bush pushed to cut off an estimated 8
million workers from overtime pay protections, and supports efforts to
outsource even more well-paid American jobs.
Meanwhile, he refuses to raise the minimum wage, despite new research
showing a minimum wage hike would not adversely affect businesses or
consumers.
The story, of course, is different for the president's wealthy
campaign donors. A recent study shows CEO pay exploded by 27% in just one
year, all while the President lavished more than $1 trillion in new tax
breaks on the richest 1% of the population.
To put the contrast into dollars, the average worker takes home $517
a week and will receive about $400 in tax breaks from President Bush. At
the same time, the average CEO takes home $155,769 a week and this year
alone received well over $50,000 in new tax breaks from Bush.
Job Totals Drop
Bush continues to talk about the American economy “turning
the corner” despite the fact that job creation in June dropped to only
32,000 new jobs. Since Bush took office, the nation has lost 2.6 million
jobs and Maine has lost the highest percentage of manufacturing jobs in
the nation.
Bush brags that in the last year some 1.5 million new jobs have been
created. This unjustified optimism ignores two facts. One, is that the
nation must create 150,000 new jobs each month just to keep up with the
population growth in the size of our workforce. Second, the quality, pay
and benefits of the “new jobs” are nowhere near that of the ones we have
lost.
New Jobs – Low Pay
Most of the job gains have been in service industries with
widely varying pay scales, some quite low. In effect, the nation has been
swapping well-paying factory jobs for positions in restaurants, hotels,
hospitals, banks, insurance firms and temp agencies.
Democratic Presidential Candidate Sen. John Kerry rightly points to a
study showing that jobs in the growing industries pay on average $9,160
less per year than jobs in contracting industries.
Not only that but permanent layoffs during the Bush years occurred at
the second fastest rate since the Great Depression of the 1930s. A
government survey shows that during the Bush years 11.4 million men and
women age 20 or older were permanently laid off. This 8.7 percent layoff
rate is almost as high as the 9 percent rate during the 1981-83 recession
and is the second highest on record.
Cannot Be
Trusted
Bush policies have devastated the national economy, created a massive
national debt, cost millions of workers jobs and income and pumped tax
break money into the pockets of the already rich.
But the crisis the nation faces in this election is far more than a
union issue and even far more than a working family issue. It is the
pressing need to get rid of a President and an Administration that has
frequently abundantly proven that it cannot be trusted.
Administration Is Dishonest
Oddly enough it is the Republican son of former President
Ronald Reagan who perhaps puts it most forcefully in a long article in the
September issue of Esquire when he says,
“Politicians will stretch the truth. They'll exaggerate their
accomplishments, paper over their gaffes. Spin has long been the lingua
franca of the political realm. But George W. Bush and his administration
have taken ‘normal’ mendacity to a startling new level far beyond lies of
convenience. On top of the usual massaging of public perception, they
traffic in big lies, indulge in any number of symptomatic small lies, and,
ultimately, have come to embody dishonesty itself. They are a lie. And
people, finally, have started catching on.”
Ron Reagan also notes that even as more Americans wake up and “catch
on,” it does not “guarantee” that Bush will lose the election November 2.
As workers, as unionists, as supporters of a better life for
all working families and, most importantly, as Americans, we must do
everything within our power to assure that Bush, like his father, is a
one-term President.
********************************** |