Ed & Workforce Republicans Approve Legislation that Harms Job Training and Job Creation Efforts
WASHINGTON – Today, House Education and the Workforce Committee Republicans pushed Workforce Investment Act legislation (H.R. 4297) through the committee that walks away from Congress’ duty to help create and sustain a highly-skilled workforce, especially for the most disadvantaged workers.
“We should be building a workforce system to expand opportunity for all Americans, builds on what works, gives businesses the workers they need to compete globally and grows the middle class,” said Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), the senior Democratic member of the committee. “Last week’s jobs numbers should have been another wakeup call to set aside political obstruction and help make the economy work for everyone. Unfortunately, the Republican bill does not rise to meet the challenges our economy faces.”
Miller offered an amendment that would create more than 300,000 construction jobs by providing funding to help modernize, renovate and repair 35,000 elementary and secondary schools and hundreds of community colleges in need. Committee Republicans voted down the amendment.
“Continued weaknesses in the housing sector, cuts to state and local infrastructure project, and uncertainty created by House Republican obstruction of the highway bill have all lowered demand for this important industry,” said Miller.
Dozens of organizations have raised strong concerns or come out against the Republican bill. For instance, youth, older workers, farm workers, workers with disabilities, women, English language learners, veterans, and low-income workers are among those who face the greatest barriers to employment. Yet the Republican bill puts their access to services at the greatest risk.
“Now is precisely the wrong time to radically alter the workforce system in a way that will result in fewer people being served and likely result in less money to serve them,” said Rep. John Tierney (D-Mass.) “That is really unfortunate for the millions of workers looking for jobs and the millions of employers searching for qualified candidates.”
Tierney, Miller and Rep. Ruben Hinojosa (D-Tex.), are lead authors of a Democratic bill (H.R. 4227) to modernize the Workforce Investment Act. It would streamline access to and better align existing programs, introduce meaningful accountability measures so taxpayers and those who use the workforce investment system know what is working and what is not, and promote innovation and best practices, providing communities with more effective tools when responding to local economic challenges.
The Republican bill locks out key stakeholders from workforce boards and increase mandated business participation from 51 percent to two-thirds. Representatives from labor, community-based organizations, community colleges, or people who work with youth, veterans, or workers with disabilities would no longer be guaranteed a seat at the table. These changes would remove important checks and balances in the system and leave it vulnerable to favoritism.
Rep. Tim Bishop (D-N.Y.) proposed an amendment that bans companies from serving on the workforce boards if they ship American jobs overseas, among other things. The amendment was rejected by the Republican majority.
Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.) offered an amendment that would authorize funding for summer jobs for disadvantaged youth. It would have created nearly 435,000 summer and year-round jobs for young people. The amendment was rejected by the Republican majority.
More than a dozen other amendments were offered by Democrats to restore access to services for disadvantaged populations, improve accountability on whether training and job programs are actually working, and promote further innovations in the workforce investment system.
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