Jobs and Economy
When I travel around Northwest Oregon, I often hear from parents who struggle to pay for child care—which in Oregon can cost as much as a year of college tuition. I’ve heard from parents who don’t have access to paid family leave at work, and have to choose between caring for a new baby and earning a paycheck. Congress must do more to address the challenges facing our families.
Our economy will be stronger and people will be healthier when we acknowledge that families need policies that work for them, not against them. Equal pay for women, good wages, paid leave, and affordable child care will better support families in Oregon and across the country. When we open the doors of opportunity to everyone, we all succeed.
One of my top priorities in Congress is to grow our economy and implement policies that create more jobs in Oregon and across the country. As a leader on the Education and Labor Committee, I’ve introduced legislation to strengthen apprenticeships and paid, on-the-job training programs to provide workers with meaningful pathways to better paying jobs, and to connect businesses with workers who have the skills they need. I support the Raise the Wage Act, which would gradually increase the federal minimum wage to $15 by 2024. I also helped pass the Paycheck Fairness Act to help to address the pay gap and provide workers with the tools they need to achieve equal pay for equal work.
More on Jobs and Economy
The Protect Older Job Applicants Act (H.R. 3992) would allow job seekers age 40 or older—the threshold under the federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act—to allege an employer used a seemingly neutral hiring practice to discriminate against them. “It’s an especially important step toward helping older workers re-enter the workforce as the nation recovers from the Covid-19 pandemic,” Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (D-Ore.) said on the House floor Wednesday. She also called the bill a “common sense fix” of the ADEA.
Plans for a business resource center run under the Columbia Economic Team are moving forward, as the project has secured commitments for $150,000 in local dollars to match federal and state funding sources. Rep. Suzanne Bonamici earmarked $175,000 for the resource center in an appropriations bill that passed the House and is now awaiting Senate action.
U.S. Senators Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley and Representatives Peter DeFazio and Suzanne Bonamici have called on the U.S. Department of Agriculture to take all statutory eligibilities into account when distributing $10 billion in aid to agricultural producers hit hard by extreme heat, drought and wildfires this summer.