America can end this national disaster—and disgrace—of willing-to-work Americans being unable to find willing-to-hire employers.

The solution: A nationwide Employers Responsibility Act (ERA).  

Such legislation would legally require employers to demonstrate as much initiative for hiring as job-seekers are now expected to show in searching for work.

Among its provisions:

(2) Large companies (those employing more than 100 persons) would be required to create entry-level training programs for new, future employees.

These would be modeled on programs now existing for public employees, such as firefighters, police officers and members of the armed services. Such programs would remove the employer excuse, “I’m sorry, but we can’t hire you because you’ve never had any experience in this line of work.” After all, the Air Force has never rejected an applicant because, “I’m sorry, but you’ve never flown a plane before.”

This Nation has greatly benefited from the humane and professional efforts of the men and women who have graduated from public-sector training programs. There is no reason for the private sector to shun programs that have succeeded so brilliantly for the public sector.

(3) Employers would receive tax credits for creating professional, well-paying, full-time jobs.

This would encourage the creation of better than the menial, dead-end, low-paying and often part-time jobs which exist in the service industry. Employers found using such tax credits for any other purpose would be prosecuted for tax fraud.

(4)  A company that acquired another—through a merger or buyout—would be forbidden to fire en masse the career employees of that acquired company.

This would be comparable to the protection existing for career civil service employees. Such a ban would prevent a return to the predatory “corporate raiding” practices of the 1980s, which left so much human and economic wreckage in their wake.

The wholesale firing of employees would trigger the prosecution of the company’s new owners. Employees could still be fired, but only for provable just cause, and only on a case-by-case basis.

(5) Employers would be required to provide full medical and pension benefits for all employees, regardless of their full-time or part-time status.

Increasingly, employers are replacing full-time workers with part-time ones—solely to avoid paying medical and pension benefits. Requiring employers to act humanely and responsibly toward all their employees would encourage them to provide full-time positions—and hasten the death of this greed-based practice.

(6) Employers of part-time workers would be required to comply with all federal labor laws.

Under current law, part-time employees are not protected against such abuses as discrimination, sexual harassment and unsafe working conditions. Closing this loophole would immediately create two positive results:

• Untold numbers of currently-exploited workers would be protected from the abuses of predatory employers; and
• Even predatorily-inclined employers would be encouraged to offer permanent, fulltime jobs rather than only part-time ones—since a major incentive for offering part-time jobs would now be eliminated.

(7) Employers would be encouraged to hire to their widest possible limits, through a combination of financial incentives and legal sanctions. Among those incentives: Employers demonstrating a willingness to hire would receive substantial Federal tax credits, based on the number of new, permanent employees hired per year.

Employers claiming eligibility for such credits would be required to make their financial records available to Federal investigators. Employers found making false claims would be prosecuted for perjury and tax fraud, and face heavy fines and imprisonment if convicted.

(8) Among those sanctions: Employers refusing to hire could be required to prove, in court:

• Their economic inability to hire further employees, and/or
• The unfitness of the specific, rejected applicant.

Companies found guilty of unjustifiably refusing to hire would face the same penalties as now applying in cases of discrimination on the basis of age, race, sex and disability. Employers would thus fund it easier to hire than to refuse to do so. Job-seekers would no longer be prevented from even being considered for employment because of arbitrary and interminable “hiring freezes.”

(9) Employers refusing to hire would be required to pay an additional “crime tax.”

Sociologists and criminologists agree that “the best cure for crime is a job.” Thus, employers who refuse to hire contribute to a growing crime rate in this Nation. Such non-hiring employers would be required to pay an additional tax, which would be earmarked for agencies of the criminal justice system at State and Federal levels.

(10) The seeking of “economic incentives” by companies in return for moving to or remaining in cities/states would be strictly forbidden.

Such “economic incentives” usually:

1. allow employers to ignore existing laws protecting employees from unsafe working conditions;
2. allow employers to ignore existing laws protecting the environment;
3. allow employers to pay their employees the lowest acceptable wages, in return for the “privilege” of working at these companies; and/or
4. allow employers to pay little or no business taxes, at the expense of communities who are required to make up for lost tax revenues.

More than six million willing-to-work Americans can’t find willing-to-hire employers.

And where there are victims, there are always people ready to profit from their desperation.

Consider the following email sent out by Steve Poizner, former Republican State Insurance Commissioner of California (2007-2011).

A successful Silicon Valley high tech entrepreneur, Poizner founded SnapTrack, Inc. and Strategic Mapping, Inc. In June, 2011, he co-founded the Encore Career Institute with the Sherry Lansing Foundation and Creative Artists Agency.

Thus, the email sent out on July 2, 2012, to advertise “Empowered UCLA Extension”:

Dear friends,

I wanted to share with you some news before my new venture – Empowered Careers – launches around the country….I’ve started this company to help address one of the key issues we face today — jobs. Our venture aims to close the skills gap through an innovative career development program — all delivered via the iPad.

It’s all designed specifically for baby boomers seeking to make a career change, get ahead professionally, or get back into the workforce.

Note the line: “Our venture aims to close the skills gap,” which it assumes to be a reality.

And the ad says nothing about the “greed gap” which exists between what employers demand from workers—and what they are willing to pay in return.

The Encore Careers Institute will offer online non-degree certificates for out of work adults and baby boomers looking to switch careers.

When did a non-degree certificate ever convince an employer to hire? Even a hiring-inclined employer?

And consider this passage:

Using our Empowered app, the iPad will transform any adult’s living room into a modern day classroom or transform a park bench into a study group while the kids are at soccer practice.

But transforming “any adult’s living room into a modern day classroom” will not compel those employers who refuse to hire to begin doing so.

Nor will it change the behavior of employers who:

• Will hire—but only on a part-time, no-benefits, minimum-wage basis;
• Continue to throw hard-working American employees into the street; and
• Move their companies to China, Mexico or Singapore.

And note that this program is aimed at those who can afford an iPad–and to shell out $9,800 for the course. This, says the website, “includes a one-time special reduction of $3,000 from our expected 2013 total program price of $12,800.”

So if you’re poor because you’re jobless, this program has nothing to offer you.

America can end this national disaster—and disgrace—of willing-to-work Americans being unable to fire willing-to-hire employers.

A policy based only on concessions—such as endless tax breaks for hugely profitable corporations—is a policy of appeasement.

And appeasement only whets the appetite of those appeased for even greater concessions.

It is past time to hold wealthy and powerful corporations accountable for their socially and financially irresponsible acts.

This solution can be summed up in three words: Employers Responsibility Act (ERA).

If passed by Congress and vigorously enforced by the U.S. Departments of Justice and Labor, an ERA would ensure full-time, permanent and productive employment for millions of capable, job-seeking Americans.

And it would achieve this without raising taxes or creating controversial government “make work” programs.

Such legislation would legally require employers to demonstrate as much initiative for hiring as job-seekers are now expected to show in searching for work.

An Employers Responsibility Act would simultaneously address the following evils for which employers are directly responsible:

• The loss of jobs within the United States owing to companies’ moving their operations abroad—solely to pay substandard wages to their new employees or avoid American health/safety laws.
• The mass firings of employees which usually accompany corporate mergers or acquisitions.
• The widespread victimization of part-time employees, who are not legally protected against such threats as racial discrimination, sexual harassment and unsafe working conditions.
• The refusal of many employers to create better than menial, low-wage jobs.
• The widespread employer practice of extorting “economic incentives” from cities or states in return for moving to or remaining in those areas. Such “incentives” usually absolve employers from complying with laws protecting the environment and/or workers’ rights.
• The refusal of many employers to provide medical and pension benefits—nearly always in the case of part-time employees, and, increasingly, for full-time, permanent ones as well.
• Rising crime rates, due to rising unemployment.

Among its provisions:

(1) American companies that close plants in the United States and open others abroad would be forbidden to sell products made in those foreign plants within the United States.

This would protect both American and foreign workers from employers seeking to profit at their expense. American workers would be ensured of continued employment. And foreign laborers would be protected against substandard wages and working conditions.

Companies found violating this provision would be subject to Federal criminal prosecution. Guilty verdicts would result in heavy fines and lengthy imprisonment for their owners and top managers.

There are legitimate reasons why millions of willing-to-work Americans remain unemployed. Or remain trapped in part-time, no-benefits jobs far below their levels of education and experience.

Some companies—such as Toys R Us—declare bankruptcy and go out of business. Others—such as Macy’s and J.C. Penney—are struggling to meet the challenges of e-commerce and the decline of shopping malls.

But there are sinister ones, too–such as the deliberate refusal of Congressional Republicans to create job opportunities for their fellow Americans.

U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (I, Vermont) made just that argument to guest host Ezra Klein on the June 12, 2012 edition of “The Rachel Maddow Show.”

KLEIN: Now, some Republicans say and some people say didn’t we do infrastructure a couple years ago? You heard a lot in the stimulus we had done infrastructure. So, how come we have all of this outstanding?

SANDERS: Because we ignored the needs for a long, long, time. Yes, we did put infrastructure. We put it into the state of Vermont, put more money into roads and bridges. But we need a lot more and that`s true for the other 49 states as well.

It’s not only roads…bridges…water systems. It’s mass transportation. It is rail. China is building high-speed rail all over the place. We are not. Our rail system is in many ways deteriorating.

We have schools that are aging. We have culverts that need work. We have tunnels that need work.

We have an enormous amount of work that is ready to go right now and it is beyond comprehension that our Republican friends will not support infrastructure legislation.

If Sanders is correct, Republicans were deliberately sacrificing the economic life of the nation because:

• They hated President Obama; and
• They believed that making the American people suffer would lead them to elect Mitt Romney.

On June 4, 2012, veteran political analyst Chris Matthews discussed this possibility with John Heilemann, the national affairs editor for New York magazine. 

MATTHEWS: How much of that is bent because of the 1% campaign of the president….going after them for grabbing most of the wealth in this country through tax policy and everything else? Are they resentful enough of that…

HEILEMANN: Yes….If you talk to people in business and finance….about the actual substance of the president’s policies, the substance does not bother them as much as the rhetoric.

More than six million Americans are now unemployed because many employers have designed “hiring” systems that simply don’t work.

So says Peter Cappelli, the George W. Taylor professor of management at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. He is also the author of  Why Good People Can’t Get Jobs: The Skills Gap and What Companies Can Do About It.

Employers often whine that they can’t find the talent they need. Today’s applicants, they claim, lack skills, education and even a willingness to work.

The truth is altogether different. According to Cappelli, the fault lies with employers, not job-seekers:

• Employers “ask for the moon” by vastly inflating their requirements for openings.
• Many qualified people are automatically removed from consideration by computer technology. The reason: Their resumés don’t match the inflated qualifications demanded by employers.
• Many employers aren’t willing to pay for the education and skills they claim to respect.  They’re looking for people who are young, cheap and experienced.
• Online applicants are often asked: “What salary do you expect?”  If you name a salary that’s higher than what the company is willing to pay, you’re instantly rejected.  
• Many of the candidates employers want to hire refuse to accept the positions at the wage level being offered.
• Employers don’t want to hire entry-level applicants right out of school. They want experienced candidates who can contribute immediately with no training or start-up time.
• Employers demand that a single employee perform the work of several highly skilled employees.
• When employers can’t find the “perfect candidate” they leave positions open for months. But if they were willing to offer some training, they might easily fill those positions.
• Companies no longer hire new college graduates and groom them for management. They no longer offer training and development. As a result, companies must recruit outsiders.
• Employers’ unrealistic expectations are fueled partly by their own arrogance. Employers believe they should be able to find “perfect people.” 

According to Cappelli, the hiring system desperately needs serious reform: 

• If jour job descriptions are inflated, bring them down-to earth.
• Don’t expect to get something for nothing—or next to it. Offer competitive salaries.
• Make sure that the automated systems aren’t screening out qualified candidates simply because they don’t have all the brass buttons in a row.
• Beef up the Human Resources section.

Cappelli worries that the complaints about a labor shortage caused by an unwilling, unskilled workforce will be repeated enough that they will be accepted as truth:

“It’s a loud story…that could become pernicious if it persists. It does have a blame-the-victim feeling to it. It makes people feel better. You don’t have to feel so bad about people suffering if you think they are choosing it somehow.”  

And where there are victims, there are always people ready to profit from their desperation.

Niccolo Machiavelli, the father of modern politics, warns in his masterwork, The Discourses: 

All those who have written upon civil institutions demonstrate…that whoever desires to found a state and give it laws, must start with assuming that all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature, whenever they may find occasion for it.

If their evil disposition remains concealed for a time, it must be attributed to some unknown reason; and we must assume that it lacked occasion to show itself. But time, which has been said to be the father of all truth, does not fail to bring it to light.

Niccolo Machiavelli

Where the crimes of corporate employers are concerned, we do not have to wait for their evil disposition to reveal itself. It has been fully revealed for decades. We need only find the courage to redress the costly outrages we see every day in the workplace.

In its June 8, 2011 cover-story on “What U.S. Economic Recovery? Five Destructive Myths,” Time magazine warned that profit-seeking corporations can’t be relied on to ”make it all better.”

Click here: What U.S. Economic Recovery? Five Destructive Myths – TIME

Wrote Rana Foroohar, Time‘s assistant managing editor in charge of economics and business:

American companies “are doing quite well,” but most American workers “are earning a lower hourly wage now than they did during the recession.”

Corporations, in short, are doing extremely well. But they don’t spend their profits on American workers.

“There may be $2 trillion sitting on the balance sheets of American corporations globally, but firms show no signs of wanting to spend it in order to hire workers at home.”

In short:  Giving even greater tax breaks to mega-corporations—the standard Republican mantra—will not persuade them to stop “outsourcing” jobs. Nor will it convince them to start hiring Americans.

While embarrassingly overpaid CEOs squander corporate wealth on themselves, millions of Americans can’t afford medical care or must depend on charity to feed their families.

Yet there is also a disconnect between the truth of this situation and the willingness of Americans to face up to that truth.

The reason, writes Foroohar:

Republicans have convinced most Americans they can revitalize the economy by slashing “taxes on the wealthy and on cash-hoarding corporations while cutting benefits for millions of Americans.”

To restore prosperity, America will need both tax increases and cuts in entitlement programs.

Now, fast forward to a March 30, 2018 story in The Motley Fool: “These 12 Companies Have Laid Off Workers in 2018.” 

The “tax reform” bill passed by a Republican Congress in 2017 “included a long-awaited reduction in corporate taxes. The top rate for corporations fell from 35% to a flat 21%.

“It also set a one-time repatriation tax on foreign profits at 15.5%, creating a windfall for many companies.” 

“In spite of the good fortune these events have bestowed on corporate America,” sums up the writer, “you might be surprised to find that there is a growing list of employers that are sending workers home this year.”   

Among those companies: 

• Verizon Wireless – 3,000 employees.
• PepsiCo, Inc. – 1,000 layoffs. 
• J.C. Penney – 360 layoffs on top of an already 5,000 firings.
• Ford Motor Company – 2,000 layoffs. Amazon.com – hundreds of workers (no specific number given).
• Macy’s, Inc. – 5,000 jobs eliminated. 
• AT&T – 4,000 employees.
• Walmart – eliminating 3,500 co-manager positions in its domestic market, and replacing half of these with lower-paying assistant store managers. It’s also laying off about 500 headquarters staff this year, and will do so in 2019.
• Kimberly Clark Corporation – laying off 5,000 to 5,500 employees.
• International Business Machines – According to a Mother Jones article, laid off an estimated 20,000 U.S. workers over the age of 40 since 2013, who were all replaced by “less-experienced and lower-paid workers.”
• Toys R Us – Filed for bankruptcy and plans to liquidate its 700 remaining U.S. locations, resulting in the loss of 33,000 American jobs. 

The companies:

• Hewlett-Packard – cutting 5,000 jobs.
• McDonalds – Undisclosed.
• Citigroup – 20,000 jobs.
• Tesla – 3,600 jobs.

And a June 28 article in The Street announced: “These Companies Have Had Some of the Worst Layoffs in 2018.”  

• EBay. Inc. – Cutting “cutting a single-digit percentage of jobs.”
• General Mills – 625 employees. Mid-Continent Nail Corp – firing 60 workers. Deutsche Bank – laying off 10,000 employees. 

Admittedly, some companies have legitimate reasons for cutting back on employees:

• PepsiCo has suffered a fall-off in customers as Americans switch from soda to healthier drinks. 
• Sears has struggled for years after the rise of e-commerce and the decline of customer traffic at shopping malls.
• Macy’s is another company struggling to realign itself in an age of online sales and changing consumer habits.
• Toys R Us has filed for bankruptcy and will soon be gone.

But there are also sinister reasons why millions of willing-to-work Americans remain unemployed.  Or remain trapped in part-time, no-benefits jobs far below their levels of education and experience. 

Chief among these is the refusal of Congressional Republicans to create job opportunities for their fellow Americans.