This economy doesn’t work for working people. Instead of creating good jobs to compete in the global economy, we’ve given free rein to corporations, cut taxes on the wealthy and reduced protections for workers. Americans are working harder and getting less for it. Wages are stagnant. Costs for housing, health care and home heating oil have skyrocketed. Millions of Americans are living paycheck-to-paycheck and are only a serious illness or personal crisis away from poverty. While CEOs pocket tax cuts, bonuses and stock options, working Americans worry about credit card payments and the price of a tank of gas.
We need to change course. Conservatives say everyone is on their own, but that’s never been true about America. We’re all in this together, and we all do better when the benefits of prosperity are widely shared. We need new policies that put people first. We need to make sure work pays a living wage and that children aren’t forgotten when both parents are out of the house. We need to invest in areas vital to the future and reclaim the manufacturing prowess that made us the strongest economy in the world. Workers need real enforcement of labor laws so they can organize on the job and get a fair share of the profits they help generate. In an economy of unceasing change, we must ensure that health care and retirement plans are secure and cannot be lost because of a change in jobs. And we have to develop a trade strategy that works for the nation not just for the multinationals.
We’ve seen this before. When the new industrial economy was created at the turn of the last century, robber barons profited amidst the desperation of factory workers denied decent wages. Americans came together and created new rules—the forty-hour week, the right to organize, a minimum wage and worker health and safety provisions—that helped build the broad middle class that is the triumph of America. Now that middle class is being squeezed in the new global economy. We must come together again and create the rules and policies needed to empower people once more, and ensure the existence of the middle class glue that holds America together.
