On this May Day, Wisconsin groups are rallying in Green Bay to highlight a key issue facing the working class: the ability to retire.

Organizers see fixing systemic issues within Social Security as a key step. The American Federation of Government Employees is co-leading demonstrations around the state, calling on Congress to fully fund Social Security.

Jessica LaPointe, president of the American Federation of Government Employees Council 220, said although the debate has been around for a while, the problems run deep right now, with chronic underfunding resulting in staffing woes at field offices.

She noted staffers are dealing with added stress and beneficiaries feel the impact.

"Service delays are far and wide," LaPointe observed. "It could take more than four months to start your retirement benefits up."

She emphasized it is especially concerning for vulnerable populations at retirement age. Beyond helping with administrative costs, demonstrators want federal lawmakers to come up with long-term funding solutions, amid predictions the program won't be able to provide full benefits a decade from now. Some Republicans have routinely floated cuts but critics of the idea say any future shortfalls should be covered by higher earners.

One recommendation is to adjust the cap on Social Security taxes, but opponents warn of unintended consequences.

Alex Brower, executive director of the Wisconsin Alliance for Retired Americans, which is also supporting the rallies, said retirees on fixed incomes deserve full and expanded benefits for dedicating their working lives to propping up the economy.

"We wouldn't have the schools that we have or any of the systems in our economy without working people," Brower pointed out. "When those working people retire, we are demanding that retirement be dignified."

He added May Day observances, which center around worker solidarity, are a good way to remind policymakers the working class should not fall into poverty when they retire. Similar rallies are scheduled throughout the month.

By Claire Carlson for The Daily Yonder.
Broadcast version by Deborah Van Fleet for Nebraska News Connection reporting for The Daily Yonder-Public News Service Collaboration

A federal grant of $62 million to the nonprofit Center for Rural Affairs in Lyons, Nebraska, will help build residential solar-power installations for Nebraska families who usually can’t afford the cost-saving systems, the center’s director said.

The Center for Rural Affairs is one of 60 grantees across the country that will participate in the Solar for All program, a Biden administration initiative that is part of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022. The program will provide a one-time injection of $7 billion nationally to help people who would normally have a hard time paying for residential solar production capacity.

“The people that have built solar have tended to be middle income and higher individuals or institutions that have the discretionary resources to do the upfront costs or do the financing,” said Brian Depew, executive director of the Center for Rural Affairs.

The center has advocated for economic justice and environmental stewardship in Nebraska’s rural communities for more than 50 years. The Solar for All project will serve all of Nebraska, not just rural areas.

“People with less fiscal capacity have not yet been able to participate fully in the benefits of solar energy,” Depew said. “That’s what we’re trying to change.”

The Center for Rural Affairs received word of the grant in April (2024). Depew said learning about the large grant was a “surreal” moment for his organization. 

“It’s a major award for the Center for Rural Affairs,” Depew said in a Daily Yonder interview. “Just the magnitude of the award and the size of the project that we’ll be able to do.”

The Solar for All program comes out of the $27 billion Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The agency estimates that 900,000 households across the country will benefit from the solar projects funded by the program. Recipients range from state governmental agencies to nonprofit organizations like the Center for Rural Affairs. 

Once the awards are allocated to the organizations such as the Center for Rural Affairs that will distribute the funds to recipients, eligible households in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, U.S. territories, and tribal nations will be able to apply for grants, technical assistance, and loans to pay for solar panels. 

In Nebraska, this opportunity will most likely open to residents in the next two years. “There will be an up to one-year planning period where we will further design…the application period [for grants],” Depew said. “We hope to start piloting some actual solar installations during the planning period, but it could be a full year before we are really up and ready to take applications from a broader array of people.” 

Depew credits the Center for Rural Affairs’ success in getting this award to the number of stakeholders they conferred with during the application process. The center met with more than 50 stakeholders from rural, suburban, urban, and tribal communities in Nebraska to get their input for a program proposal that made sense for their communities. What made it into the final application was a three-part strategy for implementing residential solar in Nebraska. 

The first strategy is community solar, in which public utilities manage the solar arrays and eligible residences could benefit from the solar through a subscription service or by owning some of the panels. The second is multifamily affordable housing solar, in which the center would work with utilities, developers, or low-income housing financing partners to deploy solar at multifamily residences. And the third strategy would be directly providing grants or loans for rooftop solar to individual residences. 

The center’s Solar for All application proposed allocating each of the three strategies one-third of the total project funds. This could change as they work on the details in the planning process that will take place in collaboration with the EPA over the next year.

“All of the projects are required to be residential-serving solar, and they’re required to serve low to moderate income individuals and individuals living in historically disadvantaged census tracts,” Depew said. 

The EPA identified these census tracts using the Climate and Economic Justice Screening Tool, which is part of the Biden administration’s Justice40 Initiative to ensure 40% of federal environmental investments go to communities that are “marginalized, underserved, and overburdened by pollution,” according to a press release. Some of these census tracts will include rural communities, but people can also qualify at the individual household level regardless of the census tract they live in. 

The Solar for All money will be disbursed over a five year period. The Center for Rural Affairs plans to put some of the money into a revolving loan fund so they can extend the funding beyond the five years. A complete list of Solar for All awardees may be found here.


Claire Carlson wrote this article for The Daily Yonder.


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The latest state tax cuts are expected to cost Iowa more than $2 billion in revenue over the next two years. Advocates for tax fairness argued lawmakers are not considering the long-term consequences of the cuts on schools, workers, and livability.

In the face of a dwindling population and shrinking tax base, Iowa lawmakers doubled down on tax cuts this year, and also passed a measure calling for a constitutional amendment to require any state income tax to be a single rate.

Anne Discher, executive director of Common Good Iowa, said lawmakers chose to cut taxes despite the state's growing economic demands like funding Educational Savings Accounts, which allow parents to use public education dollars to pay for private school.

"I understand that in a vacuum, tax cuts can sound pretty good to folks," Discher acknowledged. "But when you really have a serious conversation about trade-offs, the popularity of tax cuts is a lot less clear-cut."

Lawmakers also passed a cluster of bills to accelerate cuts in the state income tax rate from 3.9% to 3.8%, which Discher argued will have long-term economic effects. Supporters of the tax cut measures, including Gov. Kim Reynolds, have promised more fiscal austerity.

The deeper tax cuts mean an average reduction of about $6 to someone in the bottom 20% of the income bracket, $402 for the middle 20%, and more than $20,000 for someone making more than $1.5 million a year. Lawmakers said they plan to cover the tax cuts with Iowa's budget surplus, which Discher called shortsighted.

"The moment in which that's really going to impact services can be pushed out, right?" Discher noted. "But the thing about surpluses is they are one-time money, and you can't count on them in the long run. And so, when the surpluses are gone, we're going to be looking at a level of tax cuts that are really going to put a lot of important services at risk."

Discher contends implementing a flat-rate income tax would be regressive and hurt lower-income Iowans most. Supporters counter it would be more fair and efficient.


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President Joe Biden was in Wisconsin on Wednesday, touting plans for a new Microsoft data center. The visit comes amid new polling data in battleground states about what is on the minds of rural voters, with organizers noting surprising results.

The poll, released by the Rural Democracy Initiative, includes feedback from Wisconsin voters. Among respondents, 57% said they favored a more economic populist vision, with policies centered around lowering costs and raising incomes for the working class.

Patrick Toomey, researcher and partner of Breakthrough Campaigns, said the approach appears more popular than one often touted by GOP politicians.

"Just cutting taxes and getting rid of regulations is not going to do the most to help me in this economy," Toomey explained.

While economic policies aligned with Democrats, such as minimum-wage hikes, are favorable in this poll, many rural voters indicated they think Republicans are doing more for working people. Analysts said it shows Democrats have work to do to rebuild trust in these areas. Meanwhile, three-quarters of respondents either support the right to abortion or do not want the government interfering with decisions on reproductive health care.

Toomey acknowledged it will take some time for Democrats to re-connect with voters and it will not completely turn around in this election cycle. But he suggested it is not completely hopeless for the party to make gains in rural America ahead of November's vote.

"One of the key learnings here is that there are enough voters in rural areas of battleground states who are up for grabs to determine the outcome for 2024," Toomey reported.

He suggested if Democrats are savvy with their outreach, they might be able to convince rural populations they are pursuing policies voters have outlined as a top priority.

More than 1,700 voters in 10 states were part of the poll. As for Biden's appearance, it was at the same location as the failed Foxconn project announced by former President Donald Trump several years ago.