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From the Dispatch
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Over 225 Legislators From 48 States Stand Up For Jobs Now
Nov 04, 2011
This week, conservatives in the United States Senate blocked a $60 billion piece of President Obama’s American Jobs Act from advancing — a package that would have created a national infrastructure bank and funded needed infrastructure projects while putting 450,000 Americans back to work, paid for by a miniscule 0.7 percent surtax on taxpayers making over a million dollars a year. This follows the similar conservative blockage last month of $35 billion in aid to states that would have allowed states to save the jobs of hundreds of thousands of teachers and first responders. All told, Congress has now blocked three separate jobs bills over the past month (including their original rejection of the entire American Jobs Act), a striking display of intransigence on the part of conservatives who claim to be concerned about job creation. As jobs efforts stall in the nation’s capital due to this right-wing obstruction, state legislators from 48 states and counting are letting D.C. know their states need jobs now, and many are taking the lead on job creation themselves.
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Voices of “The 99%” Heard in Protests Across Nation
Oct 07, 2011
This week, a 3 week-long protest against economic injustice and inequality in the Financial District in New York City gathered momentum as approximately 20,000 people joined a march in solidarity and similar protests against the excesses of Wall Street spread to almost every other state, fueled by a rising sense of urgency on the economy. The “Occupy Wall Street” protest in New York was bolstered by a huge rally on Wednesday organized by labor unions and community groups loudly proclaiming their support for the core group of protesters who have been occupying a plaza a few blocks away from the New York Stock Exchange. As progressive leaders and many elected officials — including state legislators — begin to lend their support to the still-fledgling protest, many are repeating one core message emerging out of the diffuse and leaderless movement: underscoring the increasingly deep economic divide in this country separating the super-wealthy from the 99% of Americans who have borne nearly the entire brunt of the Great Recession and its aftermath.
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Green Economy Measures Advancing as States Focus on Jobs
Aug 11, 2011
As the national political conversation focused on deficits and budget cuts over the past few months, many state legislatures have at least noticed that the top concern of voters across the nation remains job creation. The New York Times - in an analysis of a list compiled by the National Conference of State Legislatures - counted the total number of bills introduced in 2011 legislative sessions that attempted to address this concern: 500.
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PSN 2011 Legislative Session Roundup: Broadband
Jul 14, 2011
(Note: With legislative sessions largely adjourned in statehouses across the nation, this week’s Dispatch is the first in a series of issue-specific session roundups from Progressive States Network highlighting trends in different critical policy areas across the fifty states.)
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