The wealth gap in our nation continues to rise rapidly. Labor's share of our national income--the amount of GDP paid out in wages, salaries, and benefits--has been declining since the 1980s. One of the steepest periods of decline in the labor share of income in the United States was when it dropped from 63.3 percent in 2000 to 56.7 percent in 2016.

As historian Howard Zinn points out, the media spins a tales of the American Dream teaching that "to be rich is a sign of superiority, to be poor a sign of personal failure, and that the only way upward for the poor person is to climb into the ranks of the rich by extraordinary effort and extraordinary luck."

But as recent strikes across the nation show, working people are tired of getting left behind while executives and CEOs make an average of 351 times more than the typical worker's salary. CEO compensation has grown 940% since 1978, while worker compensation has grown 12%. This level of inequality was never part of the American Dream. And the increasing imbalance will only lead to economic instability and stunted growth.

The workers of this country are done being mistreated, underpaid, and undervalued. We’re calling on the Biden administration to expand pro-labor policies that would help millions of working families by:

• Strengthening and expanding outdated overtime protections, increasing the threshold to be eligible for overtime pay to $85,000 to give millions of workers a raise.
  
• Strengthening labor protections for federal contractors to protect their union organizing rights and provide benefits including sick leave, overtime, and vacation time.
  
• Issuing new heat and wind standards to protect workers, including farm, warehouse, and construction workers.
  

• Promoting the protection and robust enforcement of labor, employment, and civil rights through immigration protections and access to work authorizations to safeguard against retaliation so that all workers can exercise their rights regardless of immigration status.

It's time to lower costs and raise wages for working people to provide urgently needed economic relief. Sign the petition to President Biden: Expand worker power.

Participating Organizations
Kesha for Vermont
Daily Kos
Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, AFL-CIO
Fayetteville Police Accountability Community Taskforce
Inequality Media Civic Action
OD Action
TakeItBack.Org
The Alliance for Retired Americans