Weekly Update: Jobs Action

Take Action

As the unemployed across the country call for more investment in job creation one company is planning on leaving the US and relocating to Mexico.

Whirpool has maintained a manufacturing plant in Indiana, even as other companies searched for higher profits by moving overseas. But now, as American workers need good-paying jobs more than ever, just after Whirlpool received millions in matching grant money, and while they're turning a healthy profit, Whirlpool is considering joining the crowd.

Workers in Indiana are asking everyone to help them save their jobs.

Learn more, and sign the petition.

National Issue Spotlight: Jobs

We've been talking a lot about job creation in Oregon. We know that unless the rate of job creation picks up it will be difficult to get out of the recession. A "jobless recovery" is not a real recovery, and until more people are working, making money that they can spend, and stimulating their local economies through their daily purchases, it won't be a sustainable recovery.

That's why union members across the country have committed to taking part in months of actions, every few months, until we see a real recovery. It has become clear that it will take hundreds of thousands of people coming together to call for policies that encourage job creation to get the real action that the unemployed and underemployed are depending on.

In Oregon we've already gotten a head start, with three worker roundtables discussing unemployment and the economy in January and a 400 person rally in Salem in February. We're working with other groups across the country to plan more opportunities for you to get involved in the coming months. It's all a part of the national Jobs Months of Action, and we're guessing you're sick of the stalled inaction we're seeing out of Washington, D.C., and ready to call for some change.

In Other News...

National AFL-CIO Executive Board Takes a Hard Look at Incumbents

The AFL-CIO national executive board is meeting this week. Along with hearing from leaders within the union movement, and political speakers including Vice President Joe Biden, the board considered endorsements for the 2010 elections. Notably, the board endorsed Arkansas Senator Blanche Lincoln's primary opponent, Arkansas Lt. Governor Bill Halter.

Union leaders across the country feel like the issues union members, and all Americans, are facing have not been addressed. Issues like healthcare reform, financial accountability, and job creation, have gotten a lot of talk but very little action in Washington, D.C., this year.

Read more about the discussion in an article written by the AP and picked up by a few news sources in Oregon.

Endorsements This Friday

This Friday, the Oregon AFL-CIO COPE (Committee on Political Education) will consider endorsements for the May primary. The COPE Board met in December for early endorsement in key races, but put off the bulk of the primary endorsements until after the February Legislative Session. General election endorsements will be considered over the summer.

An AFL-CIO endorsement requires a 2/3 vote of COPE members present to ensure that the federation is only acting on issues and supporting candidates where there is significant agreement among federation affiliates. The Oregon AFL-CIO is a non-partisan organization and as such considers candidates from all parties for endorsement.

We'll have information on what endorsements were made and other actions taken in next week's update.