Financial Group Urges More Worker Assistance.

A financial industry group on Wednesday recommended a significant increase in government support for unemployed workers to help address growing public skepticism about international trade.

The Financial Services Forum, which represents chief executives from 20 of the largest U.S. financial institutions, issued a white paper that proposes a $22 billion "adjustment assistance program." That dwarfs the federal government's current trade adjustment assistance spending of about $1 billion annually, the paper says. [...]

The paper was prepared by Grant Aldonas, a former Bush administration trade official and adviser to the Center for Strategic and International Studies; Robert Lawrence, a former economic adviser to President Clinton and Harvard University professor; and Matthew Slaughter, a former adviser to President Bush and professor at Dartmouth College.

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