For immediate release
Aug. 1, 2012
Contacts:
David Carle (Leahy): 202 224-3693
Michael Briggs (Sanders): 202 224-5141
Scott Coriell (Welch): 202 225-4115
WASHINGTON, August 1st – A Vermont non-profit has won a $2,865,734 U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) grant provided through the Older Americans Act’s Senior Community Service Employment Program, to help train and place low-income Vermonters – aged 55 and older – in jobs around the state, Vermont’s congressional delegation – Sen. Patrick Leahy, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Peter Welch – announced today.
The grant – part of $260 million in nationwide awards – will go to Vermont Associates for Training and Development, a St. Albans-based organization that provides training and employment services to low-income Vermonters.
Vermont Associates has locations in Bennington, Brattleboro, Burlington, Montpelier, Newport, Rutland, Springfield, St. Johnsbury and St. Albans.
The Senior Community Service Employment Program is the only federal jobs program designed to assist low-income seniors. Under the grant, participants will be placed in a wide variety of community service activities at non-profit and public facilities, including day-care centers, senior centers, schools and hospitals. These assignments are intended to serve as a bridge to unsubsidized employment.
In a joint statement, Leahy, Sanders and Welch said, “With many Vermonters continuing to struggle through a tough economy, these services will help people get back on their feet. By placing Vermonters in a variety of community service jobs, this grant will not only help them find employment but it will also strengthen our communities.”
Awesome.. Now I can gt a real job !!
ReplyDeleteNo more characters on this Blogspot to spend my idle time with
Wish me good fortune my friends.
tah tah
Exactly why does it take $2.8M to train anyone for unskilled, service jobs?
ReplyDeleteTrust me, as an employer that has interviewed 100s of applicants, the ONLY reason these slugs are on the dole is lack of ambition. Now I get to see my taxes squandered further bribing them to take a job.
Thanks a lot, Leahy, Sanders and Welch. WTF are you doing for us working stiffs that manage to get out of bed every day to pay the oppressive taxes that keep this rat hole afloat?
.. An employer in the town and you are calling it a rat hole? Shouldn't you be trying to manage the problem and do all you can to help, instead of putting it dow? This is your community and your well-being at stake here...
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ReplyDeleteSay.....you don't think the timing on this giveaway has anything to do with getting votes to keep the great Ponzi scheme alive, do you?
ReplyDeleteA: 4:10- I seriously doubt you are a real employer offering any job that pays a decent wage. It's highly unlikely that someone as bitter and angry as you would be worth working for. Stop crying because people don't want to be your slaves.
ReplyDeleteA 9:07: Those 'worthless slugs' you refer to are grandparents and most of them have worked their ENTIRE LIVES but now find they can't find employment because their skills don't match what employers want.
ReplyDeleteNot sure why you are so angry. If anything, that money is subsidizing the employers, not the people.
@a little perspective. Good post. It is extremely difficult for people over 55 who lose their employment to find new employment, and its getting harder not easier. Why is it we can support Medicare, Social Security, housing for the elderly but when someone comes along to try and help the 55 - 65 age bracket we get all this noise. I personally am not in that position, but I know of plenty of people in that age bracket who through no fault of their own are unemployed and can't find employment -- if this will help then I support it.
DeleteMe want to work when me want to work. Most of the time me want to just chill or whatever, or just hang with me peeps.
ReplyDeletere: "skills don't match what employers want."
ReplyDeleteGuess you never scored well in reading comprehension. The topic is, unskilled service jobs. Exactly what skills are required, and why do have to pay millions to train them? Additionally, 55 years old is at the height of your game. If you aren't proficient at something of demand by now, you only have yourself to blame.
Anyone who's reliable, and productive will never be without work, regardless of age.
Tell that to all of the unemployed machinists in the area who worked their entire lives in the machine tool industry and now are desperately trying to find employment wherever they can and are being given all kinds of reasons why they are being passed over which being translated actually mean, you are too old and adding you to our employment pool is going to jack up our employee costs due to the increased cost of your benefits. The assertion that "Anyone who's reliable, and productive will never be without work, regardless of age" is pure bull manure.
DeleteI can speak first hand of the utter and profound ignorance of your statement regarding machinists.
DeleteThe current demand for "talented" machinists, regardless of age, has never been stronger. Local ads for both Ruger and GE-Rutland have advertised wages of over $25.00/hr. Dozens of other shops are so desperate for help they pirate machinists back and forth. Most of who are well over 50.
What you and others have to comprehend is, over half the machinists from former shops were so incompetent they would have never sustained a job without the union. Hence, they have never since secured work in the field.
You truly are a lonely, ignorant jack off.
Oh yea. They have some wonderful temp jobs over at Rugers I hear. And they only let you work a certain number of hours per week which is very thoughtful of them. Wonderful place. Yeah huge demand for machinists. Why I was just recommending to my 50 year old Uncle that he go apply again for one of those jobs.
DeleteSounds like someone's bitter that didn't qualify.
DeleteCan always join the fresh recruits at HCRS. Steady turn over there for you folks with no viable job skills.
It was "unskilled workers" being paid with Federal tax dollars who built the entire Vermont recreational industry.
ReplyDelete20,000 young men were paid $25 a month (about $480 in 2012 dollars) of which 80% went to their families back home. With not much more than picks, shovels and wheelbarrows, they built dams, roads, hiking trails, ponds and campgrounds which in 2009 accounted largely for $126 million in tax revenues. For a tax expenditure of perhaps $60 million (today, $1.2 billion) to get an annual return of over $100 million for 70 years is a good use of tax money. We should be thinking about using tax money to repair the damage to our infrastructure, which the American Society of Civil Engineers has graded a D+.
Second, ANY money that comes into the community has a multiplier effect, which is to say it gets re-spent. Our landlords are aware of this, and have lobbied to preserve Section 8 (not very successfully, unfortunately) which ostensibly goes to the undeserving but winds up in the landlords' pockets. Which in my opinion is a good thing, because they get paid to provide for that money the best low-cost housing in the whole bloody world!
But to get back to the multiplier effect: The "unskilled worker" who gets this money isn't going to eat it; he or she will use it to buy groceries, some new clothes, maybe go to a movie or pay for a physical exam. If we're lucky, it'll be spent in Springfield. The businesses that get the money use it to pay their employees and pay their taxes. The employees who get the money spend it again, as do the town employees.
So, according to the economists, one dollar of public money spent for our so-called "unskilled workers" multiplies-- and as a result of the $2.8 million coming into town, we can expect to feel the effects of as much as $3.3 million being spent here-- no chump change.
And where does this tax money come from? Not from the top 6.4%, who pay 38% of the income taxes, but get 60% of the nation's gross annual income....
Chuck, what's wrong with me keeping MY money, and respending how I see fit to stimulate the economy?
DeleteAnd please explain to me exactly how I'll financially benefit from unskilled/low income folks spending my tax dollars? Am I supposed to open a tattoo parlor or sell big screen TVs?
Unless you are one of the four households in Springfield averaging $3.4 million, you simply don't have enough money by yourself to make a difference. (They, by the way are pretty civic-minded in their charity, as compared to someone like billionaire Michael Milliken.)
DeleteWe all do better when we understand we're all in this together. If you are one of the 3,000 households in Springfield that want to protect yourself against your house burning down, you do it by joining tens of thousands of strangers of all races, religions and sexual orientations in an insurance pool.
If you have a job, you are a person into whose hands tax dollars come-- the landlord who provides Section 8 housing buys furniture at Young's, heating oil from HB or Irving, food at Shaw's, coffee at Apron Strings, dines at Friendly's or Jonathan's, has his addition excavated by Larry Griswold, gets his fence installed by Springfield Fencing. And that's just one fairly small program. THAT is what "multiplier effect: is about.
Without the government to spend money wisely-- and don't count on the Republicans to get beyond the "faith-based" and crony-capitalism of their last forty years-- Springfield-- and almost all of Vermont would be the backwards, penurious, close-minded, inbred and suspicious society it was up until the Interstate came through.
It was before the interstate came thru that Springfield had the highest per capita income, and standard of living in Vermont. At village that lead the world in manufacturing technology. A technology responsible for the greatest automobile industry on Earth, a space program that was first to put a man on the moon, and a defense industry that insures our freedom.
DeleteSo explain to me again Chuck, how is it so much better since you showed up in town and enlightened all us backwards, penurious, close-minded, and inbred folks?
Yeah Chuck, it was back when we had those evil unions that made sure that there were jobs for those backwards, penurious, close-minded, and inbred folks. Back when we had bombed Europe into ruins, and Hitler had bombed England into ruins and we had no competition so it didn't matter if we were still protectionist and protected our home industry. So there Chuck explain to me why those Unions weren't the downfall of this Town, and why Republicans buying cheap votes by thumping the Bible and shipping jobs down to the former Confederacy and China isn't the best way to handle things. I revere those days when the machine tool industry was making millions and pumping into the long term betterment of the community by investing in local institutions of higer learning and keeping our rivers pristinely clear. Huh, Chuck answer me that. You progressive liberals are all alike, you seem to think that the machine tool industry was propped up with defense contracts and government programs -- you really think that Germans and Russians would have targeted Springfield when we working on all those private non-war related stuff? Huh, Chuck answer me that. Its so disgusting when you guys don't understand our patriotic past and yearn to bring it all back.
DeleteYou rock, Boss Hogg! Love your insights!
DeleteAnonymous, read "The Yankee Exodus." It's in the library, or you can get an interlibrary loan.
It details Vermont's century-long population drop, from the 1830's to the 1940's. The state was a hilly, rocky backwater, and anybody who had the least smarts headed for the Territories, where they could plow a furrow all day long without hitting a rock. (The president of Vermont's Indian Creek Republic left as soon as it became the State of Vermont and founded the township next to my Wisconsin home town).
The people who stayed in Vermont were the ones who weren't daring or well-funded enough to try a different way of life. They had various reputations-- hard and dependable workers (because that's what it took to survive) or the town drunk, and judgmental in proportion to their lack of education. You'll find their contemporaries in "Fiddler on the Roof," valuing "Tradition!" because change is frightening.
Springfield back then was not typical of Vermont; in fact, it wasn't even typical of Springfield today. It not only was well-off, it was also the most important town in the state and possibly the largest for half of that century. And of course it lost the top ranking for per capita income not because the Interstate came through, but because IBM located in Essex Junction; you incorrectly argued from "post hoc, ergo propter hoc."
The Interstate was probably the best thing to happen to Vermont: At one point (about 1978), two-thirds of Vermont residents were born elsewhere (it's now down to one-third). The original transplants were a lot of flower children who wanted peace, love and communion with Nature, something few native Vermonters would ever have settled for (knowing Nature as intimately as they did). The resulting intermix of the newcomers' values and Vermont values has made this state's quality of life almost, if not absolutely, the highest in the nation.
Evidence of an impoverished population's tendency to punish itself can be seen in the presidential elections of the Depression, when Vermont consistently voted against Roosevelt, this despite the benefits it brought to the state-- including the CCC, Food Stamps and Social Security (of which Ida Mae Fuller of Ludlow was the first recipient in the nation).
Well, I don't know about that Chuck, we were supporting silent Cal back then and he was applying all kinds of new and interesting scientific methods to assist in improving the gene pool. Just ask the Abenaki how he helped them along, course its kind of hard to find their descendants. I don't think its especially fair to point out that the Iroquois were the bigger losers in the War of 1812 and that our population left in a big sucking noise like old Ross Perot described NAFTA as making. And the machine tool industry was truly amazing, have you not listened to the old timers as they described how the Black River ran in a variety of colors back then? Course this is also as I understand it why all the buildings have their back to the Black River in Springfield, but those were exciting days. Why you could take drafting in high school and go straight into the machine shops and on a Friday night go down and punch somebodies face in at the Duck Inn -- that's why some of the local stuff happening lately kind of is nostalgic for me. We didn't have to put up with all this progressive liberal regulation either, we could just pipe all those solvents and oils right into underground tanks or into the river and it all just disappeared. Out of sight out of mind is what I say. Those were sure the good old days, and I expect that if we keep cutting services and trying to force the tax rate down that you know eventually those machine shops that moved away will get rid of those stupid computers and come back and use all of the manpower that we used to employ in the mills. Course if we could get into a good nice clean war, that would help a bunch. Nothing like defense contracts to make business zip. But we can't do that if we keep expanding the Federal budget and the Federal government. No sirree we need small government and big military, now that's the ticket. And some how we have to convince those Arabs and Persians to start wearing uniforms, why its downright cowardly of them to not put on uniforms so we can mow them down, just downright cowardly. And they are stingy too, seem to think they have a right to get rich off that oil that just happens to be under land they have been temporarily occupying for the last few centuries. Its all those union's fault though, Reagan sure showed them...just look at how employment has boomed around this area since Reagan. The Gipper he was my man, worked out all those interesting export deals between the Contra and Iran -- man was a sheer genius. Got all those good old Southern boys to come over to the Republican Party so they could maintain their educational traditions down south. Bless their little Confederate hearts, they sure know how to put their brains in neutral when it comes to voting.
DeleteNot sure that I can completely agree with you C. Gregory with respect to the Interstate being the best thing that ever happened to Vermont. It is true and books and studies have been written about the impact of the automobile on rural America and its genetic impact. On the other hand, I keep wondering what might have happened had they not gone with the interstates and massive highway system, and developed passenger rail lines to the resort areas instead. Vermont might be an even nicer place to live than it is today.
DeleteIn terms of giving individuals the freedom to emigrate, the automobile is nonpareil, even though environmentally it's a disaster, Alpin Jack. Rail transportation simply couldn't have provided the degree of idiosyncrasy needed for blithe-spirited types to stage a massive immigration to a sate that was so impoverished that 40% of its WWII draftees were found to be malnourished.
DeleteI still wonder though, what Vermont might have morphed into without the interstates. The back to the landers would have come anyway, I think the artists would have come and if we had still got the high speed internet then many of the rest would have come as well. The industrialists didn't come anyway.
DeleteSo the "back to the landers" and "artists" would have done what? without the interstate? Spur the economy by selling artwork or tomatoes on a website?
DeleteMarketing 101: Ideally, the consumer comes to you. If not, YOU go to the consumer.
I would HATE to hang a trashy piece of artwork that I'd purchased on the INTERNET beside my Velvet Elvis!
Just don't get your point or rationale.
Well, I don't know exactly what they would have done. I suspect the back to the landers would have developed Vermont's gourmet food industry as I have developed Vermont's gourmet food industry without the interstate, and I expect the artists would have done what the artists do anyway. I expect the manufacturing sector would have collapsed about like it did anyway, perhaps a little sooner. Vermont would have become a Mecca for people wanting to get away from the more hectic world, I would guess...hard to say, I suspect that Vermont would have developed a little more like Europe and the Vermont accent might have persisted. It would have been somewhat more bipolar politically than it is now I suppose.
Delete@ A 6:46
ReplyDeleteMany people who held high-paying, highly skilled jobs are now forced into other arenas that often require much LESS skillful training, but it's in a different field.
There is no shame in having worked for a company as long as possible only to find your job is now obsolete, has moved overseas/ to another state, or you are considered a liability due to age.
Rest assured, the new generations are waking up to how companies have 'cared' for their employees and will not be making the same mistakes.
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p.s.- LOL @ you trying to crack on my literacy skills.
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+1 for Alpin Jack
Just don't understand this thinking if the training my father got was good enough for his grandfather it was good enough to last him a life time. Why he didn't have any trouble finding work during WWII and afterwards...those workers back then they could work circles around those Chinese and Indians. The workers today, they are just slackers plain and simple -- they think they are worth a living wage. You know how much it costs to keep a decent Dressage horse these days, how are we going to be able to afford that if we pay the workers more than the Chinese and the Hindus. Terrible demands being made on our poor industrialists.
DeleteRE: "Without the government to spend money wisely..."
ReplyDeleteEarth to Chuck Gregory, $16T in debt proves you are grossly misled. "Spend wisely" is an oxymoron when it comes to contemporary government.
No it proves that you shouldn't reduce taxes on the wealthy at the same time you fight an unfunded war in Iraq to protect corporate oil interests, while deregulating banks and looking elsewhere while they drive the world economy into the ditch.
DeleteAnother paranoid delusional heard from!
DeleteAnonymous, I didn't know our town is $16 trillion in debt.
DeleteHowever, if you are switching topics to talk about federal fiscal policy, here are a few facts:
1. $13 trillion of that stems from the Bush tax cuts.
2. They were weighted very heavily towards the best-off: The 'marriage penalty' tax alone gave thirty times as much money-- $10,000-- to a couple making only four times as much as the average Vermont household of four, which got $300. Do you think that was fair, reasonable or equitable?
3. Since Wall Street rules Congress, don't expect they'll make the playing field more level. I hope you're not an investor, because the Republicans' laughably misnamed "JOBS Act" is actually a get-out-of-jail-free card for traders offering IPO's to people like us: We are denied due diligence on the offering, and if we lose our shirt, we can't even investigate what was done for the next three years.
But more to the point in Springfield:
1. Taxes are an investment in infrastructure. If you don't want your roads plowed, the streets in good repair and buildings (like the Woolson Block, until recently) safe from collapsing on you, you want workers with the training, the proper machinery and governmental oversight to keep things from falling apart. For lack of municipal inspection, the corner of the Woolson Block went unprepared for almost a year. It wasn't until somebody pointed out to the town that it might be liable when the facade fell off that the town pressured the landlord into fixing it. If you really don't believe in infrastructure, move to Somalia. You'll love it there.
2. You don't know how badly you're getting screwed on taxes, because you have no idea how much tax money got pushed to the top 6% during the Bush years. Slightly over one percent of households earn 60% of the income and pay 37% of the tax revenue. If they paid the same rate that your income group does (let's say you're in the 2.3% of the population that makes $35,000 and cumulatively earn 2.3% of the national income), your 1211 income tax would have been almost halved!
3. We could impose a tax rate in Vermont that would leave the top 2447 households with an after-tax income of $1.3 million, still the wealthiest families in Vermont, and adjust everybody else's tax rate proportionately. Which is to say, if their tax rate is 30% and you make one-hundredth of what they make, your tax rate is 0.3%.
4. But as long as you, to paraphrase John Steinbeck, do not consider yourself a member of a hornswoggled citizenry but rather a temporarily embarrassed millionaire, you're not going to bother thinking about this.
I don't know whether to attribute your myopathy to ignorance, naivete, or the fact that your livelihood stems from government handouts, but it's clear that you failed Econ 101, fell victim to extreme left-wing propaganda, bloomed a little to late as a flower child, and have developed a giant case of class envy.
DeleteBut more to the point in Springfield, taxes are to be collected and squandered on pet projects sold to the public as "investment" but serving little if any economic value to the town. Most of them are white elephants that make the do-gooders feel good and provide a placebo effect to those who desire a better economy but fail to understand the structural defects facing the town. And the white elephants only serve to divert appropriate "investment" to roads, bridges, and waterworks - the real infrastructure.
The white elephants keep the Springfield circus interesting but do little in the long run to create any wealth for the town. Rather they have the opposite effect of imposing a cost burden on the taxpayers and disincentivizing ecomonic improvements in private homes and businesses.
Your first erroneous point above attests to your flawed ideology and complete lack of objectivity on any fiscal matter, so it's best that we just let you hop on your trusty bicycle and ride quietly down the bike path insfrstructure and into the sunset, a copy of Steinbeck tucked neatly in your basket to convey the air of superiority to those you might pass...
Yeah Chuck, it incentivizes homeowners and local businesses to have run down collapsing brick buildings scattered all over town. Didn't they teach you that backwater slums is the preferred aesthetic for people wanting to locate businesses and improve their houses. Why every real estate investor always wants to own the nicest house or building in the neighborhood. See these large abandoned looking buildings have what we call a trickle up effect which is kind of like the trickle down effect. The trickle up effect is based on the same logic, if the neighboring building compares adversely with your own that means your own is worth more than the neighboring building, so you can be proud that you are an independent capitalist owning the nicest structure in sight. That way you can go to the Selectboard and complain about your tax rate, makes perfect sense to me. I just don't understand your naivete Chuck. The problem is all these do gooders going around and fixing up the eyesores so they can be occupied. Makes them a rarity in town -- kind of like a white elephant don't you see. Now if they were just allowed to crumble into ruin they wouldn't stick out, and then they would be like the rest of the elephants. Did you know that is why we have the elephant as a symbol for our party, and by the way it is always gray never white or pink. The real wealth in this town has to be mined, grown, or manufactured. We are clearly growing weed -- so long as those progressives making demands of the Selectboard don't screw that market up. And look at all the manufacturing we have lured into town by cutting services and complaining about taxes -- you see the manufacturers want to locate next to abandoned decrepit buildings and by fixing up the buildings we discourage them from coming to town. Instead they go to cities which have colleges and universities where the taxes and rent are low and people let their public buildings go to rack and ruin. You liberals just don't understand, you think that industry is attracted to areas where government research grants are being handed out...such socialist blather. And everybody knows that having sewer and water pipes explode, and facades fall off of buildings helps building excitement in the town. Kind of like the recent shooting, it makes me nostalgic for the good ole days.
DeleteAnonymous, "Lead, follow, or get out of the way," as Ted Turner put it.
ReplyDeleteAd hominem attacks do not constitute constructive citizenship.
If you have any particular suggestions for improving Springfield without radically restructuring the present system of revenue, everyone would be more than happy to hear them. I had one, and I have presented it to both the Chamber of Commerce and Springfield on the Move. Whether they will be acted on by those more able than I to make change is yet to be seen.
Boss Hogg, you should get a GW Bush Medal of Freedom for your nonpareil defense of capitalism. I'll consult a spiritist to see if it's possible. One practical solution for decrepit buildings is to tax them more heavily than the ones in good repair; it would provide an incentive for owners to keep the town looking as cute as Grafton (ugh!).
I await yours.
Ted Turner is is it, isn't he the one that fell asleep with Jane Fonda at the Superbowl or something. Hm, well as I see it what we need is an ongoing dose of political cowardice, now that's just the ticket. Some people might think that political cowardice is a strange sounding virtue. But not me, you see political cowardice inspires timidity and prevents bold strokes. For example bold strokes might result in the Selectboard Chairman and the Town Manager not only ordering constant police patrols, but the bringing of public nuisance suits against some of the esteemed property owners that appear to be harboring those stalwart souls who are keep important agricultural commodities on the market. And that of course would be ill advised since it would interfere with the robust market that we have going here with heavy competitive forces at work, I admit sometimes a little over zealous but what are a few pieces of flying lead in the overall scheme of things. They might decide to sit down and seriously work with the school on rehabilitating Park Street School and the Parks and Woolson building and what a terrible loss that would be to our manufacturing ambience in the town. No political cowardice is a great thing because it inspires timidity which in turn results in a minimum of government activity. And that is the secret of conservatism, minimalist activity in the face of tremendous social and economic adversity. You might actually call it courage, for in another sense it takes tremendous courage to sit on ones hands as Rome burns metaphorically of course, we don't have good enough wine to fully emulate Rome...but you know what I mean. You see as the various once proud structures disintegrate it impels in the citizens a strong sense of pride in the past, which swells with a crescendo in a patriotic chorus as to a glorious past. And those who are enfolded in this patriotic vision of the past, well they gain the strength to do absolutely nothing about creating a better future. And that is their great strength because by doing nothing they can be criticized for nothing, and they can give catcalls and jeers to those few souls who try to inspire people to actually do something -- and those few souls of course are the villains because they sometimes make mistakes, whereas the conservative forces never make mistakes in the future. You can't make mistakes in the future you see when mired in the past. It is a wonderful system you see. Now I do want to compliment you on making a proposal to the Chamber of Commerce and Springfield on the Move, that is always refreshing for them to have something new to ignore. But if you really want to see inaction in all of its glory you should submit it to the Police Chief, Town Manager and the Chairman of the Selectboard...now there you can see a masterful display.
ReplyDelete