Green Jobs

Union president Jim Savage doesn't represent the 400 workers who learned yesterday that Sunoco Inc. would permanently shut down the Eagle Point refinery in Westville, Gloucester County. But he does represent other Sunoco refinery workers - and he thinks they and other "old energy" workers are being left out of all the talk about new and green energy. "It has created a lot of anxiety," said Savage, who leads United Steelworkers Local 10-1. And no wonder. Old-energy jobs in mining, refineries, and electricity tend to be union jobs with decent wages and benefits.

Raymond Manuel has just two more checks coming, then next month his unemployment runs out. The situation led Manuel, 37, a married father of three who was bundled in a puffy tan coat, to sit in the first chair of the front row in the gymnasium of the Dixon House on a recent afternoon for an orientation on a green-jobs training program. The pilot program, held at the South Philadelphia social-service center, is part of a federal initiative to get people like Manuel, stuck in the mud of joblessness, outfitted for a new career and back to work.

"I think it's an injustice. I'm a proud American who did the best I could for my country and this is how they reward me. " - Bradley Birkenfeld, a whistle-blower in a tax-evasion probe of UBS AG, as he reported to prison for helping clients hide hundreds of millions of dollars and evade U.S. taxes "Make no mistake about it, this case is about more than just hats. " - DeMaurice Smith, executive director of the National Football League Players Association, on the Supreme Court battle over who gets to make official NFL headgear logos "The Europeans should focus the conversation on the economic issues of climate change, the green jobs, the recovery.

Employers shed 85,000 jobs in December - worse than expected - as the economy continued to stumble on its way to recovery, the Labor Department reported yesterday. Even a significant increase of 46,500 jobs in temporary staffing, long considered a leading indicator of eventual permanent hiring, could not offset widespread declines in trade, manufacturing, and, particularly, construction, which lost 53,000 jobs - the most of any sector. There are nearly 15.3 million unemployed people in the United States, up from 7.7 million at the start of the recession in December 2007.

The leading question of the day, President Obama said in a widely publicized jobs forum in Washington yesterday, is: "How do we get businesses to start hiring again?" In Philadelphia, ideas and answers to that question flowed yesterday in the Convention Center, where State Reps. Dwight Evans and John Myers, both city Democrats, held a local version attended by at least 130 politicians, labor leaders, nonprofit executives, and businesspeople. More than 20 of them spoke in a wide-ranging discussion on topics that included workforce training, green jobs, dredging the Delaware River, poor educational quality, global competitiveness, and a culture that emphasizes jobs over the kind of entrepreneurship that creates jobs.

A COMMUNITY COLLEGE is the setting for a sitcom on NBC, but the health and improvement of the nation's community colleges is no joke. In fact, if President Obama has his way, community colleges will be an engine of the economic recovery. It looks as if millions of students already have the same idea: About 40 percent of 18-24 year olds - a record - are in college, says a new study by the Pew Research Center. Recent gains are attributed to a surge in enrollment at community colleges.

TWO POINT 6 million U.S. jobs were lost last year, and unemployment continues to climb, with many experts predicting the rate will exceed 10 percent by early next year, if not sooner. The situation is far worse for younger workers, minorities, single moms and millions of others living on or below the poverty line. While faith organizations continue their work serving those in need in their communities, many groups also recognize that we need to support serious efforts from our political leaders to reduce poverty.

By David N. Taylor and Jay Timmons This Labor Day, America is in its 20th month of recession, making this the longest and deepest economic downturn since the Great Depression. More than six million jobs have been lost across the country, and manufacturing has suffered disproportionately, accounting for 1.8 million of those lost jobs. So it's difficult to understand how our federal lawmakers could seriously consider legislation that would depress economic growth and job creation for the next 20 years.

The winds of change blew across the rapidly evolving green-technology landscape earlier this year, taking with them nearly 200 jobs from Lower Bucks County. The latest generation of wind turbines needs bigger blades than the 140-foot-long, 6-ton models that Gamesa Technology Corp. Inc. has been making at its factory in Fairless Hills. So company officials announced 184 layoffs in January and said the blade work would be transferred to a larger Gamesa plant in the center of the state, near Altoona.

With no less urgent a message than this one - that the nation's economic future is at stake - labor and environmental leaders today will launch a 22-state "Made in America" jobs tour that will include a stop in Philadelphia, likely later this month. The main purpose of the tour, which will end in late September with a rally in Pittsburgh, is to emphasize that a clean-energy economy "is the next industrial foundation for America," said Leo Gerard, president of the United Steelworkers of America.