2020 Katie Barrows 2020 Katie Barrows

Economic Support Needed for Creative Professional Impacted by COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to hurt the arts, entertainment, and media industries, and the need for continued economic support for impacted creative professionals, including members of our unions, only grows more urgent. In normal times, these industries help power a sector that generates more than 4 percent of the country’s GDP and employs more than four million people. However, to date, this sector has lost an estimated $14.1 billion in economic activity due to COVID-19[1], and losses will continue as many theaters, soundstages, and performance venues remain dark well into next year. While some have continued to work, the industries’ employment rates are well below normal levels. With their work occurring in public venues and on job sites requiring close personal contact, many creative professionals will likely be some of the last workers able to return safely to their jobs due to expected longer-term social distancing requirements.

Protect professionals designated as essential workers and those returning to the workplace  

·      Require the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to issue an Emergency Temporary Standard to protect workers from occupational exposure to infectious diseases, including COVID-19.

·      For any professionals designated as essential or returning to the workplace: 

o    Guarantee access to employer-provided personal protective equipment.

o    Require employers to implement and enforce workplace social distancing policies that limit exposure to COVID-19. 

o    Require employers keep professionals who become infected with COVID-19 on payroll, remain responsible for affected professionals’ health care costs, and cover any family care costs accrued by affected professionals as a result of treating a COVID-19 diagnosis.

o    Require hazard pay as additional compensation for professionals deemed essential who are working outside their homes during the COVID-19 pandemic.

o    Provide flexibility or alternative work options for professionals deemed essential but who live with immunocompromised individuals.

Extend and expand COVID-19 economic support programs

·         Extend the CARES Act’s unemployment insurance provisions, including the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation, and Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, through July 1, 2021.

·         Ensure professionals earning both W2 and 1099/self-employment income receive the full benefits of the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program.

·         Expand the Families First Coronavirus Response Act’s paid leave provisions to professionals working for companies with 500 or more employees.

Preserve access to affordable, quality healthcare

·         Subsidize 100 percent of a person’s COBRA costs for one year.

·         Extend COBRA eligibility to 36 months.

·         Provide economic support for multiemployer health plans that are waiving cost-sharing or keeping ineligible members on their plans for reasons related to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Protect the pension funds of creative professionals

·         Allow multiemployer pension plans to: 

o    Freeze zone status for at least one year, based on provisions similar to the Worker, Retiree, and Employer Recovery Act of 2008;

o    Smooth investment and contribution base unit (“CBU”) losses in the funding standard account, and investment losses in the development of the actuarial value of assets, following provisions similar to the Pension Relief Act of 2010.

·         Institute a special partition program at the PBGC to deal with critically endangered multiemployer plans without increasing burdens on healthy pension plans.

·         Shore up the PBGC through government funding, not the robbing of healthy pension plans.

Provide economic support for organizations in the arts, entertainment, and media industries that gets people back to work

·         Appropriate $9 billion in emergency supplemental funding to ensure nonprofit arts organizations and public broadcasting stations can continue operations, keep people employed, and be ready to immediately resume productions when it is safe to do so. 

o    The $4 billion should be administered by the National Endowment for the Arts, National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. No less than 60% of the $4 billion should be in the form of direct grants. Any federal money distributed by a state or local arts agency must comply with the conditions of a direct grant. 

o    For live theater employers unable to receive federal arts funding, ensure access to low-interest loans for the purpose of operational continuity, continued employment, and the ability to resume productions when it is safe to do so.

o    Any organization accessing supplemental federal arts funding or a low-interest loan must attest that it will adhere to conditions no less stringent than Sec. 4003(c)(3)(D)(i) of the CARES Act. (e.g. minimum employment requirements, layoff prohibitions, outsource/offshore prohibitions, non-abrogation of collective bargaining agreements, union neutrality, etc.) 

·         Extend and enhance the Section 181 film tax deduction.

·         Restore the long-standing business tax deduction for live entertainment event ticket purchases.

Protect the collection and dissemination of news and information

·         Provide temporary payroll support for people working in print, radio, television, and digital-native news to keep them on the job at a time when news is essential.

·         Appropriate and direct federal advertising dollars for programs where community outreach is needed for spending on local media.

Ensure tax fairness for middle-class creative professionals

·         Allow middle-class creative professionals to deduct necessary business expenses by including the Performing Artist Tax Parity Act of 2019, bipartisan legislation that would update the Qualified Performing Artist tax deduction.

Prohibit post-employment restrictive covenants for journalists and other media employees until December 31, 2021

·         To ensure journalists and other media employees are able to find and accept new work during the COVID-19 pandemic, prohibit employers from enforcing any anti-competitive restrictive covenant.

Provide fair access to government economic support for all nonprofits 

·         Allow all nonprofits, including labor unions, access to the Paycheck Protection Program, not just 501(c)3 organizations.

If you have any questions, please contact DPE Assistant to the President/Legislative Director, Michael Wasser at (202) 638-0320 ext. 11 or mwasser@dpeaflcio.org

[1]  Americans for the Arts. (2020) “The Economic Impact of Coronavirus (COVID-19) on the Arts and Cultural Sector.” Retrieved on November 9, 2020 from https://www.americansforthearts.org/by-topic/disaster-preparedness/the-economic-impact-of-coronavirus-on-the-arts-and-culture-sector.

 

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2020 Katie Barrows 2020 Katie Barrows

Creative Professionals’ Priorities for the Next Phase of COVID-19 Legislation

We urge Congress to provide continued economic support for creative professionals, including the members of our unions, by enacting the following priorities in the next COVID-19 related legislation. Economic relief is crucial for the more than four million people working in the arts, entertainment, and media industries. They power a sector responsible for 4.2 percent of the United States’ GDP and a positive trade balance. Their work occurs in public venues and on job sites requiring close personal contact. Some continue to work during this crisis. For example, news media professionals are risking their health to collect and disseminate information critical to the public’s safety and stagecraft professionals have been drafted into service erecting temporary hospitals and treatment centers. Most other creative professionals, however, will likely be some of the last workers able to return safely to their jobs due to expected longer-term social distancing requirements. 

Protect professionals designated as essential workers

  • Require the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to issue an Emergency Temporary Standard to protect workers from occupational exposure to infectious diseases, including COVID-19.

  • For any professional deemed an essential worker:

    • Guarantee access to employer-provided personal protective equipment (PPE).

    • Require employers to implement and enforce workplace social distancing policies that limit exposure to COVID-19.

    • Require employers keep essential workers who become infected with COVID-19 on payroll, remain responsible for affected workers’ health care costs, and cover any family care costs accrued by affected workers as a result of treating a COVID-19 diagnosis.

    • Require hazard pay as additional compensation for working outside their homes during the COVID-19 pandemic.

    • Provide flexibility or alternative work options for workers deemed essential but who live with immunocompromised individuals.

Preserve access to affordable, quality healthcare

  • Subsidize 100 percent of a person’s COBRA costs for one year.

  • Extend COBRA eligibility to 36 months.

  • Provide economic support for multiemployer plans that are waiving cost-sharing or keeping ineligible members on their plans for reasons related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Protect the pension funds of creative professionals

  • Allow multiemployer pension plans to:

    • Freeze zone status for at least one year, based on provisions similar to the Worker, Retiree, and Employer Recovery Act of 2008.

    • Smooth investment and contribution base unit (“CBU”) losses in the funding standard account, and investment losses in the development of the actuarial value of assets, following provisions similar to the Pension Relief Act of 2010.

  • Institute a special partition program at the PBGC to deal with critically endangered multiemployer plans without increasing burdens on healthy pension plans.

  • Shore up the PBGC through government funding, not through the robbing of healthy pension plans.

Provide economic support for organizations in the arts, entertainment, and media industries that gets people back to work

  • Appropriate $4 billion in emergency supplemental funding to ensure nonprofit arts organizations and public broadcasting stations can continue operations, keep people employed, and be ready to immediately resume productions when it is safe to do so.

    • The $4 billion should be administered by the National Endowment for the Arts, National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. No less than 60 percent of the $4 billion should be in the form of direct grants. Any federal money distributed by a state or local arts agency must comply with the conditions of a direct grant.

    • For live theater employers unable to receive federal arts funding, ensure access to low-interest loans for the purpose of operational continuity, continued employment, and the ability to resume productions when it is safe to do so.

    • Any organization accessing supplemental federal arts funding or a low-interest loan must attest that it will adhere to conditions no less stringent than Sec. 4003(c)(3)(D)(i) of the CARES Act. (e.g. minimum employment requirements, layoff prohibitions, outsource/offshore prohibitions, non-abrogation of collective bargaining agreements, union neutrality, etc.)

  • Extend and enhance the Section 181 film tax deduction.

  • Restore the long-standing business tax deduction for live entertainment event ticket purchases.

Create a journalism-specific stimulus program to protect the dissemination of news and information

  • Provide news media organizations with access to an affordable loan program or a grant program that enables continued operations and keeps journalists and other news media professionals employed.

    • Require that 80 percent of any loan or grant going to a news media organization be spent on journalism, including payroll costs associated with gathering and distributing news and information.

    • Condition loan or grant access on an organizational attestation that it will adhere to conditions no less stringent than Sec. 4003(c)(3)(D)(i) of the CARES Act. (e.g. minimum employment requirements, layoff prohibitions, outsource/offshore prohibitions, non-abrogation of collective bargaining agreements, union neutrality, etc.)

  • Appropriate and direct federal advertising dollars for programs where community outreach is needed for spending on local media.

Ensure tax fairness for middle class creative professionals

  • Pass H.R. 3121, the Performing Artist Tax Parity Act of 2019, bipartisan legislation that would update the Qualified Performing Artist tax deduction, allowing middle class creative professionals to deduct necessary business expenses.

Prohibit post-employment restrictive covenants for journalists and other media employees until December 31, 2020

  • To ensure journalists and other media employees are able to find and accept new work during the COVID-19 pandemic, prohibit employers from enforcing any anti-competitive restrictive covenant.

Provide fair access to government economic support for all nonprofits

  • Allow all nonprofits, including labor unions, access to the Paycheck Protection Program, not just 501(c)3 organizations.

Extend and expand existing COVID-19 economic support programs

  • Expand the Families First Coronavirus Response Act’s paid leave provisions to professionals working for companies with 500 or more employees.

  • Extend the CARES Act’s unemployment insurance provisions, including the Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation, Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation, and Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, through December 31, 2020.

If you have any questions, please contact DPE Assistant to the President/Legislative Director, Michael Wasser at (202) 638-0320 ext. 11 or mwasser@dpeaflcio.org

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2020 Katie Barrows 2020 Katie Barrows

Letter Supporting the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, H.R. 2474

February 4, 2020

Re: H.R. 2474, the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act

Dear Representative,

On behalf of the 24 national unions in the Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO (DPE), I urge you to support H.R. 2474, the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, and to oppose any weakening amendments and any Motion to Recommit when the House of Representatives considers this bill. The PRO Act will ensure that professionals can exercise their right to join together in union and negotiate collectively with their employers by restoring the original intent of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).

DPE knows from our 2016 national survey of nonunion professionals that a majority of professionals want to join together in union. Unfortunately, in too many instances, employers are able to violate the NLRA and deny professionals their right to form a union with their colleagues.

The PRO Act will help ensure all professionals can achieve their right to join together in union and negotiate collectively with their employers to improve their lives and their workplaces. The legislation modernizes the NLRA so that it has remedies consistent with other workplace laws, ending the perverse incentive that exists currently for employers to break the law. Companies and individual corporate officers will be subject to financial penalties if they violate the NLRA, and professionals will have the ability to bring their cases to federal court. Further, the PRO Act will provide for fair union elections. The bill will also stop employers from hiding behind a subcontractor or other intermediary, or deliberately misclassifying professional employees as supervisors or independent contractors to evade their employer responsibilities.

Recognizing that professionals can only fully realize the value of joining together in union when they have a written contract, the PRO Act will also put a stop to employers using tactics that prevent employees from achieving a union contract. The legislation establishes a process for mediation and arbitration to assist employers and their employees with reaching agreement on a first contract. A written contract – just like CEOs have – is how union professionals can guarantee pay and benefits, ensure a voice in decisions affecting them at work, and secure pathways to sustain their careers.

The PRO Act also recognizes that professionals must be able to picket or withhold their labor in order to have the power necessary to improve their workplaces. The legislation will prevent employers from hiring permanent replacement workers in instances when professionals decide they have no choice but to go on strike. In addition, nonunion professionals will be able to engage in collective action to enforce basic workplace rights, instead of being required to pursue justice on their own through employer-favored arbitration proceedings.

Lastly, the PRO Act would eliminate state right to work laws. Secretive special interest groups and their billionaire funders push these laws in an effort to give corporations more power at the expense of everyday professionals. We must learn from the experience of the past seven decades, which has shown that people in states with right to work laws have lower wages and reduced access to quality health care and retirement security.

The experience of the more than four million professional, technical, and other highly-skilled workers who make up DPE’s 24 national unions demonstrates that working people do better when they can negotiate collectively for better pay and improved working conditions. That is why a majority of nonunion professionals want to join together with their colleagues and negotiate with their own employers. And it is why I urge you to support the PRO Act when it comes before you for a vote on the House floor.

If you have any questions, please contact DPE Assistant to the President/Legislative Director, Michael Wasser at (202) 638-0320 ext. 11.

                                                Sincerely,

                                                  Jennifer Dorning, President

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