Franken joins labor leaders to support job creation

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.workdayminnesota.org/index.php?news_6_4320

By Michael Moore 15 January 2010

WASHINGTON - Speaking directly to 20,000 unemployed Americans, including an estimated 3,000 from his home state, U.S. Senator Al Franken pledged Friday to make job creation “our first priority and our second priority and our third priority” in the Senate this year.


U.S. Senator Al Franken

The Minnesota Democrat joined AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka and Karen Nussbaum, executive director of Working America, on a nationwide conference call to address the jobs crisis. Franken and Trumka answered questions from unemployed workers, and members of the media were allowed to listen in.

Franken acknowledged that efforts to pass health insurance reform have delayed Congress from turning its full attention to the jobs crisis. “We just need to focus and do this,” he said.

Economists claim the nation’s recovery from the recession that began in December 2007 is in full swing, but nationwide unemployment stands at 10 percent – higher if you count the under-employed and workers who have given up on looking for jobs. Unemployment in Minnesota stands at 7.4 percent.

The lag in job creation has some dubbing this a “jobless recovery” – an idea Franken called “absurd.”

“A true economic recovery is one that can provide good-paying jobs for middle-class Americans,” he said. “Jobs that will provide real security and protection for working families – that’s what America needs.”

Franken outlined a handful of steps Congress can take to create those jobs, including:

• Giving employers tax credits for hiring new workers.

As an example, Franken pointed to the Minnesota Emergency Employment Development Program, known as MEED. Developed during the farm crisis of the 1980s, MEED provided state subsidies to employers for hiring unemployed workers who had run out of their unemployment benefits. MEED put 42,000 Minnesotans to work, mostly in private-sector jobs.

“It created incentives for businesses, the jump start they needed to start hiring people,” Franken said. “This is a program I think we can take from Minnesota’s past and bring it to Congress.”

FULL story at link.

[MineralMan]

1. You go, Al!

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

2. I've been re-reading

'Lying Lies and the Liars that tell them' or whatever the title is. :)
He puts all the crap the Repubs have been throwing out in proper perspective and really should be committed to memory for those of us on this aide of the aisle. The next time you hear about how Al Gore lies, or Clinton left us with a deficit or any of that crap, Al's book provides the real story. Glad he's in Congress. Here's hoping he accumulates enough allies to have an effect on policy.............

[timeforpeace]

3. Might make even more sense for him to join the job creators to promote job creation.

[Omaha Steve]

4. Kick