Labor

When unions are strong, America is strong.

“If we want to get serious about raising incomes, we have to get serious about supporting union workers.”

HILLARY, SEPTEMBER 7, 2015

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKN8L9TeT58

Labor unions helped build America’s middle class, and organized labor remains critical to fulfilling America’s basic bargain: If you work hard and do your part, you should be able to get ahead and stay ahead. Hillary believes we need to protect and strengthen America’s workforce by:

•Raising incomes for hardworking Americans. Raising incomes so that hardworking Americans can afford to live a middle-class life is the defining economic challenge of our time. Hillary believes that our success as a nation should be measured by whether American families get ahead. She has proposed an economic plan to get it done.

•Restoring union collective bargaining rights. Hillary was an original co-sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act. Hillary will fight to strengthen the labor movement and to protect worker bargaining power. She will continue to stand up against attacks on collective bargaining and work to strengthen workers’ voices.

•Raising the minimum wage and strengthening overtime rules. Hillary believes we are long overdue in raising the minimum wage. She has supported raising the federal minimum wage to $12, and believes that we should go further than the federal minimum through state and local efforts, and workers organizing and bargaining for higher wages, such as the Fight for 15 and recent efforts in Los Angeles and New York to raise their minimum wage to $15. She also supports the Obama Administration’s expansion of overtime rules to millions more workers.

•Investments that create good jobs and build up workers’ skills. Hillary supports expanding investments in our infrastructure to create good jobs and union jobs. And she has proposed rewarding high-quality training and apprenticeships—which unions have established for decades—and are proven to raise wages for workers.

•Protecting workers from exploitation. Hillary believes we need to protect workers against employer misclassification, wage theft, and other forms of exploitation.

•Supporting working families. Equal pay, paid family leave, earned sick days, fair schedules, and quality affordable child care aren’t luxuries—they’re necessities for families. Hillary will fight for workplace policies that will help more Americans enter the workforce and succeed there.

•Protecting retirement security. After working hard for years, Americans deserve a secure and comfortable retirement. Hillary will fight to protect retirement security, enhance—not privatize—Social Security, and push back against any effort to undermine retirement benefits.