Tomorrow, millions of Americans across the country will commemorate the birth, the life and the dream of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. through service. As a tribute to Dr. King's legacy and the very real needs of our nation, the President-elect and Vice President-elect have launched a national organizing effort on the eve of their Inauguration to engage Americans in service.

Congress first initiated the Martin Luther King Jr. Service Day in 1994 as part of the King holiday celebrations. SEIU along with other organizations will be sponsoring an official National Day of Service Event at RFK Stadium. Thousands of people will be assembling care packages for our troops overseas.

Be a part of this historic day tomorrow when Americans band together to renew our local communities. Even if you are not in the DC area, communities all over the country will be holding National Day of Service events--go to the official website at www.usaservice.org to find events in your area.

>> Michelle Obama tells you what this call to service is all about at USAService.org in a video

On this weekend's edition of MSNBC's Meet the Press, former Rep. David Bonior, a member of President-elect Barack Obama's economic transition team, talked about ways the next administration can help get the economy back on track. One proposal supported by President-elect Obama and 60 percent of the public is the Employee Free Choice Act, which will help employees bridge the gap of wage inequality in the country today.

Watch the video clip:

The New York Times recently made a similar point in its endorsement of the "swift passage" of the Employee Free Choice Act:

The measure is vital legislation and should not be postponed. By giving employees a bigger say in compensation issues, unions also help to establish corporate norms, the absence of which has contributed to unjustifiable disparities between executive pay and rank-and-file pay. There is a strong argument that the slack labor market of a recession actually makes unions all the more important.

Bonior echoed the same sentiment in a recent letter to incoming Wal-Mart CEO Mike Duke:

The time is ripe for a new Wal-Mart with an incoming President who has pledged to bring change to this country, ensure a fairer economic system for workers and business alike, reform health care, and restart our economic engine so that it works for all Americans. Here's to a New Year, a new Wal-Mart, and a new resolve for being part of the positive change that's coming.

(Transcript of segment below: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28605356/page/3/)

REP. BONIOR: Well, from my perspective we've got to get a hold of this inequality we have in this country today on, on wages and income, and this Bush tax cut piece is a, is a big part of that. The top--over the last 20 years, the top 10 percent took 90 percent of the income gains in this--in the country. And the top 1 percent took roughly 60 percent. And the top 1/10th of 1 percent took 35 percent of that. I mean, it's skewed the wrong way. And what we need to do is focus in on not only monetary policy and fiscal policy, as we have talked this morning, but we've also got to talk about where we want to end up.

MR. GREGORY: Mm-hmm.

REP. BONIOR: And the way we end up with helping actually people is to give them the chance to bargain collectively at the table. With 7 percent unionization in this country, you're not going to get the dispersion that you need. We were successful in this country--after the second World War, the three most profitable decades for working people. Shared prosperity occurred after the second World War because unionization was at 35 percent. The Employee Free Choice Act is an important piece of legislation that President-elect Obama and Biden support, the Congress supports, 60 percent of the American people support, and that will help share in the benefits and the bounties of the country.

President-elect Barack Obama's office announced the details of his major speech on the economy Wednesday afternoon, advocating "urgent action" on his economic stimulus plan. The speech will be held at 11 a.m. today at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA., located just outside of Washington, D.C.

Obama will focus on the stimulus plan he is negotiating with Congress, "[making] the case for urgent action on an American recovery and reinvestment plan that will save or create 3 million jobs while investing in priorities like health care, energy and education that will jump-start economic growth," the transition team said in a release.

The president-elect is taking his appeal straight to the public after lobbying on Capitol Hill on Monday for his stimulus plan, which is expected to reach $775 billion over two years. Get more details on Obama's economic stimulus plan.

There is a great editorial in The New York Times today on unions and the Obama Administration's commitment to labor--giving basically a full-throated endorsement of the Employee Free Choice Act and why it is such an important part of an economic recovery program.

Employee Free Choice legislation:

"The measure is vital legislation and should not be postponed. Even modest increases in the share of the unionized labor force push wages upward, because nonunion workplaces must keep up with unionized ones that collectively bargain for increases. By giving employees a bigger say in compensation issues, unions also help to establish corporate norms, the absence of which has contributed to unjustifiable disparities between executive pay and rank-and-file pay."

"The argument against unions -- that they unduly burden employers with unreasonable demands -- is one that corporate America makes in good times and bad, so the recession by itself is not an excuse to avoid pushing the bill next year. The real issue is whether enhanced unionizing would worsen the recession, and there is no evidence that it would...Without a united front, workers will have even less bargaining power in the recession than they had during the growth years of this decade, when they largely failed to get raises even as productivity and profits soared."

"If Mr. Obama's campaign promises are to be kept, that mindset cannot prevail again. Mr. Obama's creation of a task force on middle-class issues, to be led by Vice President-elect Joseph Biden and including Ms. Solis and other high-ranking officials, is an encouraging sign that labor issues will not be given short shrift."

"Instead of slashing the pay and benefits of domestic farm workers and further complicating our country's immigration situation, President Bush should work with President-elect Obama to strengthen worker conditions," said SEIU International Executive Vice President Eliseo Medina. "Until that happens, SEIU's two million members add their voices in opposition to the H-2A program changes."

Read the full statement.

Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Executive Vice President Eliseo Medina released the following statement concerning proposed changes to the nation's H2A agricultural guest worker program announced by the outgoing Bush Administration:

"At this critical moment we should be focused on rebuilding our economy so that it is stronger and fairer for our children and grandchildren. The Bush Administration's proposed changes to the H2A guest worker program are the wrong policies at the wrong time by making it easier for big business to exploit some of the lowest-paid workers in the country.

"Instead of slashing the pay and benefits of domestic farm workers and further complicating our country's immigration situation, President Bush should work with President-elect Obama to strengthen worker conditions and create a comprehensive solution to our broken immigration system that restores the rule of law and combines smart enforcement strategies at the border and in the workplace.

"Until that happens, SEIU's 2 million members add their voices in opposition to the H-2A program changes and we call on Congress and President-elect Obama to reverse these regulatory changes. With the state of our nation's economy, we cannot afford to put our agricultural workforce in jeopardy and undermine U.S. workers."