December 3, 2009 | Read Time: 1 minute
President Obama today is holding a White House event to discuss job growth, and some charity leaders will be rubbing shoulders with executives from Google and Disney.
With the unemployment rate passing 10 percent for the first time in more than 25 years, the president called for the forum to find ways to spur new jobs in addition to government efforts supported by the $787-billion economic-stimulus package.
According to The New York Times, the conference will have six discussion groups. They will be on “innovative and green jobs, small-business incentives, long-range infrastructure plans, encouraging export-oriented businesses, government and private-sector partnerships, and training for the jobs of the future.”
The guest list is primarily made up of business people, union leaders, and mayors, but a few charity officials will be among the 130 or so attendees.
They include Phaedra Ellis-Lamkins, chief executive of Green for All, an Oakland, Calif., group focused on creating “green jobs”; Robert Greenstein, director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a thank tank in Washington; and Lawrence Mishel, president of the Economic Policy Institute, another Washington think tank.
In addition to this, the Ford Foundation, in New York, made an announcement this week tied to the Obama administration’s forum. The grant maker said it has committed $80-million to improve federal and state polices designed to benefit Americans who are unemployed or face other economic problems.
Read The Chronicle’s article about the Ford program.
