Sign your Organization on: Protect & Expand Workforce and Economic Opportunities in Reconciliation
As Congress debates the next federal budget – the decisions they’ll make go beyond dollars and cents. They’re deciding whether we invest in working families and small businesses—or turn our backs on them. What’s at stake isn’t just funding levels; it’s a fight over our country’s priorities and our values. The stakes are high, and the consequences will be real. They’ll show up in the life of a single parent cut off from food assistance while trying to finish a training program. And they’ll mean lost tax credits for a small business that was hiring and training dozens of workers in their community.
At the same time, this bill would protect tax cuts that disproportionately benefit top income earners – recent analysis by the Joint Committee on Taxation found that 90% of earners of $500,000 to $1 million would see a major tax cut. Of those workers earning $15,000-$30,000, only 15% would see a tax cut of even $500.
There are parts of the bill that could help workers – it includes an important expansion of Pell grants to short-term programs, for example. When taken in totality, though, the cuts to critical services and supports on which students, workers and small businesses rely far outweigh any benefits. Workers cannot advance their careers and businesses cannot expand when workers don’t have enough to eat, can’t see a doctor when they are sick, or cannot pay for their basic needs.
Budgets are statements of priorities – and this one draws a clear line. This budget package makes it clear that the workforce needs of people, small businesses, or local economies are not a priority to this Congress. While there is broad bipartisan support for skills training policies, those policies alone won’t solve economic challenges.
Cuts to Medicaid, SNAP or restrictions on the Child Tax Credit are inextricably linked to the impact – or lack thereof – of skills programs. Despite coming through different committees on Capitol Hill and being felt by different state agencies if implemented – together, they are all part of one connected debate about who gets to succeed in this economy.
The cuts aren’t shortfalls that private or state investment can fix. Instead, the harms would only grow – when and if the bill is implemented. Most states’ policies for how students pay for college or a credential are already linked to federal provisions, meaning that any restrictions to financing education Congress advances could be intensified at the state level.
And state budgets operate differently than our federal budget – states must balance their budgets each year; the federal government does not (spoiler – until Congress gets to the debt ceiling debates). Cuts to federal contributions to Medicaid or SNAP create bad choices for states: states will have to either plug these budget holes left by Congress with other state funds OR cut services to residents in a way that people and small businesses will feel and see in their everyday lives.
Today, more than half of all jobs (52%) require education or training beyond high school but not a four-year degree—yet only 43% of workers have had access to the skills training and supportive services (like transportation, childcare, or career navigation) necessary to fill these in-demand roles.
The mismatch persists across the industries at the backbone of our economy. More than 90% of industry association economists report that employers in their sectors struggle to find qualified workers. Nearly 90% of construction contractors report challenges finding workers. Nearly half of all manufacturers say that finding and retaining workers is their primary concern.
Cutting back on programs like Medicaid, food assistance, job training, and some financial aid and loans that help workers train for in-demand jobs and support them while doing so will make these challenges worse, not better.
Read below for more details on what Congress is considering, the actions that they should take instead, and how you can act.
The budget legislation passed by the House would take Medicaid coverage away from 6.3 million to 14.4 million people who can’t document that they meet rigid work requirements. The bill proposes to require states to take Medicaid away from 19- to 64-year olds who cannot document that they are working (or participating in another qualifying activity like caregiving) for at least 80 hours a month.
The proposal would also deny coverage to people who cannot document that they are already meeting this requirement. The proposal would exempt people with disabilities, pregnant people, and other groups.
Also, for the first time ever, the House Agriculture Committee proposes as part of the budget package to take food assistance away from millions of people – including parents with children over the age of 6 and adults 55 to 64 – who don’t meet a stricter work requirement. The adults subject to this harsher work requirement “would only be able to receive food benefits for three months in a three-year period unless they show compliance with a 20-hour-per-week work requirement or prove they qualify for an exemption such as having a disability.”
Let’s be clear: most adults under age 65 who get help paying for food or health coverage DO work. But these proposals will cause many working people to lose the modest assistance they need to make ends meet because they will struggle to complete burdensome paperwork or because their low-paying jobs typically have unsteady hours and no sick or caregiving leave.
Additionally, work requirements do not meaningfully increase work or income for the adults receiving the assistance, as studies have shown. There’s also no evidence that work requirements help meet employers’ need for skilled workers. Instead, they cause hardship for people struggling to make ends meet by making it more difficult for them to afford food and to see a doctor.
Compounding the negative impact of work requirements on individuals, these cuts will make access to healthcare for everyone worse. Nearly 85% of all health care facilities report need for more allied health workers. Cuts to Medicaid funds that flow to states mean lower levels of reimbursement and cuts to the workforce. These shortages will grow even more acute – just as the largest generation (the Baby Boomers) age into needing more health care services than ever.
The House budget bill would cut billions already appropriated to support the bipartisan vision of revitalizing and modernizing U.S. infrastructure. These proposed cuts include clawing back billions in Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) funds that have already gone out to states, cuts to programs targeting communities most in need of federal investments and those that support jobs and training for tens of thousands of U.S. workers.
Programs funded by IIJA, the Inflation Reduction Act and CHIPS Act were projected, before these proposals, to create three million jobs – each year. By taking away just those provisions included in the House bill, that calculus flips, and would cause hundreds of billions of lost economic impacts in communities like Grand Rapids, Michigan or Shreveport, Louisiana.
Of the 400-plus programs that IIJA funds, 72 programs can be used to support workforce development for a potential total investment of $490 billion. Cuts proposed to the IIJA are more than delays to road resurfacing – they are rescissions to funding that could be used to train millions of people to repair our current infrastructure and bolster it for the next generation.
Far from saving taxpayers money, the provisions of this bill would add more to our deficit by preventing projects underway from progressing.
Instead of cutting, Congress should invest in skills training, career pathways programs, and supports like healthcare and food assistance that help workers and local businesses thrive. States that have undertaken such investments have proven the benefits of doing so:
As Congress continues the debate over this package, they need to hear from their constituents like you to make sure they are centering and prioritizing programs and supports that help working-class people:
➡️ Join the organizational sign-on letter urging Congressional leaders to protect and expand workforce programs and economic opportunities in a reconciliation package!
Working people and small businesses are hurting economically, and addressing that pain should be a top priority for elected officials on both sides of the aisle. By slashing crucial programs like Medicaid, food assistance, federal student aid and loans, and investments to create and train millions for infrastructure jobs, Congress would turn their backs on working people and small businesses. These programs have enjoyed bipartisan support, now is not the time to walk away from them.
