Happy Labor Day 2022—Unions Win Elections
It will be a relief to celebrate Labor Day in 2022, knowing we have the pro-union Biden administration in charge. Democrats have not only created millions of jobs and reduced unemployment but have also understood the value of unions in promoting economic justice and interracial community. Today’s unions not only promote the enforcement of labor protections, increase pay for both union and nonunion members, and reduce income inequality, they also promote interracial solidarity by helping to institutionalize norms of fairness and equity.
Here’s an overview of the Biden administration’s achievements so far in supporting American workers.
The American Rescue Plan—signed by President Biden 3/11/2021
90 million Economic Impact Payments
Child Tax Credit
Homeowner Assistance & Rental Assistance
Employee Retention Credit and Paid Leave Credit
Improvements to Unemployment Insurance Program
Assisting with Health Insurance Premiums
Keeping Workers Safe
Executive Actions
Reversed Trump-era ban on worker training around systemic racism for federal contract workers. 1/20/2021
Fired the general counsel of the NLRB and installed someone who will better direct resources for the board. 1/21/2021 https://www.nlrb.gov/bio/general-counsel
Modernized DOL regulations related to the Davis-Bacon Act, which establishes a prevailing wage for construction workers on federally funded projects. Reversed Reagan-era rules that undermined the ability of the Department of Labor to accurately collect wage data. 3/11/2022
Increased the minimum wage for workers on federal contracts to $15 an hour. 4/27/2021
Provided student debt relief, including reforms and partial and total forgiveness, so workers’ wages aren’t consumed by decades of paying down student debt. 8/24/2022
Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act—signed by President Biden 11/15/2021
The AFL-CIO praised this law’s $1 trillion of investments in creating good union jobs to deliver these infrastructure improvements:
roads, bridges, transit, rail
climate change mitigation
electric vehicles
clean drinking water
high-speed internet
resilient transmission lines
and more!
The Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) highlighted these provisions:
Historic investment in modernizing our nation's crumbling transit infrastructure, including critical workforce development to ensure frontline transit workers are trained to safely repair, maintain, and operate vehicles with this new technology.
Also provides important protections and safety measures to help ensure transit workers are safe on the job.
The Communications Workers of America (CWA) mentioned these aspects of the bill:
$65 billion in the IIJA to support the expansion and affordability of broadband to help close the digital divide.
Emphasis on prioritizing broadband projects from employers who follow labor law, which means that the funding will create good, sustainable jobs.
The Electrical Workers (IBEW) believes the law will result in these benefits:
Usher in a new era of worker-centric prosperity—one characterized by good, union jobs that will put millions to work modernizing our electric grid.
Let IBEW lead the way in building out the charging infrastructure needed for the wide-scale adoption of electric vehicles, buses, trains, and trucks, continuing the critical role of power professionals who build and maintain the grid that makes life in America possible.
CHIPS & Science Act—signed by President Biden 8/9/2022
Semiconductor products are critical to our economic and national security and rank as the fifth largest US export sector, providing roughly 250,000 US jobs directly and over a million indirectly. However, at the present time, the U.S. share of chip supply to the world is only about 10 percent.
For the US to restore world leadership in chipmaking, it is imperative to increase domestic advanced semiconductor nanomanufacturing capacity and capability.
The Act Includes $200 million towards a dedicated workforce and education fund.
The bill represents a comprehensive approach to competition with China and takes on China’s unfair trade practices.
“The science title of this bill boosts critical research funding for the National Science Foundation and other agencies, and directs the foundation to incorporate labor organizations into its ‘programmatic work’ as stakeholders,” according to Amanda Ballantyne, director of the AFL-CIO Technology Institute.
Inflation Reduction Act—signed by President Biden 8/16/2022
Create Clean Energy Jobs
Incentivize prevailing wages
Stop companies from ripping off workers
Make it in America
Make the Tax Code Fairer
Crack down on millionaires, billionaires, and corporations that evade their obligations, and make sure the largest corporations pay their fair share.
Ensure that no family making less than $400,000 per year will see their taxes go up by a single cent.
Revitalize American Manufacturing
Build American clean energy supply chains by incentivizing domestic production in clean energy technologies like solar, wind, carbon capture, and clean hydrogen.
Support American workers with targeted tax incentives aimed at manufacturing US-sourced products.
Strengthen America’s manufacturing base.
Provide bonus credits to employers who use prevailing wages and apprenticeships, ensuring that federal tax policy supports good-paying, high-skilled jobs.
Create good-paying union jobs in energy communities. Clean energy tax credits will be increased by 10 percent if the clean energy projects are established in communities that have previously relied upon the extraction, processing, transport, or storage of coal, oil, or natural gas as a significant source of employment.
Lower Healthcare Costs
FACT SHEET: The Inflation Reduction Act Supports Workers and Families - The White House, 8/18/22
Other References & Resources
Labor Action Tracker: (Cornell University) Follow labor actions by region and by industry
Labor Notes is a media and organizing project that has been the voice of union activists who want to put the movement back in the labor movement since 1979.
Republicans Say They’ll Go After Labor Movement If They Take Control of House , Truthout, 8/22/22
White House Task Force on Worker Organizing and Empowerment Report, White House, Feb. 2022
America Is in the Midst of a Dramatic Labor Resurgence | The New Republic, Oct 2021
Approval of Labor Unions at Highest Point Since 1965, Gallup, Sept 2021
Labor Day: How unions promote racial solidarity in the United States - Equitable Growth, Sept 2021
Unions help reduce disparities and strengthen our democracy | Economic Policy Institute, April 2021
Democrats peg inflation to corporate greed on campaign trail | The Hill, 8/22/2021