Page 66 - Working Poor News Today

Position they have taken is simply too difficult and that breeds this kind of radicalism. >> and heres the thing that might make them back down. particularly in one aspect of the bill, which is medicaid expansion. for mostly the working poor and its version of medicaid that supreme court decision, the states have the option of opting into the medicaid expansion, for mostly the working poor and expanded version of medicaid eligibility or not. and weve seen a lot of states opt out. states that opt...

And that breeds this kind of -- >> and heres the thing that might make them back down. particularly in one aspect of the bill, which is medicaid expansion. because of the other part of that supreme court decision, the states have the option of opting into the medicaid expansion, for mostly the working poor and expanded version of medicaid eligibility or not. and weve seen a lot of states opt out. states that opt out of medicaid expansion will lose access to billions of loss in federal dollars, i...

Themselves of are too severe for them to back down from the underlying philosophical position is simply too difficult and that breeds this kind of -- >> and heres the thing that might make them back down. particularly in one aspect of the bill, which is medicaid expansion. because of the other part of that supreme court decision, the states have the option of opting into the medicaid expansion, for mostly the working poor and expanded version of medicaid eligibility or not. and weve seen a lot o...

For the raleigh news and observer. thank youior time. >> thanks for having me. >> so the naacp is behind it, but as i understand from the reporting there are environmentalists and womens rights organizations across the board who joined forces here in these rallies and thats why theyve grown week to week. >> its true. the growing momentum is reflective of not only the diverse crowd, but the new organizing muscle behind it. you are seeing the local democratic party and other outside political grou...

Were seeing the sequester hit poor people particularly hard. some of the people affected will testify before congress next week in a hearing on the state of the american dream. joining me now from portland, oregon, is diedre, who will be testifying before the senate subcommittee on economic policy on wednesday. thank you for joining me. >> thank you. >> so you work for two on one which is a human services hotline, is that right? >> yes. >> tell me both from your own experiences and from what you...

Than $2 per person per day. has that been exacerbated in the last two to three decades as wage stagnation and declining membership in union and all sorts of other things that used to be institutions that protected the working poor and the working middle class? as those have declined, their power has declined. have the levels of extreme poverty gone up? >> so its kind of interesting in the united states. when you look at the basic federal poverty line, which is 11,000 or $12,000 for a person over...

>> in new jersey, where do you think your key vulnerability targets are in campaigning against chris christie. what are the top three ways to get voters going your way? >> jobs and the economy. we have over 400,000 people out of work. new jerseys middle class shrunk under this governor. property taxes have risen 20%. middle class and the working poor are suffering. in essence, this governors policies have hurt them. hes turned his back on them. i feel it because i lived that. on your show last t...

Prosecutions. reason is the maximum penalty for committing a safety violation that results in the death of a worker is six months in jail. in comparison, if you chase a wild burro on to federal land, its a year in jail. a lot of prosecutors arent willing to take this up. on top of this. osha is severely underfunded. it has a budget of $558 million. at the number of inspectors it has, it would take osha 129 years to inspect every workplace in the united states once. so theres just many workplaces...

Are trying to be clever about how theyre doing this. but it prolongs the cuts from happening. what you see are a lot of social programs getting hit hard. one of them thats getting hit the hardest is head start. head start gets hit the hardest because they dont operate during the summer. they have to make their cuts no. you see the low-income families having to cope with the fact that their child wont get coverage. they have to spring for baby sitting or child care services with money they dont h...

Poverty. you showed the face everyone could relate to. >> we found the families through listening in on the 211 hotline that people call social services. we heard thousands and thousands of families. most of them want to work and dignity of providing for the families. these are not the exception. these are the rule. of course there is fraud in the system. that is minute compared to the families who are working poor or out of work who want to provide for their families. >> if you look at the work...