Majority Agenda Project

Boston College sociologist, Charlie Derber is interviewed here by Eileen McCluskey on the "Voices Near & Far" cable TV program.

August 30, 2010–One Nation Working Together released a powerful and lyrical vision statement today: For Jobs, Justice and Education for All! Speaking to "peace abroad and jobs at home" and the need for a green economy, it quickly drew many "likes" on Facebook but also prompted one supportive but cautionary comment: "You know, we really need many nations working together." Here's the full text:

The noted peace movement thinker, Phyllis Bennis explains why she's supporting the One Nation Working Together mobilization:  "I think Oct 2nd is a great example of what it means for us as a peace movement to take on the dual challenges of both bringing our anti-war, anti-military budget messages to a much broader mobilization than our own, making the links about how the costs of war directly impact all the key issues around jobs, health care, the environment, housing, the economic crisis/recovery, etc., AND demonstrating our willingness/capacity to mobilize in support of the broad call around jobs etc. because it's important in its own right... 

Amid the disheartening economic news, folks taking a longer-term view of the economy point to ominous trends but they also findi signs of hope in new forms of organizing from abroad and even from some home-grown examples, like the freelancers union. This article by Peter Hall-Jones from last November's New Unionism introduces us to the "precariat":

As organizers and activists around the country gear up for the October 2, 2010 jobs march in D.C. there are startling signs that--absent a major new stimulus package--the economy is headed for a double dip. Last week's new unemployment claims numbers are out and they top 500,000. This prompted Nouriel Roubini, among the few mainstream economists to predict the current collapse, to tweet: "Unemployment claims up to 500K after optimists predicted all year they would fall below 400K. Labor market dismal & double dip risks rising..."

$7.13 trillion! Trillion! New York Times Magazine columnist Peter Maass cites new studies for the non-war costs of US carrier groups along major oil routes: over three decades, the cost of patrolling the Persian Gulf, in purely economic terms, amounted to $7.13 trillion. Of course, these costs are not figured into the price you pay at the pump, but you can be sure that's where your tax dollars go. Here's Maass' full essay from Foreign Policy magazine.

What are the real effects of long-term unemployment? The Wall Street Journal had an interesting article "Recession Strikes Deep Into Work Force."

"The nation's 9.7% unemployment rate tells only part of the recession's story, according to a new study that found more than half of adults in the U.S. labor force have suffered a spell of unemployment, a pay cut or reduction in work hours. Middle-age workers—50 to 64 years old—are most likely to have taken a hit in the last 30 months of the downturn, a group normally at the peak of its earning potential ...

"Those without jobs are enduring the longest spells of unemployment recorded in modern history. The typical unemployed worker today has been out of work for nearly six months, almost double the previous post-World War II peak—12.3 weeks in 1982-83...

"Long-term unemployment is associated with severe breaks in career paths and erosion in income, health and other aspects of well-being."

Rev. Jesse Jackson and United Auto Workers President Bob King issued the following statement at a July 12th press conference in Detroit.

DETROIT (July 12, 2010) No group has suffered more from America's economic meltdown than working men and women. The auto industry was decimated and workers paid the price. Urban America is in crisis and teachers, transportation workers, and all who do the hands-on work that make our cities run are the first to feel the effects of budget cuts. Unemployment continues at around 9.8%. Detroit is ground zero of this national crisis with an unemployment rate that is far higher. From December 2007 to June 2009, auto assembly and parts production accounted for 325,000 lost jobs. The auto industry has gone from a high of 1.5 million workers to 400,000 today.

In Appalachia and the Gulf, years of unenforced regulation, driven by corporate greed and government complicity, have led to needless deaths and destruction in the coal and oil fields.

How to take on the "coalition of the heartless, the clueless and the confused"?

Anemic job growth persists in June with little over 80,000 new private sector jobs created last month. Anticipating these numbers, several writers this week warned that the real deficit to address is the jobs deficit. Economics columnist, David Leonhardt, cautions that the US is cutting back public sector budgets at just the same time that the rest of the world's economies are cutting back – putting us on a sure path to a double-dip downtown. Who, after all, will create the demand needed to put people back to work?