This week, the Labor Movement and allies are calling for a week of action October 10-16 to create and keep good jobs. To learn more about the America Wants to Work campaign demands, check out the 6 pillars to create & keep good jobs.

Many Jobs with Justice coalitions are organizing actions this week at Verizon Wireless and Apple stores to support CWA & IBEW members bargaining with Verizon.  The Student Labor Action Project is leading a National Day of Action October 14 in the fight for full and fair employment as students take action to support workers at Verizon.  Others are coordinating efforts with local “occupy” protests, and putting pressure on members of the so-called “super-committee” to let them know we can’t balance the budget on the backs of working people.

Click here to find an America Wants to Work action near you next week and here for information on the Oct. 12 National Teach-In.  Follow the action on Twitter with the hashtag #want2work.

There are still over 15 million unemployed Americans, nearly 6 job-seekers for each opening, and about 100,000 workers entering the job market each month.  Public services and education are being wiped out.  Corporate greed and Wall Street recklessness put the squeeze on working people and have created the worst economic crisis in a generation.  Big corporations shipped jobs overseas and Wall Street speculators took more and more of our wealth, getting rich quickly at the expense of workers and families.

But this is not news.

What has developed is the upsurge of workers, youth, and the communities we all live in to Occupy Wall Street, and to be in solidarity with these actions around the country.  This momentum came just in time, as workers around the country have begun to fight back in bigger and more coordinated ways—understanding that the fight is over who has control over what happens in our workplaces and our communities — working people or Wall Street corporations.

Last winter in Wisconsin and

Continue reading Building a United Movement to Make Wall Street Pay

Today, in cities across the U.S., communities are coming together to stop H.R. 2164, legislation presented by Texas Congressman Lamar Smith.  H.R. 2164 would make it mandatory for nearly every employer in the U.S. to use a computer program to access an error-prone government database to verify whether or not a job applicant is eligible to work before any worker could start a new job through a process known as “e-verify.”  This legislation is expected to be taken up by the House Judiciary committee for markup tomorrow.

E-Verify will hurt all businesses and the fragile economy, and will leave workers more vulnerable to abuse on the job by giving unscrupulous employers yet another tool to use against workers who try to stand up for their rights.

TAKE ACTION NOW!  Tell Congress to Stop E-Verify

E-Verify will place a significant burden on small businesses, raising their costs even as they are struggling in this economy. Almost every business—no matter how small—will be forced to implement this complicated system.  The estimated cost to

Continue reading Tell Congress: No More Red Tape! Stop Job-Killing E-Verify Legislation

Today, in cities across the U.S., communities are coming together to educate and take collective action to stop H.R. 2164, legislation presented by Texas Congressman Lamar Smith.  H.R. 2164 will make the use of E-Verify mandatory for nearly every employer in the United States.  This legislation is expected to be taken up by the House Judiciary committee for markup at the end of this week.

Mandatory E-Verify is a jobs killer. It is bad for working people, bad for business and bad for the economy.  That is why community leaders, small business owners, and workers are speaking out today against the E-Verify program.

In Portland, Portland Jobs with Justice will join community leaders in a press conference telling Congress that forcing employers to use the flawed E-Verify system will harm U.S. workers and employers and undercut the country’s economic recovery.

A mandatory E-Verify system would require employers to perform a computer check for every job applicant

Continue reading Communities United as Part of National Day of Action Against E-Verify

Our country is facing the worst economic crisis of a generation. Big corporations shipped jobs overseas and Wall Street speculators took more and more of our wealth, getting rich quickly at the expense of workers and families. People are struggling and workers are angry and frustrated. Too many people cannot find good jobs and too many jobs don’t pay enough to support a family. Workers and communities are being divided as immigrant workers and public employees are scapegoated and blamed for the economic crisis caused by unregulated corporate greed.

At Jobs with Justice, we know that good jobs are the cornerstone of strong, healthy, happy communities. A good job is one where workers have collective bargaining rights, employment security, and wages and benefits that allow their families to enjoy a decent standard of living and earn a fair share of the wealth produced by their labor.

Last year, one in five American adults worked in jobs that paid poverty-level wages. Right now, not only are there are not enough jobs to go around, there are not enough of the good jobs we need to get our economy going again.

Continue reading The Fight for Good Jobs

Today’s dismal jobs report reminds us that we’re in a jobs emergency requiring bold federal action.

Tell Congress: Tax Wall Street to heal Main Street, and put America back to work

Our communities are devastated by foreclosures and unemployment.  Corporate-funded politicians are gutting services and attacking worker rights, claiming our state and national governments are broke – while Wall Street and corporate CEOs are getting record bonuses and sitting on record cash reserves (and often paying little or nothing in taxes).  Despite massive fraud and reckless greed that wrecked our economy, throwing millions of Americans out of work and out of their homes, not a single Wall Street “bankster” has gone to jail.

The fight back is growing!

Yesterday, National Nurses United (NNU) led a National Day of Action in more than 60 cities, supported by Jobs with Justice coalitions and other allies, demanding a Financial Speculation Tax (FST) which could pay for millions of good jobs, making Wall Street speculators pay for some of the damage they caused

Continue reading We need jobs! Tell Congress: Tax Wall Street to Heal Main Street

Responding to the continuing massive jobs deficit, Chicago Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky proposed to create 2 million jobs, introducing the “Emergency Jobs to Restore the American Dream Act.”  Surrounded by Chicago JwJ coalition leaders and other groups, Schakowsky declared:

“Unlike the long disproven claims that more tax breaks for wealthy corporations will lead to more employment, I have a bill that will actually work.  How can we guarantee this bill will get 2 million people back to work?  By hiring them!”

The proposal, which could be more than paid for by taxing millionaires or financial speculation, establishes:

1)      School Improvement Corps – Creates 400,000 construction and 250,000 maintenance jobs through new funding to public school districts for needed school rehabilitation improvements ($100 billion)

2)      Park Improvement Corps – Creates 100,000 jobs for youth between the ages of 16 and 25 through new funding to the Department of the Interior and the USDA Forest Servi

ce’s Public Lands Corps Act. Conservation projects

Continue reading Brother can you spare 2 million jobs? Emergency Jobs Bill proposed.

Arizona and Wisconsin may seem like a world apart. But they have more in common than you think. In these states and many others, working people – immigrant and native-born alike – are under fierce attack by corporate-backed politicians.

From Arizona laws that mandate racial profiling to Wisconsin laws that strip workers’ rights to collectively bargain for a middle class way of life, working families everywhere are under assault. Corporate CEOs and the politicians they finance benefit from creating a toxic environment where immigrants, public employees and working men and women are scapegoated for all the problems we face. They tell us immigrants steal our jobs – hoping we forget the millions of American jobs they ship overseas. They say firefighters and policemen are overpaid – hoping we ignore Wall Street’s colossal bonuses, million-dollar salaries and endless corporate greed. They say immigrants don’t pay taxes – hoping we don’t notice that corporations like GE and Exxon Mobil rake in billions in profit and pay nothing

Continue reading Workers must unite for better immigration policy

One year ago, what was long known to be a laboratory for the Right also became recognized as an epicenter for human rights efforts today. On April 23, 2010 Arizona Governor Jan Brewer signed SB1070 into law, elevating the state of Arizona into the national spotlight as both the capitol of prejudice and the heart of a vibrant migrant and human rights movement.  While Russell Pearce, Sheriff Arpaio, and Jan Brewer entered the courts to defend their unconstitutional and inhumane work, families, neighbors, workers, people of faith, and students mobilized in the tens of thousands to send the clear message that “we will not comply” with the criminalization of our communities.

One year later, with the exception of a few states like Georgia and Florida, the country has turned away from the wrong direction of Arizona and its 1070 copy cats.  Yet, while the Obama administration has sued Arizona for its law, its also bragged about deporting one million people while in office via the expansion of police-ICE collaborations.  The organizers of

Continue reading National Summit to Turn the Tide on Anti-Immigrant Enforcement

In Tennessee, 1,200 workers and community leaders have already mobilized to the state capital in Nashville on March 15, far surpassing the original expectations of 500.  Under the banner of rallying for jobs, living wages and public services, Tennesseans came from all ends of the state—from Memphis to Knoxville.  Both East and Middle Tennessee Jobs with Justice coalitions mobilized, organizing buses to arrive by 12 noon central time.

“Working Tennesseans didn’t cause the economic crisis,” said Karly Safar of East TN Jobs with Justice who also works for the United Campus Workers.  “And we shouldn’t have to pay for it.”

Although Tennessee has not gotten the national attention of Wisconsin, Indiana or Ohio, working families in the state face a right-wing trifecta in all branches of government where they are at risk of more lay-offs, cuts in services and multiple bills that would negatively impact immigrant workers.  The demonstration is expected to go well into the afternoon.