Big Companies Join Obama in Initiative to Help Long-Term Unemployed

Source: NY Times

WASHINGTON — President Obama has persuaded some of the nation’s largest companies, including Walmart, Apple, General Motors and Ford, to revamp their hiring practices to avoid discriminating against applicants who have been out of work for a long stretch of time.

Mr. Obama hosted a group of corporate chief executives at the White House on Friday to highlight those efforts and the use of presidential persuasion to help the jobless find work. In all, White House officials said, about 300 businesses have agreed to new hiring policies, including 21 of the nation’s 50 largest companies and 47 of the top 200.

“Folks who’ve been unemployed the longest often have the toughest time getting back to work,” Mr. Obama said at the White House event. “It’s a cruel catch-22 – the longer you’re unemployed, the more unemployable you may seem. Now this is an illusion, but it’s one that, unfortunately, we know statistically is happening out there.”

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“Just because you’ve been out of work for a while does not mean that you are not a hard worker,” Mr. Obama said. “Just means you had bad luck or you were in the wrong industry or you lived in a region of the country that’s catching up a little slower than others in the recovery.”

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/01/us/politics/big-companies-join-obama-in-initiative-to-help-long-term-unemployed.html