The Families and Workers Fund & U.S. Department of Labor Co-Host the First Good Jobs Summit

July 11, 2022 – Announcement

On Tuesday, June 21st, leaders from the government, philanthropy, labor, nonprofit, and business sectors convened at the U.S. Department of Labor for the first-ever Good Jobs Summit, part of the Department’s Good Jobs Initiative to create and support good-quality jobs.

The Families and Workers Fund was proud to co-host this first-of-its-kind event, which was attended in-person and online by nearly 4,000 people If you missed the event, you can now watch a full recording of the plenary session here.

“For too long, we have measured the quantity of jobs produced – not whether those jobs sustained and uplifted the people in them. The Good Jobs Summit represented a step forward on the pathway towards making meaningful job quality a serious economic concept and measure of economic health,” said Rachel Korberg, Executive Director of the Families and Workers Fund.

The event included a dynamic lineup of speakers, including Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh, Deputy Secretary of Labor Julie Su, Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm, White House Infrastructure Implementation Coordinator Mayor Mitch Landrieu, Sarita Gupta of the Ford Foundation, Saket Soni of Resilience Force (a Families and Workers Fund grantee), and our very own Rachel Korberg, as well as many other grantees and partners.

During the Summit, The Departments of Labor and Commerce announced their shared “Good Jobs Principles,” a coordinated effort to provide employers, workers, federal agencies, state and local governments, and other advocates with a roadmap to advance the goal of quality jobs for all.

“Building a better America means everybody gets an opportunity,”  said White House Infrastructure Implementation Coordinator Mayor Mitch Landrieu. “Through the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, we are not just building bridges, roadways, and high-speed internet, we are building a generation of high paying jobs. This is an incredible opportunity, and we have a magnificent responsibility to get it right.”

The event also provided a platform to share the Families and Workers Fund’s first-ever collaboration with the White House. We are thrilled that the White House has launched the “Talent Pipeline Challenge: Supporting Employer Investments in Equitable Workforce Development for Infrastructure Jobs,” and are proud to share that we are committing $1 million in aligned funding to help advance good jobs and diverse talent pipelines.

“This administration is unified around the concept of a good job,” said Secretary of Labor Marty Walsh. “I have seen it in my own life and throughout my career: good jobs change lives and lift up whole families. We have the opportunity right now to lift up more people than ever before. [The Good Jobs Summit] represents the partnerships we need to rebuild our nation’s infrastructure and address the generational challenges we face from climate change to global competition, to public health, to racial justice and gender equity.”