Building a Main Street Economy

Overview

Principles for a Main Street Economy

Good jobs are the gateway to opportunity, prosperity and security for working America.

Opportunity means that good jobs must exist: Both public and private sectors have a role in creating an economy that provides full employment for our workers.

Prosperity flows from good jobs. Not only are workers fully and meaningfully employed in good-paying jobs, but they are re-connected to the tax rolls – meaning their tax dollars contribute to a shared prosperity that pays for our schools, our infrastructure, and important things like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid -- all of the things that make our nation strong.

Security means that families do not have to worry about losing their homes to banks or losing their health care, or how they will send their children to college.

A Main Street economy means the public and private sector working together to replace the jobs that have been lost.

A Main Street economy means that when our economy recovers, everyone recovers. Wall Street recovery and Main Street recovery are not one in the same, but they should be. Just as CEO bonuses are back up, stocks are once again soaring, and the financial sector is now hiring by the thousands, workers on Main Street should share in this prosperity. When we all do better, we all do better.

A Main Street economy leaves no one behind. Equity demands that everyone shares prosperity during good times and everyone – from Wall Street to communities of color -- shares sacrifice during downturns.

A Main Street economy means everyone pays their fair share. This means shifting taxes from the middle class to corporations and the wealthiest Americans, who can pay more. And we have to end tax breaks, loopholes and giveaways that only detract from our shared prosperity and our ability to pay for the good things that make our country strong.

Updates

Resources

• Fact Sheet: USAction Campaign for the Middle Class: Good Jobs, Secure Health Care and an Economy that Works for Us Platform | Word | PDF
• Fact Sheet: Medicaid Talking Points | Word | PDF
• Report: The Bush Tax Cuts After Ten Years:Bad for Iowa, Bad for America.
• Report: Tenth Anniversary of the Bush-era Tax Cuts
  A decade later, the Bush tax cuts remain expensive, ineffective, and unfair.
• Report: Iowa Women Need Jobs and Support for Their Families
  A new report produced by the National Women’s Law Center that supports extending middle class tax cuts and improvements in CTC, EITC, but not tax cuts for the rich. This report gives Iowa-specific numbers on the impact of various proposed federal tax policies on women, single parents, and families with kids.

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