Saturday: Community Dialogue on Welfare Reform Reauthorization

by IMC-LA Saturday, Jul. 14, 2001 at 9:47 AM

Saturday (tomorrow, July 14), 1:30-4:00pm, at the Crossroads Women's Center, 4167 S. Normandie Ave., LA -- Community Dialogue on Welfare Reform Reauthorization & Valuing Caring Work. Called by the Every Mother is a Working Mother Network.

Mothering is real work, we want real wages!

Calling mothers, other carers & those who stand with the grassroots!

Speak Out for welfare as a carer's right and for the value of caring work to be included in welfare benefits!!!

Oppose welfare reform which forces us to leave our children for any low-waged work!!!

Press government to pay for caring, not killing!!!

Results of the dialogue will be submitted to Congress as testimony.


For more information or directions, contact:
EMWM PO Box 86681, Los Angeles, CA 90086-0681
Tel/fax 323-292-7405
E-mail: 70742.3012@compuserve.com
Global Women's Strike webpage:
http://womenstrike8m.server101.com


Carer's right to payment. Children's right to care!
Welfare 'reform,' now up for reauthorization (review and renewal) in Congress, has destroyed welfare as a right and entitlement. It puts forward that caring for your own children has no value, and forces women into killing a workday. It is forced labor and low-wages work recruitment, and has widened the pay gap between women's and men's wages. It results in more women and children living in poverty, which means more of us will end up in prison.

Mothers and their children will be left with nothing when the clock stops on their 60-month lifetime limit to receiving benefits. Money is cut for women and children, but more is spent for Star Wars and weapons for military action around the world. Caregivers are the heart of the economy but along with our children always come last.

Welfare 'reform' is a racist attack; the majority of those on welfare are women and children of color. It denies the work older women and women with disabilities do caring for themselves and others, forces lesbian women to name their father of their kids, forces marriage, puts women at risk of violent relationships, discourages breastfeeding and cuts benefits to immigrant women. It has destroyed what was every woman's insurance policy against complete dependence and starvation.

Reauthorization is a chance to change welfare 'reform' but the voices and demands of mothers who are suffering the most and who want the right to care for their own children are not being heard. We want to choose, not be forced, whether or not to work outside the home. It's time for a change!


Every Mother is a Working Mother Network
Campaigns to establish that raising children and caring work is work, and that the time mothers spend raising children, and the economic value of their work be included in out right to welfare and other resources. We campaign for resources to enable a mother to raise her own children full-time or to also work outside the home. We are a national multiracial grassroots network from different situation. EMWM is coordinated by the wages for housework Campaign.

Money for Life and Welfare, Not War and Prisons!