Newspapers and journalists everywhere agree, young voters are emerging everywhere. The number of college students and graduates alike are higher than ever. However, as Marisa Lagos of the San Francisco Chronicle notes, the "youth" category does not represent all of the interests of voters between the ages of 18 and 30. Those in and entering college are on average face "$20,000 in student loan debt and 25- to 34-year-olds have the second-highest rate of bankruptcy of any age group, according to statistics compiled by Rock the Vote, a nonprofit group that aims to engage youth in the political process" (Lagos). Economic and financial issues that the youth feel directly effect them are of the up-most importance. The exchange rate, taxes, financial support and social security are all on the minds of the educated youth. Youth today, though often inspired by or educated by their parent's voting practices, lack the party affiliations and loyalties of their baby-boomer parents.

According to a journal published by Jared Sagoff in January of 2006 through "The Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement" (CIRCLE) the main issues for voters in 2004 were: Taxes, Education, Iraq, Terrorism, Economy/Jobs, Moral Values and Health care. Sagoff calculated and compared the importance of each issue for the entire voting population, voters aged 18-24 and voters 25+. For the youth category of 18-24, in 2004 Moral Values was ranked most important at 23% with Economy/Jobs following closely a 21%. If ranked in order of importance the issues would go from most to least important as follows: Moral values, economy/jobs, terrorism, Iraq, Taxes and Education tied and lastly health care. It is important to keep in mind that these numbers represent Sagoff's calculations based upon the National Exit Poll of 2004.

I know that this group focuses a lot of attention on local bills and legislation that affect workers. Though this article posted yesterday by the Associated Press has little to do with legislation, I found it refreshing to find an article about union activity in New York.

By ELLEN SIMON

NEW YORK

Laura Tapia is the union movement's equivalent of a beat cop.

A tiny, fast-talking woman from Puebla, Mexico, she's spent two years walking the 99-cent stores, fruit stands and sneaker shops of Brooklyn's immigrant Knickerbocker Ave. She made her rounds recently, hugging the woman selling tamales from a cart, pointing to the car wash, which she says is usually staffed by underage kids, and clucking that the combination laundromat-Post Office was robbed in the middle of the day.

"When you are on the street all day, you know everything that happens," she said, shivering in her down parka. "Everything."

Tapia is an organizer for the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. Only two of the roughly 170 stores on Knickerbocker are unionized, but organizing workers is her secondary goal. Her immediate task is investigating working conditions, injuries and wage and hour violations involving the stores' shelf stockers, cashiers and salespeople.