United for a Fair Economy's E-Newsletter (May-June 2007)
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United for a Fair Economy's E-Newsletter |
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| Monthly Dispatch to Help You Fight for a Fair Economy
In this issue: Renewed Energy for Economic Justice Western Union Challenged on Highway Robbery Anti-Poverty Tax Credits Move to the States Debunking Immigration Myths and the Fight for Tax Fairness The Power of Possibility: The U.S. Social Forum |
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Renewed Energy for Economic Justice Dear friends, Imagine sitting at your desk, as you have done countless days before. The phone rings. The person on the other end tells you that you have been selected as a Barr Fellow. You'll get the whole summer off, a two week trip to South Africa and Zimbabwe with eleven other Boston leaders, a week with an Ashoka Fellow (men and women identified around the globe with system changing solutions for the world's most urgent social problems), an Executive Coach...AND your organization will receive $30,000 to do whatever it needs to strengthen itself and build a new tier of leadership while you are gone. An impossible dream? I had to pinch myself, but I'll know it's real when I get on a plane on June 6, heading for Johannesburg. A condition of our fellowship is that we not have contact with our organizations or think about our work for three months, so I won't be returning to the office until September 4. Expending our time and energy in completely different ways will enable us to get out of our boxes, and return with fresh ideas and visions. This is the second group of Barr Fellows, and the first group has assured us that this really happens! In the meantime, UFE is in the capable hands of Anisha Desai, our Program Director/Deputy Director who has stepped up to be the Acting Director for the summer, and Mark Schmitz, Operations Director, who will be the Acting Deputy Director. The Barr Foundation has also provided assistance for all the Acting and Interim leaders from the 12 organizations; they will gather for mutual support and learning during the summer. It is an exciting moment for UFE, as we expand our leadership, build our capacity, and achieve greater focus and impact in our work for greater economic equality. I'm looking forward to seeing what the talented staff has accomplished when I return! May you all have time to step back, reflect, regroup, get re-energized, and recommit to a world of peace and justice. All the best, Meizhu Lui Western Union Challenged on Highway Robbery
As
we wrote about last month, remittances sent by immigrants to their home
countries exceed the amount of foreign aid to those countries
worldwide. Yet Western Union and other electronic transfer providers
siphon as much as 28% from those transmittals in fees, interest and
exchange rates! Following the press conference, about 150 people marched from Central Park to the Western Union annual shareholders' meeting. Fifteen UFE and TIGRA representatives attended the meeting itself, delivering a Mother's Day card to CEO Christina Gold, asking Western Union to adopt the Transnational Community Benefits Agreement(PDF). Our speakers at the annual meeting gave moving testimony about personal hardships from Western Union's high fees, which contrasted sharply with the company's proud statement of its $4.5 billion revenues and 22% growth rate.
UFE's Responsible
Wealth project plans to file a resolution on remittances again next
year. If you own Western Union stock, or would like to buy a share so
that you can assign your proxy to a representative at next year's
annual meeting, please contact mlapham A New Attack on Poverty According to a report released in April by the Center for American Progress entitled, "From Poverty to Prosperity: A National Strategy to Cut Poverty in Half," poverty in the United States is far higher than in many developed nations. With 37 million, or one in eight Americans living in poverty, and inequality at record highs, the report says that the time for action is now. The report set an ambitious goal of reducing poverty by 50% over 10 years. And, while it recommends 12 key steps to achieving its goal, three of these steps alone would reduce poverty by 26% - more than halfway towards the goal. According to UFE Executive Director Meizhu Lui, who was on the task force and contributed to the report, "Because of the modeling by the Urban Institute, we are quite confident that if the recommendations are followed, the overall goal of cutting poverty in half over 10 years is not aggressive, but actually quite realistic." See Meizhu's video about the report. UFE Board member Barbara J. Robles was also on the task force and contributed to the report. Anti-Poverty Tax Credits Move to the States The federal Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is considered one of the most effective programs for lifting working families out of poverty. It offsets taxes and supplements wages for low- and moderate-income working families. The size of the credit is determined by how much income a person makes per year and how many dependents they have. Social security and unemployment pay do not count towards the EITC. Since poor families in many states face substantial state taxes, many progressive states have established state-level EITCs to further aid working families. In fact, 20 states currently have some type of state EITC. In recent years advocates have worked to expand the EITC in states that don't have it. Ed Hatcher, President of the Hatcher Group, recently spoke at a conference for members of the Tax Fairness Organizing Collaborative to share the EITC messages that conservative policy-makers are responding to:
The effort to expand to additional states continues to be successful. This year New Mexico established a state EITC, joining Iowa and Kansas. An additional seven states have EITC legislation proposed that has a decent chance of passing this year. For an excellent online resource center for state EITCs, please see www.stateeitc.org Debunking Immigration Myths and the Fight for Tax Fairness Progressive groups that work on tax and budget issues are finding that they need to address the issue of immigration. "They're stealing our jobs and driving down wages," we hear. Or, "They don't pay taxes," is another common complaint. So, progressive think tanks, research groups, and grassroots organizations are incorporating the issue of immigration into their work. It was with this in mind that UFE's Tax Fairness Organizing Collaborative put immigration at the top of the agenda at its recent annual conference. Through discussions, planning, and analysis, we determined it is imperative that research reflects the needs of organizing and advocacy groups at work in the US. For example, one of the issues that these groups have collaborated on successfully is how to best dispel the myth that immigrants do not pay taxes. In addition to hosting the conference, UFE has produced a readily accessible immigration and taxes research resource list that has been made available to all TFOC members. "Understanding the value of how issues can be better framed with the right sort of information and organizing and educating with this information to help debunk the false myths of the opposition, can provide a much needed boost to the task of introducing immigration in a positive budgetary and taxation light," said Adrian Boutureira, Education Specialist for UFE. For more on research on taxation and immigration at the policy level, see: National Immigration Law Center Center for Budget and Policy PrioritiesSavings for All Asset building as a key pathway out of poverty continues to gain momentum - even among financial institutions. A new report from the Aspen Institute's Initiative on Financial Security entitled "Savings for Life" focuses on a series of policy recommendations for increasing financial security for all Americans, including working or low income families who have little or no savings. According to the report, in the past, "Policymakers have focused primarily on income-based plans driven by tax subsidies, most of them geared toward retirement savings... Unfortunately, those plans are currently beyond the reach of many Americans. We need savings policies that enable all citizens to save, invest, and own, regardless of income." Perhaps because some industry players recognized their own role in sustaining poverty, the report comes from a collaboration that includes CEOs of major financial services companies, such as Bank of America, Goodman Sachs and Capital Group. You can read the full report at www.aspeninstitute.org/ifs The Power of Possibility: The U.S. Social Forum For those of us working for social change, the big annual get-together is the U.S. Social Forum. It's a conference for groups that emphasize grassroots organizing and an optimistic view that a change in U.S. domestic and foreign policies is possible. This year's Social Forum is June 27 to July 1 in Atlanta, Georgia. The US conference is one of many regional gatherings that grew out of a worldwide meeting of activists held in January 2001 in Porto Alegre, Brazil, under the banner "Another World is Possible." This year at the U.S. gathering, UFE will lead two workshops, co-lead a third, and participate in two panel discussions. The first workshop, "War and the Economy," concentrates on looking at war from an economic standpoint as opposed to a moral one, including how war drains resources and reduces social spending. The second workshop, "Immigration and the Economy," focuses on dispelling myths about immigration and the economic reasons for the current influx of people into the United States. The workshop also addresses the concerns of U.S.-born workers about immigration. UFE is also co-leading another workshop with Political Research Associates called "Neoliberalism, Structural Adjustment, and Racism in the U.S." And in addition to the workshops, UFE will participate in two panel discussions organized by the Democratic Socialists of America: "Toward An Economic Justice Agenda" and "Government as an Agent of Social and Economic Justice."Sisterhood, Research, and Activism At its 25th anniversary gathering on May 31 - June 2 at Spelman College, the National Council for Research on Women explored "Critical Challenges, Real Solutions: How Women Can Change our World." Faculty from women's studies centers across the nation came together with women from both service-oriented and social justice non-profits to explore the key issues facing women and girls around the globe, such as women's economic development and an end to violence. UFE's Executive Director Meizhu Lui participated in a panel discussion about research and its connection to action. The panelists agreed that data is important for effective advocacy with policy makers, but they also discussed how information that validates the personal experiences of women at the grassroots level gives them confidence to get involved in policy change. Women from Spelman gave inspiring examples of the activism of women students in Civil Rights and racial justice movements - a "herstory" that has yet to be acknowledged. Thinking ahead to 2008, they counted it a victory that the "soft issues" that are associated with women such as economic security and health care are moving up to the top of the electoral agenda. People doing research on women and people working with women at the grassroots pledged to work together more closely across sectors - because sisterhood is powerful! Help us Help You! We've been working hard to make UFE's E-News useful to you - and we want to do more. 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