Job Guarantees
New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker has released a draft job guarantee plan, and New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand and Sanders have said they're in favor of some form of job guarantee. It's a pretty broad policy idea that could take any number of forms, but the basic idea is that the government guarantees work to whoever wants it. One left-leaning think tank's draft plan advocates that government would hire people to work in infrastructure, child care and the Postal Service, among many others. Plans often also guarantee a wage well above the current federal minimum of $7.25 an hour.
Basic Income (But Not Quite)
The LIFT the Middle Class Act from California Sen. Kamala Harris creates a refundable credit (a lot like the Earned Income Tax Credit — one that gives the taxpayer a refund even if the taxpayer has no income taxes to pay) of up to $6,000 per family. It's like a universal basic income program, as Vox's Dylan Matthews and Slate's Jordan Weissmann have noted, but not quite — it's only for relatively poor families (so, not universal), and it's only for families who are already working and earning at least a low level of money (so, not basic).
Medicare For All
Sanders has for years been a proponent of Medicare for all — generally used as a loose term for single-payer health care (said payer being the government). Now, potential 2020 contenders including Booker, Gillibrand, Harris, Sen. Elizabeth Warren from Massachusetts and Texas Rep. Beto O'Rourke are all in favor of the idea, as well.
Overhauling Corporate Accountability
Warren has put forward a bill that would require large corporations to be federally chartered and to make sure that charter "requires corporate directors to consider the interests of all major corporate stakeholders — not only shareholders — in company decisions," as she put it in a Wall Street Journal op-ed. In addition, workers would elect 40 percent of the members of a corporation's board of directors.
Improving Working Conditions
Multiple potential candidates (Booker, Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown, Gillibrand, Harris, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, O'Rourke and Warren) support a $15 minimum wage, and several also have pushed for expanded paid family leave. In a similar vein, Sanders' Stop WALMART Act would require large corporations to provide $15 hourly wages and sick leave.
Rent Relief
Booker and Harris have both introduced bills that would provide refundable tax credits to people paying large shares of their income in rent. Booker's bill would also attempt to grow the amount of affordable housing.