November 2012 RESULTS Domestic Conference Call Agenda
Call-in number: (888) 409-6709
Begin
Time Content
(duration)
Facilitator
(location)
12:30 (3 min)
Meredith
Welcome and Story
Dodson
(Washington,
Hi everyone! My name is Meredith Dodson and I am the Director of RESULTS US Poverty
DC)
Campaigns. Thank you for joining our RESULTS November U.S. Poverty National Conference
Call. We have a very exciting call for you today.
For those who are not familiar with RESULTS or attending your first RESULTS event, I want to
offer you a special welcome to our call today. We are a grassroots advocacy organization
working to create the political will to end poverty, and we have an active and engaged network
of local volunteers who build relationships with legislators, the media and local communities.
We host national conference calls every month to educate and train our 30 U.S. poverty
chapters and network of “Free Agent” advocates. If you are looking for a way to shape policies
and make a difference for millions of Americans struggling with poverty, I hope you’ll get
involved with us!
This is an especially important time for low-income Americans. Now that the election is over,
Congress has a lot of work to get done before the end of the year. Your advocacy will be critical
to protect low-income working families around the country. Without a strong voice urging
Congress to preserve vital services like the Earned Income Tax Credit, the Child Tax
Credit and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (formerly Food Stamps), they could
disappear for millions of struggling families. I am so glad you were able to join today’s call,
whether you have never been a part of a RESULTS event before or you are a longtime
RESULTS volunteer advocate. I am confident you’ll be inspired by our special guest, Barbara
Ehrenreich, and we’ll give you strategic actions you can take to make your voice heard.
Before we get started, let me remind you that we have PowerPoint slides for today’s call
available on our website. If you’re able, we encourage you to do through as we do the call. You
can download them as a PDF file from the RESULTS Homepage under RESULTS News or
using the link on our Facebook page.
12:33 (2 min
min)
Meredith
Dodson
(Washington,
DC)
12:35 (30 min
min)
Barbara
Ehrenreich
(TBD)
Introduce Barbara Ehrenreich
We are thrilled to welcome renowned author and activist Barbara Ehrenreich on our call. Ms.
Ehrenreich on has written extensively about low-income families in America. In her book Nickel
and Dimed, Ehrenreich spent time working in low-wage jobs to investigate what life was like for
the working poor. Currently, she is a regular columnist with The Progressive and has also
written for Time Magazine, The New York Times, Mother Jones, The Atlantic Monthly, Ms, New
Republic, Z Magazine, In These Times, Salon.com, and other publications. She is also a
Founding Editor at the Economic Hardship Project and Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies.
Speaker: Barbara Ehrenreich
There might be a few people on the call not familiar with your book Nickel and Dimed.
Can you tell them briefly about that book and what you found during your research?
I didn’t want to do that project didn’t want to do but got talked into it. See what it would be like
to support myself in job market at the entry level — if don’t use a resume or background to get
it. I was a maid, waitress, home health care, etc. in late 90s — the kinds of jobs you can take if
you walk in off the street. Averaged $7/hour, equivalent of $9/hr now. I had only myself to
support — not talking about families. I was surprised to find that minimal decrepit housing was
beyond my reach — trailer parks and residential hotels. It was not easy.
If I had an ax to grind and I do, I am so upset by way people in poverty were denigrated in our
society. We certainly saw a lot of this during presidential campaign — the poor were portrayed
as people who just want handouts, who made bad decisions and live bad lifestyles. Instead
poor people work hard but just don’t make enough money to make ends meet.
Since you’ve written Nickel and Dimed, how do you think the experiences of low-income
working Americans has changed in the past ten years?
It’s gotten worse. I certainly didn’t think it would still be relevant. It’s much harder even for those
with education. Wages have not risen spectacularly despite living wage campaigns, but still not
enough. Just in Massachusetts this week, “good” min wage of $8.25, but researchers calculate
that this is less than half of what’s needed to support one parent with one child. Since the
recession, we see deepening misery — overcrowding (more in same dwelling), people giving
up medical care, and there’s been a disturbing uptick in suicide rate.
So if read Nickel and Dimed, remember that however difficult, those were the “good times”.
Can you tell us about the Economic Hardship Project and what your overall goals are?
I’ve been frustrated by lack of coverage of poverty in the media — for decades. It is just not
covered by mainstream media, even new media. The other problem is for journalists — they
don’t get paid or are asked to do work for no money or insultingly little money. The journalists
who would do the kind of good coverage cannot afford to do it. So we are raising money to
support journalists to do good, surprising coverage of poverty and economic hardship —
remember the poor are not a monolithic group. We’ve raised money and have 15 stories so far,
and I’m happy to talk about these stories more.
Many of the folks on the phone are volunteer advocates who make the case to
policymakers that we need to invest in specific policies that break the cycle of poverty.
There is a lot at stake during Congress’ Lame Duck session. What if any advice do you
have for them as they work with members of Congress from across the country?
We have to go head-on against prejudices against the poor. If we saw these kinds of messages
being said based on race/gender, we would be shocked, but we see things that are foolish —
again, remember what we saw during the Election campaign.
I want to emphasize (different from question) — not sure about the use of the term “cycle of
poverty”. It’s not so much a cycle as a chute. Once start poor or slip downhill, you get poorer —
there are forces that push you down further and faster and you get worse. Ex. employers want
credit reports for blue and white collar job. That discriminates against people who’ve been
having a rough time — very easy to have downward slide accelerate.
We also need to remember limits of EITC. It applies to people who are employers so people
who don’t get jobs don’t get it. Started during time of prosperity and plentiful jobs. We have to
deal with poverty of those who cannot find jobs or cannot take jobs them because they are
caretakers of children or family members.
(Meredith reminded audience that the EITC is really focused on families with children — so
often excludes or limited if childless worker or a non-custodial parent. RESULTS has supported
legislation that expands the EITC)
Questions/Comments from Audience
Seattle (Bob Dickerson): thank you so much for being on the call, saw play in Seattle
and eye opener. Who you are and what you do provides huge megaphone for these
issues — please continue doing work. Question: how can we better get people most
affected, those in poverty, more involved in advocacy on advocacy to improve policies
about what affects them?
Advocacy = lobbying and that can be a leap of imagination for most people. It’s not something
that automatically comes to mind. I am impressed with the numbers of people that risked
discomfort to be in line to vote — poor people, esp. black and Latino, despite efforts to
suppress the vote in this week’s election.
Minneapolis (Paul Hoffinger): in terms of the activation and motivation of people to vote,
something that was tapped into — including a variety of factors, ex. in MN measures to
restrict voting and gay marriage, helped get certain folks and then many people to vote.
Love idea that people who are poor want to do something, and then how to do that.
Difficulty to tell stories when agencies want to protect their identities, and invisible part
of America even with Michael Harrington’s book. Anything you want to say?
As journalist, I can say many media outlets not interested in sad story of those living in poverty.
In recent months working with Econ Hardship Project, I’ve gotten responses from editors —
what else is new? So we focus on telling and exposing the ways that people pushed down
further. Co-editor Gary Rivlin wrote Broke USA, on credit lenders (payday loans) are targeting
the poor. We are looking into the various ways poor people are penalized by local governments
— maybe inadvertently, but probably not. Ex. local governments penalize “truants”, kids
standing around and not going anywhere. These fines can add up to an insurmountable debt
and when sometimes, it’s because the kid just missed the bus or the bus was too full. We find
that things like that are interesting in editors, and jolts people. We also need to look beyond
“what can we do to help the poor” to what can we stop doing to make it worse.” Ex. Wage theft
— estimated $100 billion per year is stolen from low-wage workers by bosses, who tell them to
work but don’t pay or the computer is rigged and calculates wrong. That amount is in the order
of magnitude of safety net programs.
Chicago: Ari ____, Prof Maternal and Child Health, part of the Secretary’s Commission
on Infant and Child Mortality — including entire anti-poverty piece. Making
recommendation to expand the EITC — that all states have and all refundable, use as a
way to help not just those that work — even if looking for a job. As an advocate, look at
tools in our toolkit — make applicable to those not working. Talk about children’s
allowance. Especially concerned that President Obama did not talk about poverty during
the election. Any feedback?
GOP wants to eliminate Unemployment Insurance. That is something ALEC – American
Legislative Exchange Council wants to eliminate. The idea that if you shouldn’t get any support
when hit rough patch. We need to hit back, most people horrified. Need to raise our voices
more!
1:05 (6 min
min)
Meredith
Dodson
(Washington,
DC)
Update from Washington, DC
Now that Barbara has shared her insights, I’d like to spend a few minutes reviewing where
things are in Congress and what the election results mean for families living in poverty. First of
all, as I think you know the balance of power has not changed — Republicans will continue to
control the House of Representatives while Democrats are in the lead in the Senate and White
House. Secondly, as we talk about what’s at stake for low-income families during what is called
the “Lame Duck” session, it is the members of Congress we’ve had for the past two years who
will be in Washington and ultimately vote on any measures — not the new members that we
voted in for the first time on Tuesday. For some of you, you have the opportunity to weigh in
both with those in charge of still representing you based on your old Congressional Districts
and those that will represent you come January.
So, there are a few “must do” items for the Lame Duck Congress:
1. Expiring tax provisions, inc key tax credits for low-income working families
2. Automatic nine percent cuts to a variety of annually funded programs, what those in
Washington call “Sequestration
To address these, policymakers are talking about making a big budget-cutting deal — one that
would deal with expiring tax provisions and these automatic cuts, but also set in motion an
overhaul of the federal budget. This is a very dangerous time for low-income families, since the
decisions Congress makes in the next few weeks will have a long-term impact on a variety of
services that help break the cycle of poverty.
If you care about poverty, it’s critical that we protect the Earned Income Tax Credit, also known
as the “EITC”, and the Child Tax Credit, known as the “Child Tax Credit”. These vital supports
for low-income working families do more to lift low-income Americans out of poverty than any
other program except for Social Security — in 2010 alone, the EITC and CTC lifted 9.2 million
people out of poverty, more than half of them children. Yet the EITC and CTC could disappear
or be drastically cut for millions of struggling families. My colleague Jos Linn out in Iowa will talk
through some specific actions you can take that will make a difference to protect EITC and CTC
in a few minutes.
If you care about hunger or health coverage, there is also a lot at stake. The Supplemental
Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly food stamps) is our nation’s first defense against
hunger and is particularly important for children — ____ percent of the folks who use SNAP are
kids. And those of you that are concerned about access to health care should pay attention to
the proposed cuts to Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).
Specifically, we expect to see a two-phased deal:
1. Some sort of framework for reducing the deficit. Depending on how the negotiations go,
this will happen in December or might get pushed back into early January.
2. Then we’ll see various committees in Congress work on more detailed legislation in
2013, where they will specify what cuts will be made to which programs.
The more we send a clear message NOW to Congress that cuts to anti-poverty programs must
be excluded from a budget deal, the more likely it is that the deal Congress works out in the
next few months will protect society’s most vulnerable. If we get that locked in the initial
framework, the ultimate budget-cutting package will be more fair and progressive rather than
increase poverty further. That’s why it is so great that you are on today’s call and, I hope, you’ll
take the kinds of actions in the next few days that we know will make a big difference.
So, to close out this section, I want to emphasize that we need to keep pushing members of
Congress about the EITC and CTC. “Through our communication with our own members of
Congress, we need to ask them to deliver two key messages for congressional leadership:

Make sure the expiring improvements to the EITC and CTC are made permanent
(at the very least extended)

Any deficit reduction framework must include principle that specifically protects
EITC and CTC
Latter point is very important. Without it, EITC and CTC will be on chopping block in deficit
reduction. With that, I will turn it over to Jos Linn in Iowa to talk about actions we can take that
will make a difference.
1:10 (15 min)
Jos Linn (Des
Moines, IA)
TAKE ACTION!
Now it’s time to put all the information and inspiration from today’s call into action. As Meredith
pointed out, now that the election is over, Congress is going to be making some big decisions
impacting all Americans, and in particular low-income Americans, in the coming weeks and
months. It’s our job to make sure that they do the right thing. So here are some actions you can
take starting today that will make a difference.
E-mail Congress TODAY
Send an e-mail TODAY telling your representatives and senators to
put low-income working families first by protecting the EITC and Child
Tax Credit. Use your smartphone or tablet to scan the QR code on
slide 12 of the conference call PowerPoint or on the half-page call-in
flyer some of you may already have. This will take you to an e-mail
action on our website. All you need to do is type in your contact
information and hit send and you’re done. It takes about 30 seconds
It’s that easy. If you have a few minutes, we urge you to edit the
subject line and text of the e-mail to make it more personal. Perhaps
sharing a story related to the tax credits or simply why you care about
this issue. The more personal it is, the more impact you’ll have.
If you don’t have the QR code, just go to www.results.org and hit the link under the purple Take
Action Now banner on the Home Page and it will take you to the e-mail alert. Send your e-mail
right now or right after today’s call.
EITC and CTC Call-in Day on November 13
Next, let’s give our members of Congress a warm welcome back to Washington, DC next week.
This Tuesday, November 13 RESULTS is organizing a call-in day in support or tax credits for
working families. These calls, especially if there are a lot of them on the same day, can really
make an impact. What better way to put the EITC and CTC front and center with our elected
officials than having them arrive in the office with a stack of messages about them.
On slide 13 of the PPT and the call-in flyer, you’ll see talking points for your calls. Just call the
Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected to your representative or
senators offices. Once the receptionist answers, you can say:
My name is _________ and I am calling from ________________. I am calling in support of the
Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit. These credits are critical in helping working
parents support their families and stay out of poverty. People like firefighters, police officers,
nurses, child care workers, and military personnel benefit from these credits. Yet I am very
concerned that Congress will let recent, much-needed improvements to the EITC and CTC
expire at the end of this year. I am also concerned that Congress will cut the EITC and CTC as
part of deficit reduction.
I urge Sen./Rep. ___________ to make the expiring improvements to the EITC and CTC
permanent and support a principle that specifically protects the EITC and CTC from cuts in any
deficit reduction framework.
We know that calling Congress can sometimes seem scary or intimidating, especially if you’ve
never done it before. But it is actually easy and fun. In fact, some of our volunteers have been
very creative in making their calls and we are happy to have one of those stories today.
Share: RESULTS Chicago (Cindy Changyit Levin) shares about one of her call-in
experiences
My name is Cindy Changyit Levin. I’m a RESULTS partner in the Chicago area and one of my
passions is sharing how easy it is to take action to fight poverty.
Even though I’m now a group leader and part time staff with RESULTS, I was a bit intimidated
by advocacy when I first started taking actions about 10 years ago. So, if you’re new to us on
this call, I totally understand how you might be feeling. Back when I started, I was worried I'd
have to be a policy expert and afraid if I called a member of Congress, he or she might call
back and challenge my opinions. I didn't understand that members of Congress really work for
us. Then, I came to realize that actions are as simple as putting a pen to paper and saying to
my elected official, “I care about people living in poverty, and I want you to care about them,
too.”
If my first point is that “Advocacy can be easy,” my second point is that advocacy can fit into
your life, whatever it is you do. I’m an at-home mother of two young children, so things could
get a little hectic around here especially before they were old enough for school. When they
were babies, I found advocacy was a way for me to volunteer with great impact without
interrupting our lives. I could make a 2-minute phone call to Congress when kids were down for
a nap. I could write to senators in the middle of the night, when I couldn't sleep anyway after a
baby woke me up for a diaper change. I could volunteer on my own time and actually be a part
of the national conversation about poverty.
To help show folks how easy it is to make a phone call to Congress, I’ve made videos with my
kids to showing you can participate in a call-in action as you do things in your everyday life.
You can find one on YouTube called “Calling Congress Easier Than Baking a Cake” In it, I talk
to my 6 yr old on her birthday about the issue of the day. Then, to prove that it takes very little
time, I call my Congresswoman’s office – all while making a birthday cake with my daughter. I
hope you think about this for the upcoming call-in this coming Tuesday the 13th. Using our
Capwiz tool to help you, it’s even easier than ever!
Thank you for joining on this call. I hope you take many actions with us and spread the word
that these actions are easy, fun, and powerful
Thank you, Cindy. We do urge you to watch her video; it’s fun and inspiring. So plan to start
your Tuesday this week off with calls to your representative and both senators about the
importance of the EITC and CTC. Again the number is (202) 224-3121. Note that you’ll have to
hang up and call back in for each office. If you’re not sure who your members of Congress are,
you can search by Zip Code on the RESULTS Elected Officials page. You can find the link on
slide 16.
Call the Tax Aide and Set Up In-District Meetings
For those who have worked with Congressional offices before, including RESULTS volunteers,
or those of you wanting to do more, we urge you to call and talk directly with the tax aides in
your House and Senate offices (we’re on slide 15 now) about protecting the EITC and CTC.
The aides in Washington, DC are the policy people and the gatekeepers of information, so
talking and getting to know them is very important.
You can find talking points for your conversation in the RESULTS November Action at
http://tinyurl.com/RESULTSAction-Nov-12 or the U.S. Poverty Actions and News page on
the RESULTS website. When calling, talk to the aide about the families who get these credits,
like firefighters, police officers, teachers, military families. Talk about how they incentivize work
and lift people out of poverty. The action sheet even has information on how many children and
families in your state will be hurt if the EITC and CTC improvements expire. You can find the
names of the tax aides for your representatives and senators on the RESULTS Elected
Officials page, again seen on slide 16.
We also urge you to request face-to-face meeting with your members of Congress when they
are in your home district. These meetings matter. 97 percent of Congressional staff say that indistrict meetings with constituents are the best way to influence members of Congress. And if
you’ve never done one of these meetings or feel intimidated by it, have no fear. RESULTS
trains, prepares, and supports you for these all-important meetings. In fact, let’s hear a story
about a recent in-district meeting our volunteers in Columbus, OH had:
Share: RESULTS Columbus (Ginnie Vogts) shares about a recent meeting her group had
with Rep. Pat Tiberi
After months of trying to get an appointment with the now seasoned Republican Representative
who will become the Rep of some of our members through redistricting, we finally scored a face
to face through the clever approach of one of our members. Rachael happened to be at a
community function attended by the Rep. She is both a member of our group and a
"grasstops" in that she is on the City Council of a town just north of Columbus. She introduced
herself as a member of RESULTS and as a Council member. He said he thought we were on
his list and she remarked, "What, the do not call list?" The next day we got an appointment.
This Rep is on the Ways and Means Committee so we were very anxious to talk to him about
protecting EITC. In the past he has held community education meetings to encourage his
constituents to take advantage of EITC which brings over $112 million to his district annually.
He was not aware of the amount until we pointed it out to him. Three members of our group
attended this meeting and we also invited the Executive Director of our local Settlement House
whom we honored at our last fund raiser as a community leader. It turns out that the Rep and
the ED went to the same high school. They played in the same band. They knew many of the
same people. The redistricting caused the area where the settlement house is to now be in his
newly reshaped district. After a lengthy reunion, we got down to business; we reminded him of
who we are and what we do as an organization. Once I began extolling the virtues of EITC the
Rep interrupted me to say, "Ginnie, EITC isn't going anywhere." So I said well how about the
2009 improvements of the Recovery Act that allows poor hard-working people to marry without
a penalty and those with more than two children to get a little more. (He has four children, the
last three being triplets) He said there could be negotiations around these improvements. So
that's when we handed him the data showing how much his district benefited from EITC and
CTC. We also had on hand the Save For All letter that outlined the principles we want included
in tax reform negotiations signed by 1900 organizations from all over the country. We also had
hand-written letters from constituents done at an outreach meeting at a local church the
Sunday before urging him to protect refundable tax credits.
Bill, our ally and grasstops Exec Director, arranged for the Rep to come by the Settlement
House and get acquainted with his new territory which he accepted. As if this were not
enough, on our way out the person who was the next appointment was their old high school
principal. So they had another reunion. We followed up by sending a thank you note and a
letter to his staff in DC outlining our meeting and giving some information about our requests.
We considered this a good meeting and we hope to have many more.
Thank you, Ginnie. We hope all of your will take the opportunity to set up face-to-face meetings
with your members of Congress and hopefully create similar experiences of your own.
Finally, be sure to also talk to your friends, neighbors, family, and colleagues about the EITC
and CTC. Polls show that not many people know about these credits and when they do, they
have a lot of misconceptions about them. However, the polls show that when people find out
the truth about these credits — such as that you have to work to get them; they lift millions of
people out of poverty, most of them children; the help families transition off of public assistance,
and that they support local economies because people tend to spend them quickly and locally
— support the EITC and CTC goes way up. There will be a lot of talk about taxes over the next
few months so use this opportunity to educate people you know about tax credits for working
families. This will go a long way in building the political will to protect them.
So in review:

Send your e-mail to Congress TODAY about the EITC and CTC

Call your House and Senate offices on Tuesday and talk to the receptionist about
the EITC and CTC

Call the tax aide and request face-to-face meetings with your representatives and
senators to talk about the EITC and CTC

Educate people you know about the EITC and CTC
We wish you good luck and if you have questions or need help, please feel free to contact
Meredith Dodson at dodson@results.org or me, Jos Linn, at jlinn@results.org.
1:28 (3 min)
Meredith
Dodson
(Washington,
DC)
Close and Thank You
Report from operator: 99 sites and 187 participants on the call
- If new we hope you will get involved either with the group (especially for those of you
that have hooked into one of our house parties) or as a part of our Action Network
 If you are new to RESULTS, we urge you to join Introduction to RESULTS Call on
November 14 at 9 pm ET and November 30 at 1 pm ET. People can register at
http://tinyurl.com/RESULTSMeetandGreet. The call is 30 minutes and gives
participants the information and inspiration they need to take the next step in joining us.

We are pleased to announce the dates for the 2013 RESULTS International Conference
— it will be July 20-23, 2013 in Washington, DC. We can also announce that the
keynote speaker will be Nobel Peace Prize winner Dr. Muhammad Yunus. I urge you to
plan to attend our conference next July.

RESULTS next national conference call will be Saturday, December 8 at 12:30pm.

All of these and other events are in our RESULTS website calendar, which can be
found under the Events tab on our Homepage.
Not mentioned on call, but also important:
•
RESULTS Free Agents Call is this Tuesday, November 13 at 9pm ET. This support
call is for advocates in areas with no active RESULTS group. To participate, dial (218)
486-1611, passcode RESULTS# (7378587#).
•
Join the RESULTS New Activist Orientation Series. This two-call series provides a
more detailed overview of RESULTS and advocacy training. This is great for new
members to a local RESULTS group. The calls are November 28 and December 12
at 9pm ET. To participate, dial (712) 432-3100, passcode 761262. RSVP to Lisa
Marchal at lmarchal@results.org. (Note: we will repeat the first call on December 5 at
9pm ET).
•
Thank you to our RESULTS groups in Detroit, Houston, Santa Fe, and
Washington State for their recent fundraising events. We appreciate all the hard
work they put into these successful events. Upcoming fundraisers: Inland Empire, CA
(11/9), Austin, TX (12/2), Olympia, WA (12/5)
•
We have a brand new RESULTS Celebrations site to help you to fundraise for your
birthday or other milestones. Our Race to End Poverty site is still active for anyone
doing a Turkey Trot or Jingle Bell run before the end of the year. Visit either site and
click on the "Register" tab to get started. Contact Cindy Levin at clevin@results.org with
questions.
Following a RESULTS tradition closing out the conference call by opening up the lines, we
suggest that you shout out the name of the city you’ll be calling DC from this week urging
Congress to protect low-income people in the budget battles ahead. Operator, if you would
please open up all the lines so we can call out their locations?