10 worker protections that should be in the US government’s next aid package

Editor’s Note: Elizabeth Warren is the senior US Senator from Massachusetts. Ro Khanna is the US Representative for California’s 17th District. The opinions expressed in this commentary are their own.

America’s essential workers span the economy. They include custodial staff disinfecting public spaces, grocery clerks stocking shelves, delivery drivers bringing food to families, home care workers supporting seniors and people with disabilities and warehouse workers processing our shipments of basic necessities. State and municipal workers in sanitation, transit and utility jobs are making sure the basic infrastructure of our communities keeps running. And of course, our doctors, nurses and hospital staff are battling this virus on the front lines. Without our essential workers, Americans lucky enough to shelter in place would be hungry, sick and sitting in the dark while the trash piled up outside.

The Covid-19 pandemic is bringing into sharp focus all the ways in which our system has long been rigged against working and middle-class families. And it has highlighted the critical importance of workers in low-wage jobs that are rarely afforded sufficient dignity or compensation, but on whose labor we depend – during a crisis or not. A majority of essential workers are women, and a disproportionate number are women of color. Of the thousands of health care providers infected with the virus in the United States, more than 70% are women, according to a recentstudy by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Millions of essential workers didn’t end up at the financial margins by accident or overnight. Inequality is the result of decades of work by all three branches of government. Congress delivered a one-two punch, repeatedly passing giant tax breaks for the wealthy and refusing to raise the minimum wage for more than a decade. Countless administrative and judicial rulings have made it harder for workers to organize and negotiate for more pay and better conditions.

For over half a century, growth in our economy has gone almost entirely to the wealthy. Wages have been essentially stagnant since the 1960s, while the costs of essentials, like health care and housing, have continued rising. The average costs for housing and health care alone, even with employer-provided health insurance, now eat up more than 70% of the average janitor’s salary in this country. That’s not an economy set up to treat custodial staff as essential.

It’s time we made a different choice. We have to protect these workers who are protecting us, and we must act with urgency. That’s why we have introduced a 10-point proposal that we’re calling the Essential Workers Bill of Rights, and it should be included in the next relief package. Our proposal will ensure essential workers have the equipment, safety standards and job protections they need during this pandemic:

We can’t erase decades of inequality overnight. Nor are essential workers the only ones suffering during this crisis – about 33.5 million people have filed for unemployment since mid-March. Going forward, we’re going to need to take big, bold steps to reboot and transform our economy – and make structural changes so families don’t have to keep living crisis to crisis. American economic policy has been focused for too long on helping the rich get richer. We need to rebuild the economy so it works for all Americans and rebalance economic power so no workers have to struggle to make ends meet.

It’s time we value the dignity and importance of the essential work millions of frontline workers do every day – and we must take care of them while they’re taking care of all of us.