Worker Rights and Labor

The recent attacks on workers' rights are just wrongheaded.  We elect our leaders to create jobs, not take away the good jobs that hard-working people already have.  Those who attack workers only succeed in slashing the funding that keeps teachers in our classrooms and protects health care for working families and seniors.

I support working with labor to solve problems, build stronger workplaces and give working families a real voice.  Unions give workers a voice to express concerns about their safety, security, pay, benefits, and about the best ways to get the work done.  Workers deserve a voice in the workplace and we cannot silence hardworking Americans.  In Washington, I am  fighting to protect the right to organize, expand paid sick leave and keep workers safe. 

My priorities for Worker Rights and Labor include:

Protecting the Right to Organize
Expanding Paid Sick Leave
Keeping Workers Safe

Protecting the Right to Organize

Corporate America is denying workers the freedom to form unions.  Taking away workers’ rights has set off a long-term downward, spiral of lower wages and fewer benefits.  Workers with good jobs are trying to hold on to a middle class standard of living, even as more and more people suffer lower wages, less health care and no retirement security. Good jobs are vanishing and the American Dream is slipping out of reach.

All workers should have the freedom to decide for themselves whether to form unions to bargain for a better life. Last Congress, I supported the Employee Free Choice Act (H.R. 1409) to help America’s working families take the American Dream into their own hands. It protects the freedom to organize and takes away corporate veto powers.

Back to the top.

Expanding Paid Sick Leave

At a time when workers and their families are still struggling to get by, no one can risk missing a paycheck or losing a job.  Many workers do not have paid leave they can use to take time off work when they are sick, or when they need to stay home to take care of a sick child or elderly relative.  Too many workers face this fear when they or someone in their family is sick or needs medical care.  For the 40 million Americans who have no access to paid sick days, an everyday illness brings impossible choices between the jobs they need and the families they love.  Workers who can’t afford to stay home are forced to put their families – and the public's health – at risk. 

Lower wage workers are hit hardest by the lack of a minimum paid leave standard.  According to one Harvard Researcher, 76% of low-wage workers have no paid sick leave.  Recent research from the Urban Institute shows that for working parents with incomes below 200% of the federal poverty line, 41% have no paid leave of any kind — no paid sick leave, no paid vacation, no paid personal days.  

I am pushing for the passage of the Healthy Families Act (H.R. 1876) to require all employers with at least 25 or more employees to provide 7 days of paid sick leave annually, and a pro-rata amount of leave for part time employees. This bill will make a big difference in the everyday lives of America’s working families.

Back to the top.

Keeping Workers Safe

Too many workers go to a job where they are at serious risk of injury, illness or death. In 2009, according to preliminary data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 4,340 workers were killed on the job — an average of 12 workers every day — and an estimated 50,000 died from occupational diseases. Workers deserve a safe workplace to go to everyday. Our nation needs tougher laws to protect our workers.

That is why I am pushing for new legislation that called the Protecting America’s Workers Act (H.R. 190), a bill that would expand Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) coverage to millions of other workers to ensure safe working conditions.  It would also strengthen health and safety penalties and provide workers with the right to contest OSHA citations or penalties.  I am also urging more funding for the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, an agency that provides leadership in work-related illnesses and injuries.

Back to the top.