[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 132 (Tuesday, September 16, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Page S5634]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. SANDERS (for himself and Ms. Stabenow):
  S. 2832. A bill to provide for youth jobs, and for other purposes; to 
the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, if you talk to the people in Vermont, and 
I suspect in any other State in America, they will say the most serious 
crisis facing this country is the lack of decent-paying jobs, 
particularly when it comes to young Americans. This is an issue we do 
not talk enough about, and this is an issue on which we have to focus.
  Yes, we are better off today than we were 6 years ago when we were 
hemorrhaging 700,000 jobs a month and the Nation's financial system was 
on the verge of collapse, but the truth is that the economy for working 
families and lower income families today remains in very difficult 
straits. The middle class of this country--the backbone of this 
country--continues to disappear and more and more people are living in 
poverty. In fact, we have almost more people living in poverty today 
than at any time in the history of this country, and all the while we 
are seeing more wealth and income inequality, such that 95 percent of 
all new income generated in America since the Wall Street crash is 
going to the top 1 percent.
  The fact is that real unemployment in this country is not the 
``official'' 6.1 percent we see on the front pages of newspapers. The 
truth is that if you count those people who have given up looking for 
work because they live in high-unemployment areas or the people--and 
there are many of these--who are working part time when they want to 
work full time, real unemployment is 12 percent. That is a crisis 
situation.
  As bad as that is, the unemployment rate is far worse for young 
Americans. Today the youth unemployment rate is 20 percent--20 percent. 
We all paid a lot of attention to the tragedy in Ferguson, MO, a few 
weeks ago, but what was not discussed is that African-American youth 
unemployment is 33 percent, and in many areas of the country it is even 
higher than that. Today over 5.5 million young people have either 
dropped out of high school or have graduated high school. And do you 
know what they are doing? Nothing. They have no jobs. Many of them in 
Vermont and throughout this country are hanging out on street corners 
and many of them are getting into trouble. Maybe they are doing drugs, 
maybe they are involved in crime, but this I will tell you, and the 
statistics are very clear on this: If you leave school--either you drop 
out or you graduate high school--and you don't get a job in your first 
year, you don't get a job in your second year, you don't get a job in 
your third year, there is a strong likelihood you will never get a job, 
never get a career, never make it to the middle class, never be part of 
mainstream America.
  Youth unemployment at 20 percent is clearly one of the reasons why in 
the United States of America we have more people in jail today than any 
other country on Earth. A lot of people don't know that. China's a 
great big country, a Communist authoritarian country. Doesn't China 
have more people in jail than we do? No. We have more people in jail 
than China.
  I think the time is long overdue for us to start investing in our 
young people, helping them get the jobs they need, helping them get the 
education they need, helping them get the job training they need so 
they can be part of our economy, part of the middle class, and not end 
up in jail or dead from overdoses of drugs. The situation is so dire 
that there are studies out there that tell us now that one out of every 
three African-American males born today, if we do not change this, will 
go to prison in his lifetime--one out of three. This is a crisis 
situation, and it is one that cannot be ignored.
  The legislation I have introduced today, along with Congressman John 
Conyers of Michigan, is called the Employ Young Americans Now Act. This 
legislation will provide $5.5 billion in immediate funding to States 
and localities throughout the country to employ 1 million young 
Americans between the ages of 16 and 24 and provide job training to 
hundreds of thousands of other young Americans. Under our bill the U.S. 
Department of Labor would provide $4 billion in grants to States and 
local governments to provide summer jobs and year-round employment 
opportunities for economically disadvantaged youth, with direct links 
to academic and occupational learning. There is another $1.5 billion in 
there to provide such services as transportation or childcare, which 
would be necessary to enable young Americans to participate in job 
opportunities.
  I am very grateful this legislation has already been endorsed by the 
AFL-CIO, which is the largest labor union in the country, representing 
some 13 million workers; the American Federation of State, County and 
Municipal Employees; the United Auto Workers; the United Steel Workers 
of America; the Campaign for America's Future; and the National 
Employment Law Project.
  I thank Senator Debbie Stabenow of Michigan for her support on this 
legislation as well.
  We cannot continue to ignore the crisis of youth unemployment in 
America. We are talking about the future of an entire generation. We 
are talking about the future of the United States of America. Let's 
start focusing on this issue. Let's give millions of young people the 
opportunity to earn a paycheck and to make it into the middle class.

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