The new demand for an old idea: Guaranteed jobs now By David Stein and Ady Barkan November 2, 2018 – Dissent These are turbulent times of crisis and opportunity to build a better, more humane opportunity. On the one hand, we have world—to enlarge the state’s social welfare witnessed a significant turnabout in the past functions while undermining its violent ones, two years—the theft of two Supreme Court like Immigration and Customs Enforcement. seats; ongoing voter disenfranchisement; and Ocasio-Cortez has endorsed the federal jobs the undermining of agencies like the Consumer guarantee, telling The Nation, “It’s basically a Financial Protection Bureau, among countless public option for jobs. It guarantees a bare other attacks on democratic life and minimum which employment can’t go below.” governance. All of this comes atop escalating The new Poor People’s Campaign, which, like state and state-sanctioned violence. Although its 1968 predecessor, endorses the right to a the unemployment rate has come down good job, conducted one of the biggest acts of dramatically in the ten years since the Great civil disobedience this country has ever seen Recession, the employment-to-population ratio over the summer, with thousands arrested while has yet to recover to pre-recession levels, and fighting for policies that would benefit low- wage growth remains slow. For many workers, income Americans. All of this suggests that we jobs remain too low paid, too insecure, and too are in a moment when our political dangerous. imaginations are growing and our democracy is deepening, even while the forces of On the other hand, progressive politics are retrenchment expand in kind. And there is a getting bigger and more imaginative. One key connection between proposals like the federal indication is the increasing support from jobs guarantee and the rejuvenation of leading politicians for a federal job guarantee— democratic practice. These proposals speak to for plans to provide good jobs for all who want people’s everyday dreams for a different world them. Over the past few months Senators and create policy mechanisms to make them Kirsten Gillibrand, Cory Booker, and Bernie real. Sanders, among others, have championed a variety of plans to further these goals. Last There has not been this much attention for a week, Representative Ro Khanna released an federal job guarantee since 1978, when the important new bill, the Coretta King Full Humphrey-Hawkins Full Employment Act Employment Federal Reserve Act, that would limped across the legislative finishing line. compel the Federal Reserve to address the Amid tremendous lobbying from business interests of working people and people of color organizations, the bill lost its key proposal to and weaken the grip of the financial sector on make the federal government the employer of the central bank. Exciting as these proposals last resort when private employers were not up are, they will need massive grassroots social to the task. Nevertheless, on the day it was movements behind them to achieve their goals. signed, Coretta Scott King, a leading activist who had pushed it along, stood beside President These can and must take many forms. Carter. She envisioned the new law as a first Grassroots campaigns like the one that step, not the last. She remarked that because her propelled Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s victory husband was assassinated in the midst of the in her primary was driven by increased voter Poor People’s Campaign, others needed to push turnout. Her platform and political vision won it onward. “We felt that we had an obligation, a over those who saw her candidacy as the 2 mandate, to pick it up and to carry it forward,” through the Second World War and seen what she said. was possible. They saw what government support for childcare could do: 3,000 childcare In contrast to what Scott King had hoped, in the centers across the country cared for 130,000 years that followed, politics became less children at any given time during the war, while democratic, not more. Superdelegates were their mothers took jobs in defense industries. introduced to the Democratic Party, a sign that This cohort used that experience to affirm their a new form of insider politics were taking hold, commitment to guaranteed jobs—to broaden and the Democrats soon abandoned their their imaginations of what a federal commitment to full employment. Writing at the government committed to care for its people time, Barbara Ehrenreich decried this trend, could look like. arguing instead for the type of grassroots organizing and “labor-intensive politics” that William Lucy, the cofounder of the Coalition drove Ocasio-Cortez’s victory. Ehrenreich of Black Trade Unionists, was one of those who suggested that such campaigning will need to saw what was possible during war and promote “people-oriented programs [like] wondered what would happen if those same national health care, housing subsidies, child energies were used for peace. He explained in care, high-wage jobs, better schools.” Those 1975: “In wartime, when they gear up the war are exactly the sort of policies that are machine, everybody fits into a slot: they make increasing in popularity today. welders out of laborers and pipefitters out of farmers.” We think the call for guaranteed jobs can catalyze a movement. Forty years later, it’s As Lucy recognized, there were myriad time to do what Scott King urged us: pick it up possibilities for the type of work people could and carry it forward. Ocasio-Cortez’s vision for do. And in most cases, people could learn their guaranteed jobs does just that. It emphasizes skills on the job. “People can be put to work. In child care and environmental conservation. government, the public sector, in Like Scott King did, she argues that we need to transportation, construction, health services, create a peace economy to displace our environmental work. The Congress as well as militarized one. As Scott King explained in the Administration is dealing with the deficit 1975, “this nation has never honestly dealt with (in the Federal budget), but that ought to be a the question of a peacetime economy.” Ocasio- secondary concern.” Forty years later, Lucy’s Cortez too has responded to this problem by words ring even more true—especially the suggesting we transfer funds used to build environmental concerns. Many of the problems machines of war to more peaceful purposes. As he highlighted have grown more dire. her platform notes, “In times when we’re told While Lucy’s comments on deficits in 1975 that there’s not enough money, Republicans may have struck some at the time as heretical, and corporate Democrats seem to find the cash he was expressing an important set of moral to fund a $1.1 trillion fighter jet program or a values. After all, it isn’t worries about the $1.7 trillion-dollar nuclear weapon deficit that keep people up at night these days. ‘modernization’ program.” It’s rent hikes that are leading to homelessness. The demand for genuine full employment— It’s long commutes—propelled by low wages where everyone who wants a good job can find and lack of affordable housing—that make one—is a bold proposal today, but it was a key tucking your kid in at night a challenge. It’s part of the Democratic Party’s platform from worrying about whether your unpredictable the 1940s to the 1970s. Many of those who work schedule will make it impossible to attend originally crafted these policies had lived school. And besides, the federal government 3 doesn’t need to budget its money like a support the effort to register black voters. The household. As Lucy stressed, it should put its great Ella Baker gave a powerful speech about resources to the public purpose. how far the freedom struggle still had to go: “even if segregation is gone, we will still need This is why the call for a federal job guarantee to be free; we will still have to see that everyone is on fire with progressives and presidential has a job. Even if we can all vote, but if people aspirants. It can help address so many priorities. are still hungry, we will not be free.” Those Think of a key problem confronting the United gathered in the audience—John Lewis, Fannie States, and chances are a well-crafted job Lou Hamer, Aaron Henry, Annelle Ponder, guarantee could help alleviate it, if not solve it: Lawrence Guyot—had faced down beatings, racial inequality; climate change; inadequate jailings, and assassination attempts. They knew worker power; poverty; the gender wage gap; about hardship. They also knew that Baker was skyrocketing housing costs; broadband access; correct. “People cannot be free until there is child and elder care; mass incarceration; the enough work in this land to give everybody a opioid crisis. A job guarantee can change the job,” she emphasized. playing field. This doesn’t mean it will solve all our problems. But by creating a new set of More than fifty years have passed since Baker’s conditions and power relations, social speech, and it’s past time to recall her wisdom movements will be in a better position to do so. and political vision. A decade after the Great Recession, most people have still not Yet in some progressive quarters, the call for recovered. More than one-third of us can’t guaranteed jobs has been met with skepticism. afford food, housing, or medical care. In most Some claim it would be too administratively states and municipalities, the public jobs that complicated and too politically difficult. There evaporated after the 2008 recession have never is undoubtedly some truth here.