While AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka was in Milwaukee Labor Day with President Obama and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler traveled throughout California, taking part in three Labor Day celebrations. In Los Angeles, she told an enthusiastic crowd at the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor ’s Labor Day breakfast: There’s nothing wrong with good jobs in America. There’s nothing wrong with trade that creates jobs—instead of killing them. Click the headline to read more>>

In a Labor Day address to more than 10,000 union members and their families in Milwaukee, President Obama announced a massive new job-creating road, rail, runway and air traffic control rebuilding project. Speaking to the Milwaukee Area Labor Council’s annual LaborFest celebration, Obama said it was “the great American middle class that made our economy the envy of the world. It’s got to be that way again.” Click the headline to read more>>

The U.S. jobless rate worsened to 9.6 percent in August from 9.5 percent in July, with 54,000 jobs lost, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data out today. The private sector created only 67,000 jobs in August, far below the 150,000 jobs a month needed to keep up with the population and extremely far below the hundreds of thousands of new jobs needed each month to return to pre-recession employment levels. Government employment fell by 121,000, largely reflecting the loss of 114,000 temporary workers hired for U.S. Census 2010. Click the headline to read more>>