www.EmploymentCrossing.com Several hundred construction and transit workers, machinists, teachers and other labor unionists railed against the U.S. government's proposed bailout of Wall Street on Thursday, in a protest steps from the New York Stock Exchange, according to Reuters. Union leaders criticized a $700 billion plan aimed at rescuing the credit markets by relieving financial institutions of distressed debt. "The Bush administration wants us to pay the freight for a Wall Street bailout that does not even begin to address the roots of our crisis," said AFL-CIO National President John Sweeney. "We want our tax dollars used to provide a hand up for the millions of working people who live on Main Street and not a handout to a privileged band of overpaid executives." Signs read "No Blank Checks for Wall Street" and "Our Hard-Earned Pensions Are Not Up For Grabs." Protesters cheered repeated calls for the government to spend money on education, health care and housing as freely and readily as it was proposing to do for Wall Street. "We know that the economic situation has to be solved. But we want a responsible rescue, not an opportunistic bailout," said United Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten. "[If] there should be accountability for the teachers, then there should be accountability for Wall Street," he said.
