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Update: White House Launches Task Force Headed By Biden To Strengthen Middle Class
January 30, 2009 12:10 p.m. EST
Kris Alingod - AHN Contributor
Washington, D.C. (AHN) - Having repeatedly called for a bailout for the middle class during the campaign, President Barack Obama on Thursday unveiled a task force to help middle class Americans. The announcement was made the same day the Commerce Department said the economy shrank the most in nearly three decades.
"The strength of our economy can be measured by the strength of our middle class," the President said at the White House. "This is a difficult moment. But I believe, if we act boldly and swiftly, it can be an American moment - when we work through our differences and overcome our divisions to face this crisis."
The Middle Class Working Families Task Force aims to raise the living standards of working families and "will conduct outreach sessions with representatives of labor, business, and the advocacy communities," the White House said in a statement.
The initiative will be chaired by Vice President Joe Biden, who is known for his working class roots. Its members will include the secretaries of Health and Human Services, Education, Commerce and Labor. The National Economic Council director Larry Summers, Office of Management and Budget director Peter Orszag and Council of Economic Advisers chair Christina Romer will also be part of the task force.
Members are scheduled to hold their first meeting on Feb. 27 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The talks will revolve around providing green jobs to strengthen the middle class. As part of their "key priority" of transparency, the task force will make available material and reports from meetings at their website, AStrongMiddleClass.gov
The Vice President wrote in an op-ed piece published on Friday in USA Today, "For years, we had a White House that failed to put the middle class front and center in its economic policies. President Obama and I are determined to change this. Quite simply, a strong middle class equals a strong America. We can't have one without the other."
"One of the things that makes this task force distinctive is it brings together - in one place - those agencies that have the most impact on the well-being of the middle class in our country," Biden added. "We'll be looking at everything from access to college and training with the Department of Education... to child care reform with Health and Human Services, to labor law with the Department of Labor. With this task force, we'll have a single, high-visibility group with one goal: to raise the living standards of middle-class families."
Obama had proposed a four-point economic recovery plan for middle class Americans during the general election. He devoted his first press conference as president-elect to calling for a stimulus aimed at assisting the unemployed and "helping hardworking families."
The nation's real gross domestic product (GDP) fell 38 percent in the fourth quarter of last year, according to the Commerce Department. The contraction was less than the 5 percent forecast, but the biggest since 1982.
The administration is currently working to have a stimulus passed by Congress. The House voted along party lines to approve an $819 billion package on Wednesday. The Senate is set to take up for debate a $900 billion version of the recovery plan next week.
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