In Tuesday’s debate, BETO told the story of a mother with a daughter with disabilities who cannot make ends meet.
She's working four jobs, raising her child with disabilities, and any American with disabilities knows just how hard it is to make it and get by in this country already. She wants to know how we are going to help her, how we're going to make sure that her child has the care that she needs, that we strengthen protections for those with disabilities, that she just has to work one job because it pays a living wage.
The story is all too familiar in our new gilded age. The last time the minimum wage was raised was more than a decade ago. There is no way an individual, much less a family, can support itself at $7.25/hour. True to form, however, Bill O’Reilly had to respond with skepticism and cynicism to a story that should arouse compassion as well as set off alarm bells about what’s wrong with our country.
Beto wasted no time in responding with receipts:
This story is about more than Gina and Summer, though the situation of these two women is a perfect example of the ways in which our government has failed to address the needs of working Americans in just about every arena.
In recent months Beto has come out with a slew of plans on housing, labor, and small business designed to improve the lives of working people. On Monday ctkosh posted a diary on Beto’s social security plan which includes provisions for people who leave the work force to care for family members. Here is a very incomplete list of some of the other initiatives Beto has championed.
Wages
Beto has long stood with the Fight for $15, but his support for labor extends far beyond that. His labor plan calls for the creation of industry-wide wage boards to determine wages for employees.
Establish wage boards in industries with low union membership to deliver immediate wage gains. In low-wage industries where union representation is low or non-existent — such as fast food and ride-sharing — Beto supports empowering boards with equal employee and employer representation in an industry to bargain over national wage levels, which would be enforced by the Department of Labor as regulations. Wage boards would help ensure that workers in these industries immediately see their wages increase, but would not be a long-term substitute for labor organizing and collective bargaining.
There is a precedent for this proposal in the industry wage boards introduced in 1938 as part of the New Deal but later revoked. The need for such boards, however, is now more urgent than ever given the pervasiveness of the gig economy and the number of workers that employers classify as “independent contractors” to avoid existing labor laws.
Other provisions include improved overtime rules and fair pay for part-time workers.
Unions
At the heart of Beto’s labor proposal lies the right to form a union. Currently unions are limited to one employer or shop. Beto has called for a sweeping reform of unions as we know them. Instead of being “enterprise-based” (i.e., limited to one enterprise), they would be “sectoral base” (i.e., applied across an entire industrial sector). This would eliminate many of the rules designed to make unionization difficult, if not impossible, right now.
In addition Beto would extend the right to unionize to agricultural and domestic workers, who excluded from collective bargaining rights according to a 1935 law. Not surprisingly the majority of workers in these industries are people of color. Beto showed his commitment to this issue in July when he answered the SEIU’s challenge “Walk a Day in My Shoes” and shadowed April Perala in her job as a home care worker.
Beto’s ideas on unions and wages have won labor’s support. Shaun Richman, the former organizing director of the American Federation of Teachers (America’s second largest union), had this to say about Beto’s proposal:
The biggest surprise is O’Rourke, who has one of the best labor platforms in the field … O’Rourke has clearly been taking advice from some of the smartest thinkers on how to restore union power … O’Rourke embraced some of the boldest solutions. Most interestingly, on the choice between wage boards and certified sectoral bargaining, O’Rourke’s team asks, “Why choose?” Under his formula, the wage boards would address big-ticket items across entire industries and take them out of competition, while the sectoral bargaining would empower unions to negotiate over the detailed minutia that workers also want to address in a contract. O’Rourke’s plan would give unions multiple strategies to end the corporate race to the bottom over pay and working conditions.
Housing
Last week Beto introduced a robust and multi-faceted housing plan. Like many of the other candidates, he proposes substantial increases in funding for the construction and rehabilitation of public housing, public transportation, Low Income Housing Tax Credits, and the Housing Choice Voucher Program (also known as Section 8).
The plan also goes full bore YIMBY (Yes in my backyard) by proposing an astonishing number of federal incentives to pressure states and municipalities into eliminating zoning laws created to restrict public housing (i.e., NIMBY provisions). This plank in particular earned Beto the enthusiastic praise of Henry Kraemer, the housing policy analyst for Data for Progress. The plan as a whole received a rave review Diane Yentel, President and CEO of the National Low Income Housing Coalition.
Yet what is unique about Beto’s housing plan is the path to home ownership it offers for low incomes Americans. The plan calls for the creation of a Post Office Bank, in which people earning up to 400% of the poverty line could open a Kickstart Savings Account. The government would match annual contributions of $1000 for individuals or $2000 for families at the rate of 2 to 1, which in a three year period would yield enough for a downpayment on a house. Here’s an example from the plan:
Consider the following example to see how Kickstart savingsaccounts could make homeownership a reality. A married couple with three kidswants to save for a down payment. They earn $45,000 and save $2,000 each yearout of their tax refund to obtain the full $4,000 match. After three years ofsaving, they will have accumulated $18,000 in their Kickstart savings account.They would be able to purchase the median priced home ($250,000)with an FHA loan (3.5% down payment or $8,750) and cover the closing costs($8,750).
Americans with Disabilities
To go back to the beginning of the post: the plans outlined will help not only parents like Gina. They will also help her daughter Summer. Among the many actions Beto has called for is the end to the practice of paying workers with special needs a subminimum wage, which often amounts to pennies to the dollar of other workers:
Raise the federal minimum wage to $15 and end the decades-old holes in minimum wage and other labor laws that are rooted in racism, sexism, and ableism. He would call for legislation ending the subminimum wages for tipped workers and workers with disabilities and apply Fair Labor Standards Act protections to all workers, including agricultural and domestic service workers. The federal minimum wage would be indexed to the national median wage going forward.
* * *
Tonight Beto will be hosting a rally of love and peace to counter Trump’s rally of hate and division in Dallas. If you live in the Dallas/Fort Worth area, you should attend. Even if you support another candidate, you should attend to show Trump that Texas is now a trending blue state and Texans stand with working folks who want a better America.
Thursday, Oct 17, 2019 · 2:41:51 PM +00:00 · tobie
Holy smokes! No sooner do I post a diary, than BETO writes a Medium post on the need for durable medical equipment and an end to airline discrimination against people with disabilities. Airlines are currently not obliged to be ADA compliant.
Here’s a link to the Medium post.