The U.S. lost a stunning 22 million jobs in March and April at the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, with only about half of those numbers returning in the following seven months. With weekly jobless claims remaining high, voters might want to know more about what former Vice President Joe Biden and President Donald Trump intend to do on the issue of labor.
Biden has pledged to do whatever it takes to help jobs recover through direct stimulus payments. His plan includes funding for state and local governments to keep essential workers on their payrolls and federal payouts to supplement state unemployment checks.
Meanwhile, Trump favors tax cuts and deregulation to stimulate the economy but concedes that another infusion of cash stimulus is likely needed. The president also extended federal unemployment benefits for six weeks after they were set to expire in July but at a lower rate of $300 a week, half the amount of the earlier benefit.
Both candidates support tax incentives for manufacturers to keep jobs at home. Biden even proposes tax penalties for those businesses that ship manufacturing jobs overseas with the intention of selling finished products back into the U.S.
Whoever wins the election in November faces a daunting task, with millions still out of work, consumer spending slowing down, and a resurgence in coronavirus cases adding to the economic woes.
Emily Hoeven, newsletter editor at CalMatters, joins Cheddar News to discuss California Governor Gavin Newsom's gun law modeled after Texas's abortion law.
Chuck Rocha, host of 'Nuestro' podcast and opinion contributor at The New York Times, joins Cheddar News to discuss why Democrats are losing Hispanic voters.
More businesses are requiring workers to return to the office, but there is concern that many employees in the middle class, especially women and people of color, need remote work options for reasons including childcare and financial security. Joan Williams, director of the Center for WorkLife Law at the University of California, joined Cheddar to discuss why office mandates could be detrimental to the middle class. She noted that while companies claim a return to offices would help foster more collaboration and efficiency, reports show that they are successfully able to do their jobs from home.
The U.S. postal service has confirmed that it secretly developed and tested a blockchain-based mobile voting system ahead of the 2020 election. Susan Greenhalgh, senior advisor on election security, Free Speech for People, joins Cheddar News to discuss the cybersecurity complications of a mobile voting system.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled to allow the controversial Texas abortion law to remain in effect, banning abortion at six weeks and allowing any private citizen to sue a person or doctor aiding or abetting someone seeking an abortion. Outraged at this decision, California Governor Gavin Newsom is working to draft a proposal in line with the law as it relates to guns. Shawn Hubler, California correspondent at the New York Times, joins Cheddar News to discuss.
Even as tech giant Google implements a vaccination mandate, charging its employees to declare their vaccine status within a time frame or risk dismissal, the federal government is tangled up in the court system trying to impose one of its own. Cindy Cohn, the executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and Harry Nelson, founder and managing partner of Nelson Hardiman LLP, joined Cheddar to debate the ethics, efficacy, and legality surrounding the issue. While Cohn noted that she thinks the federal mandate might be legally sound, her organization is also concerned with a separate question of privacy. "At EFF what we're most interested in is the digital surveillance that's going along with some of these attempts to try to track and confirm whether people are vaccinated or not," she said.
