The pace of economic recovery has improved but not accelerated sufficiently since the last AFSCME convention; and

WHEREAS:

            The recovery remains one of the weakest in modern times with only two job openings available for every five job seekers; and

WHEREAS:

            Much of the decline in the unemployment rate is due to people dropping out of the labor market, or never entering it, instead of broad employment gains; and

WHEREAS:

            Weak consumer demand is the primary cause of the weakness in the labor market which has contributed to record levels of long-term unemployment and a decline in the wages of the bottom 90 percent of workers, whose employers have no incentive to increase pay; and

WHEREAS:

            CEOs who headed Standard & Poor’s 500 companies for the past two years saw their median pay jump 13 percent to $10.5 million in 2013 largely because of big gains in corporate profits which have come mostly from job cuts; and

WHEREAS:

            Public sector job losses have continued since 2012 and now total more than 725,000.  These public sector job losses are unprecedented and are a key factor in the lack of demand in the economy; and

WHEREAS:

            Instead of making public sector investments to spur economic growth, GOP leaders in Congress have forced large cutbacks in federal spending that have slowed the recovery and cut jobs.

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED:

            That AFSCME will continue to fight to reverse the austerity policies at the national level which have led to large public sector job losses, held down economic expansion, and blocked

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED:

            That AFSCME supports and will work for federal legislation to restore and expand needed public services and jobs and to create carefully designed job creation programs for the long-term unemployed that will maintain labor standards and not displace existing jobs and workers.