Top Priority Should Be Jobs

Americans need jobs -- today's new jobs report showing that employers added far fewer jobs than expected last month matches what Americans are experiencing in their everyday lives. But instead of working together to find real solutions, Republicans are touting their budget that guts Medicare and destroys two million more jobs.

CORE MESSAGE

We need more good-paying jobs -- not more wasteful taxpayer handouts to millionaires and big corporations.

Connect: Our leaders should be focusing on creating jobs and putting the middle class back to work.

Define them:  Republicans in Congress said they'd bring jobs, but all they're doing is trying to take away Medicare to pay for trillions in new tax breaks for their millionaire and corporate donors. 

Discredit: At a time when Americans are struggling, the last thing we need is to waste trillions of dollars on handouts for millionaires, oil companies, and big corporations that didn't create jobs before and won't now.

Core values: America can't be prosperous if corporations are sitting on record profits, while millions of people sit idle in their homes -- a strong America is built on a strong middle class, which means good jobs, growing opportunity, and hope for the future.

ATTACKS & RESPONSES

"Democrats just want to sit back and do nothing about Medicare."

• We've already taken steps to preserve Medicare even longer into the future - the health care law extended its life by nearly a decade, and we can do even more to build on these smart reforms.
• Instead of working together, Republicans voted to gut Medicare to pay for trillions in tax giveaways to their corporate and oil company donors.
• Politicians in Washington need to get their priorities straight and start looking out for working families and seniors instead of their big corporate donors.

"The Bush tax cuts grew the economy and created millions of jobs." 

• The Bush tax cuts created record deficits and were followed by the slowest job growth since World War II.
• Americans' average income dropped during the Bush years, and now the richest 1% control 40% of our country's wealth.
• The middle class has always been the backbone of our country -- the working people who contribute to the creation of wealth should share in it.

"The last thing we need to do is raise taxes on job creators - we need to cut corporate tax rates to promote competition and fix our economy."

• With American families struggling, Republican politicians have some nerve making working families pay for tax giveaways for their corporate donors. That makes no sense, and Americans aren't buying it.
• Corporate profits are at an all-time high, but corporations are paying lower taxes than ever before - and some aren't paying any at all. America can't be prosperous if corporations are sitting on record profits, while millions of people sit idle in their homes.
• When Presidents Reagan, Bush Sr., and Clinton asked millionaires and big corporations to pay their fair share, it led to millions of new jobs and economic growth.

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW

• The U.S. private sector created only 54,000 jobs in May, falling far short of expectations, and demonstrating that our leaders need to act to help get the middle class growing again.
• Even though Americans' top priority is putting Americans back to work, Washington Republicans "jobs plan" is nothing more than a repackaging of the same failed policies - more tax giveaways for millionaires and corporations.
• Washington Republicans are relying on discredited and fringe economists to defend their budget.
• The Republican plan would:
  • Increase our national debt over the next decade;
  • Destroy two million jobs in the next two years;
  • End Medicare as we know it by creating a voucher system that will double health care costs for seniors;
  • Gut Medicaid - shifting costs to states that are already in financial trouble and eliminating coverage for many Americans, including seniors who live in nursing homes, children and people with disabilities;
  • Make significant cuts to K-12 education, job training, and Pell grants that help kids go to college;
  • Give over $4 trillion in new tax breaks for millionaires and corporate special interests and protect $40 billion in giveaways to Big Oil -- even though corporate profits are at an all-time high and corporations are paying lower taxes than ever before.
  • Take health insurance away from 32 million Americans;

• Most Americans say the best way to reduce the deficit is to raise taxes on millionaires and eliminate giveaways for oil companies, but Republicans won't even put that on the table.
• Nearly 60% of Americans oppose the Republican Medicare plan, nearly 90% of Americans want to increase or keep Medicare funding the same, and 75% want to preserve or increase funding for Medicaid.
• Americans trust President Obama and Democrats in Congress by a 15-point margin when it comes to rebuilding the middle class.
• A new study shows that the richest one percent of Americans own 40% of the nation's wealth.

We develop messaging by aggregating, analyzing and distilling polling, tested messaging, and expert recommendations, and monitoring the media to identify what is and isn't working.  See here for some of the experts and organizations we draw on.