What should the president do now?

Push to repeal the sequester (a reconciliation bill in the Senate would allow repeal with 51 votes, thereby putting pressure on House Republicans) and replace it with a “Build America’s Future” Act that would close tax loopholes used by the wealthy, end corporate welfare, impose a small (1/10 of 1%) tax on financial transactions and reduce the size of the military.

According to the Center for Economic and Policy Research, more than 40 million Americans work in jobs where they have no access to paid sick days. In addition to the potential loss of wages and jobs for working families, the lack of paid sick days forces many people to go to work when they are contagious and get co-workers and customers sick and decreases productivity for workers who show up unable to perform to their normal level of ability. More and more cities and states are recognizing the realities of the damage having a workforce without paid sick leave does to workers and to the economy.

The AFL-CIO supports the nomination of Caitlin Halligan to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and urges the Senate to support cloture and to vote for her confirmation. As President Obama's nominee for the appeals court, Halligan has an impressive record in public service. Halligan served as the solicitor general for the state of New York and as general counsel for the New York County District Attorney’s office. She has garnered broad support, ranging from law enforcement groups, appellate advocates and women’s bar associations.  

Last week, the AFL-CIO, along with the National Education Association (NEA) and Change to Win, filed amicus briefs challenging the constitutionality of California's Prop. 8 and the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) in the U.S. Supreme Court. 

Same sex couples do not have the same access to workplace and health care benefits and the AFL-CIO supports equal rights. 

More than 160 state and local labor federations and central labor councils have passed resolutions in support of comprehensive immigration reform that includes a pathway to citizenship for aspiring citizens already in the United States.  The labor organizations that have passed resolutions so far come from 39 different states and represent more than 6 million workers.

The renewal of the Violence Against Women Act is now on its way to President Obama, who has said he will sign it into law. On the eve of Women's History Month, working families were able to celebrate that the House finally passed the renewal of the Violence Against Women Act on Thursday. The Senate already passed the act. 

In Miami Gardens, Fla., last night union leaders, immigration activists and elected officials called for comprehensive immigration reform—including a path to citizenship for the nation’s 11 million aspiring citizens—in another in the series of actions that are part of the AFL-CIO’s immigration reform campaign. 

As you may have heard, the Republicans' refusal to discontinue the hostage crisis around the sequester has led to the across-the-board budget cuts kicking in today. What you may not have heard is that the sequester actually increases the the public debt-to-GDP ratio, Andrew Fieldhouse of the Economic Policy Institute points out. 

As working families celebrate the 50th anniversary of the historic March on Washington this Aug. 28, which accelerated the nation’s own march toward social and economic justice, it's important to note union members played a big role in spreading the message that social justice is economic justice. The march, which propelled the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act, was conceptualized by labor leaders at the time—along with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.—including, A. Philip Randolph, AFL-CIO vice president and president of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, and Bayard Rustin, field coordinator, who called for the march. Along with the leadership of Randolph and Rustin, the UAW, the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union and the Transport Workers (TWU) were instrumental in supporting the march.

While many Republicans balked at passing $60 billion in relief for Hurricane Sandy cleanup (they eventually passed a little higher than $50 billion), TIME’s Steven Brill wrote that the United States spends nearly that much in health care costs each week.

In Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us, Brill asks the question very few people raise: Why does the United States pay so much for health care?