The Obama Transition team announced on Sunday that President-elect Barack Obama intends to form a "White House Task Force on Working Families."

The Task Force will be chaired by Vice President-elect Joe Biden and becomes effective January 20, 2009, the day Obama is sworn in as President of the United States.

The aim of the Task Force is to raise the living standards for American middle-class, working families. Top-level administration policy-makers of the Task Force will paritcipate in regular meetings, and will also conduct outreach sessions with leaders of the labor, business, and advocacy communities.

“My administration will be absolutely committed to the future of America’s middle-class and working families. They will be front and center every day in our work in the White House. And this Task Force will be one vehicle we will use to ensure that we never forget that commitment. I think it can make a great contribution to our work, and I’m grateful that the Vice President-elect has agreed to chair it,” said President-elect Obama.

The Vice President-elect said: “Our charge is to look at existing and future policies across the board and use a yard stick to measure how they are impacting the working and middle-class families: Is the number of these families growing? Are they prospering? President-elect Obama and I know the economic health of working families has eroded, and we intend to turn that around.”

Obama's goals for the Task Force include expanding education and lifelong training opportunities, improving the balance of work and family, restoring labor standards and workplace safety, protecting the incomes of the middle-class and working families, and protecting retirement security.

Members of the Task Force will include the Secretaries of Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Commerce, as well as the Directors of the National Economic Council, the Office of Management and Budget, the Domestic Policy Council, and the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisors.



Source:
Change.gov