I told you on Wednesday that we had outlined a set of principles that any bailout plan should be following to help Main Street, not just Wall Street.
Today we have followed up on that with a detailed proposal, the Main Street Recovery Program, that, if enacted into law, would put those principles to work for working Americans — at less than half the cost of the Wall Street bailout currently being debated by Congress.
What’s in the plan, you ask?
The Change to Win recovery program would provide:
- homeowner relief that would allow families to stay in their homes through renegotiated mortgage terms
- comprehensive health care that would reduce overall cost while promoting healthier lives
- pension fund protection that will extend the amortization periods for multi-employer pensions, establish an oversight board, and provide opportunities for retirees whose employers were driven out of business
- energy independence and the greening of the American Dream through public and private investment in new technologies to provide low cost energy and a clean environment
- physical infrastructure designed and built for the 21st century to restore and replace the roads, bridges, mass transit systems, airports, and parks of the last two centuries
- tax equity for working and middle class families who pay a larger percentage of their incomes than those taking a larger and larger share of the income and wealth of the country
- workplace fairness that respects and rewards work, protects worker rights and equal opportunity, and provides for workers organization and collective bargaining without employer intimidation or interference
- educational opportunity through a trust fund to expand education from early childhood programs to grants for college tuition.
It’s time that we started addressing the fundamental problems in our economy — the problems that have pushed the American Dream out of reach of a generation of working men and women. The Main Street Recovery Program would do just that.