[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 1] [House] [Page 710] [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]CONGRESSIONAL JOBS NOW CAUCUS The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the gentlewoman from Ohio (Ms. Kaptur) is recognized for 5 minutes. Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, the single most important concern for Americans throughout our Nation is the vast and growing rate of joblessness. This is not difficult to understand. Bob Herbert asked in a recent New York Times column, ``How loud do alarm bells have to ring?'' More than 15 million Americans--more than 1 in 10 people--are out of work. Another 15 million people are underemployed or have quit looking. That means that over 30 million Americans want to work but cannot find the job they want. More people join their ranks every single day. Worse, 4 in 10 unemployed workers have been jobless for 27 weeks or longer. Yes, we have a jobs crisis in our country, and it's everybody's number one issue. That's why I joined with colleagues on both sides of the aisle to form the Congressional Jobs Now Caucus, to keep the focus where it needs to be. That's why I sponsored bills to create jobs in America to stem our rising trade deficits and to bring justice to Wall Street, which has shut down normal lending across this country, contributing to the jobs crisis. Job creation is not a Republican issue or a Democratic issue. We are all in this together. Last month, Toledo, a city I represent, lost an additional 1,200 jobs. Added to the yearly tally, more than 38,600 individuals, or 11.8 percent of the city's population, are without work. The unemployment rate in the adjoining rural Ottawa County, also in our district, is now over 17 percent. Again, these are official numbers which did not include those who have part-time jobs and need more hours or those who have simply given up because there are no jobs to be had. Job creation is not just an urban issue. The damage has spread to the suburbs of our country, and no one is safe from the jobs hemorrhage. In fact, a recent study by the Brookings Institute, as examined by Mr. Herbert in his article, found that the largest and fastest-growing population of poor people in the United States are in the suburbs. The number of poor people in our country grew by 5.2 million when President Bush was President between 2002 and 2008, and more than 90 million Americans--90 million; that's a third of our country--are living on less than $21,834 for a family of four. The alarm bells are roaring. At the same time, the basic goodness and generosity of the American people remains one of our greatest strengths. Through it all, the American people remain compassionate and caring. Last weekend, a local television station in our region organized a telethon for relief to Haiti. Even with double-digit unemployment and great economic uncertainty, the people of our community opened their hearts to the people they've never seen in a country most of them have never visited and donated tens of thousands of dollars to that end. For our community and our country, the first alarm bells started ringing with the empty promises and rapid failure of NAFTA as it outsourced jobs everywhere, certainly to Mexico. The next alarm bell rang every time another trade deal came down the pike that took more of our jobs that used to exist in this country and doled them out to every undemocratic place in the world. You can't make televisions in our country anymore--not a single one is made here--or clothing, or cars, or electrical parts, or even toys. More and more, even our food is being imported. You mean we are falling behind in even that? There was plenty of warning, but big business and big money insisted on the right to seek out the lowest common denominator in the most undemocratic places, and they found it in China, in Mexico, in Bangladesh, in Pakistan, in Guatemala and every poor, undemocratic place where penny-wage workers are treated like the expendable pieces of equipment that they work with. In our country, now we need those jobs because people without jobs can't pay mortgages. They can't pay their health insurance. They can't buy cars. They can't plan for their children's future or even get enough food and clothing to meet their families' needs. Unemployment also means our Federal deficits rise as people can't pay their way forward. Unemployment and COBRA benefits are running out. State funds are depleted. Our private charities are overwhelmed. The American people need work and they need good jobs. It's really that simple. We simply can't rest until we get our economy back on track and create jobs for everyone who wants to work. I hope it is to this subject--the economy and job creation--that President Obama will direct his address tomorrow night. We know that under President Bush we were hemorrhaging 734,000 jobs when he left at the end of his term, and though we haven't been losing as many jobs, now is the time during this fiscal year where we need to do more for our people to put them back to work, to use that productive energy to help pull our country forward rather than allow her to continue to fall behind, and that begins with work for every single American who needs a job. ____________________