If you’re a woman considering a career in the growing clean energy economy, check out this new online guide from the U.S. Department of Labor. “Why Green Is Your Color: A Woman’s Guide to a Sustainable Career” is designed to help women find and keep higher-paying jobs in the clean energy economy.

The online publication (click here) will help workers learn about a range of in-demand and emerging jobs, as well as job training opportunities and career development tools, in the clean energy economy. The guide also serves as a resource for workforce development professionals, training providers, educators, career counselors and women’s advocacy organizations.

Sara Manzano-Díaz, director of the Labor Department’s Women’s Bureau, says many occupations in the clean energy economy remain virtually untapped by women.

This guide is an invaluable resource that workforce professionals can use to help women transition into higher paying jobs that serve as a pathway into the middle class. It is also a tool to help fight job segregation.

Additional resources to help women succeed in nontraditional and emerging job sectors are available by contacting the Women’s Bureau at 202-693-6710 or click here to visit its website.

The White House Champions of Change program wants to honor those people who have helped people in their communities take advantage of the Affordable Care Act’s growing benefits and those who have championed access to health care for everyone in their community throughout their careers.

Before the nearly two-year-old Affordable Care Act was passed, children were refused insurance coverage because of a pre-existing condition and people with chronic conditions ran out of insurance coverage because their expenses hit lifetime limits. Now young adults under the age of 26 can stay on their parent’s coverage.

Many Americans, including people on Medicare, can now access preventive services for free, while insurance companies are being held accountable for spending the majority of premium dollars on care, not on advertising and bonuses.

Thanks the work of thousands of people across the country educating and raising the awareness of  people in their communities about the benefits of the nearly two-year-old Affordable Care Act, millions of Americans have taken advantage of  health care reform’s new benefits.

If you know an individual or organization who is educating their community about the new health care law and helping people take advantage of the benefits from the law, click here to nominate your health care reform champion of change. Nominations must be submitted by midnight of Feb. 16.

The White House Champions of Change program highlights the stories and examples of citizens across the country who are out-innovating, out-educating and out-building the rest of the world through projects and initiatives that move their communities forward.

A demonstration at Apple’s Grand Central Terminal store in New York City drew a dozen people, who peacefully handed over a petition with 250,000 signatures to an Apple store manager. Shelby Knox, the director for Change.org, led the effort to collect the signatures.

Knox and New York Times reporter Charles Duhigg, who helped break the story about the horrific conditions involved in producing the world’s most popular products, spoke today with Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman. Also on the show: Mike Daisey, whose one-man play, “The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs,” is based partly on his visits to Apple’s Chinese factories and his interviews with the workers there. Daisey pointed out one of the key reasons the ability of Apple suppliers like Foxconn to institute slave-like working conditions–lack of a free labor movement.

Labor organization in China is illegal. If you organize a union in China that is separate from the Communist Party, and those are largely fronts, in terms of working conditions, you go to prison if you’re caught by the government. So, that largely shuts down any sort of serious effort at labor organization. I think that’s part and parcel of the landscape. I mean, there’s a reason why this environment works so well for the needs of creating a hyperinflated, hyper-growing industrial revolution, and that’s that you have a base of workers who live under an authoritarian government and can be controlled. The circumstances are very controlled. And so, I think that’s part of the equation that we don’t like to look at.

Read the full transcript of the show and watch the video here.

On Wednesday, Feb. 15, the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University, will hold a special discussion focusing on what the Wisconsin protests mean a year later; the history, law, and politics of collective bargaining in the public sector; and what these public sector labor struggles mean for the country more generally.

The discussion will run from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the Georgetown Law Gewirz Center on the 12th floor.

Georgetown University professor and Kalmanowitz Initiative Executive Director Joseph McCartin will lead the panel.  Panelists include Craig Becker, a former National Labor Relations Board member, Mahlon Mitchell, president of the Professional Fire Fighters of Wisconsin (IAFF), Joseph P. Rugola, executive director of the Ohio Association of Public School Employees (OAPSE/AFSCME) and Newsweek and Daily Beast contributor, Eleanor Clift.

Q.: As you’ve noted, the January drop in unemployment was especially sharp for African American and Latino workers. The jobless rate for black workers fell by 2.2 percentage points to 13.6 percent, the lowest level since March 2009. For Latino workers, the jobless rate dropped by 0.5 to 10.5 percent, the lowest since January 2009. What’s behind this good news?

A.: My best guess is that much of this is a statistical quirk. These numbers are always erratic and can and do jump around month to month. However, part of the drop is probably real. I suspect that with the African American population much of the story is related to the increase in manufacturing and construction employment, which is likely clustered in the Midwest. These are sectors that disproportionately employ African American workers.

The improvement for Latinos is less easily explained. Of course, many Latinos are employed in construction, but more in the West and South than Midwest, which has seen the biggest gains.

Anyhow, I suspect that part of the improvement in the employment picture is weather related. We had unusually warm weather across the Northeast/Midwest in December and January, which means that construction and manufacturing were not disrupted as much as usual. That would make it appear that we are adding jobs.

Q.: Employment in manufacturing and construction also showed strong growth in January. You attribute the construction  job hike to unseasonably warm weather. But what about manufacturing? It’s been one area of job growth for several months now. What’s behind its resurgence and can it continue?

A.: Car sales clearly are the main factor here. Car sales have rebounded by more than 20 percent from their low in 2009. This means jobs not just in autos, but also in a wide range of supplier industries. This uptick is likely to continue as people replace older cars, but the rate of growth will certainly be slower.

Q.: Recent upward revisions to job growth for November and December mean the nation has averaged an increase of 201,000 jobs over the past three months. The January jobs data shows several measures of unemployment are coming down—for the unemployed and even for those who are discouraged and had given up looking for a job. Yet the numbers of the long-term unemployed  remain stubbornly the same—5.5 million workers. How do you interpret these data going forward?

A.: We have a huge backlog of unemployed workers and especially long-term unemployed. This is not going to change in a month. To give an idea of the relative magnitudes here, we need roughly 100,000 new jobs a month to keep pace with the growth of the labor force. That means that over the last three months we whittled down this pool of unemployed workers at the rate of roughly 100,000 a month. If all of these jobs went to the long-term unemployed, it would take us more than 4.5 years for all of them to get jobs.

Q.: We often hear that the reason hiring has been so low in this recovery is that employers can’t find workers with the education and skills they need. What’s your take on this assertion?

A.: This claim is inconsistent with the data. If the issue was skills then we would expect to see areas/occupations where wages are rising rapidly and there is other evidence of shortages, such as increased overtime for the existing workforce and a big increase in job openings. We do not see this in any major sector of the economy. There is no major occupation where wages are rising rapidly or in which average weekly hours have risen sharply. There also is no area that has anything resembling an excess of job opening to unemployed workers.

It continues to look overwhelming like this is a simple case of inadequate demand depressing employment for everyone. The rate of unemployment for college grads is still more than twice its pre-recession level. That is not consistent with employers having difficulty getting skilled workers.

UPDATE: Metro DC Communications Director Chris Garlock send us this more detailed report from this afternoon’s actions.

Chanting “Whose America? Our America!” as many as 700 labor and community activists turned out in force earlier this afternoon outside the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), shutting down Woodley Rd. with an impromptu sit in and brief takeover take-over of the Mariott Wardman Park Hotel driveway.

Well-heeled CPAC attendees gawked as the huge crowd turned Woodley Road into a multi-hued street festival of “the 99%” The spirited demonstration (click here for a slideshow) lasted over two hours, with many planning to stay on through the afternoon for the second round, dubbed Occupy CPAC: Scott Walker and the Union Busters, planned to start at 5 p.m. focusing on Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R), who’s scheduled to address CPAC tonight.

Union and progressive activists are staging some unique events today at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) meeting in Washington, D.C., the annual gathering of the Who’s Who of the 1 percent, including Mitt Romney, Scott Walker, Newt Gingrich, Paul Ryan, Ann Coulter and Grover Norquist.

You can keep up with today’s Occupy CPAC actions with this live Twitter feed from the Metropolitan Washington [D.C.] Council AFL-CIO and with the hashtag #OccupyCPAC.

Actions are set for noon and 5 p.m. (EST). If you are in the D.C. area and want to jin, head over to the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel (2600 Woodley Rd. at Connecticut Ave. N.W.). The nearest Metro stop is the Woodley Park station.

There’s still time to show your love to the special someone who Occupies your heart on Valentine’s Day, and Union Plus and Working America members can get a 20 percent discount on flower arrangements through Teleflora. (Click here to join Working America and get your flower discount.)

Earlier this week, Union Plus posted a few labor-inspired messages on its Facebook wall the union lover in you might want to include with the flowers.

• My love, like a union contract, gives you a feeling of security.
• My heart skipped a beat…I need workers’ comp.
• They might withhold my paycheck, but I’ll never withhold my love.

Click here for more or to add your own.

Alliance for Retired Americans President Barbara Easterling wrote this at Huffington Post.

In 2010 Mitt Romney made $21.7 million, while that same year the average senior citizen received $14,000 in Social Security benefits.

Put another way, Mitt Romney made more by 6:00 a.m. on January 1 than many retirees did the entire year. His daily income was over four times greater than many seniors’ annual income.

Why does this matter? Shouldn’t his finances be none of our business? To me, it matters because of how sharply it contrasts with his plans to increase the Social Security retirement age, lower benefits for some seniors, and let Wall Street gamble away—and profit from—a privatized Social Security system. It reflects a cold indifference to those less fortunate.

Seniors—along with younger generations who worry if they will ever be able to retire—need to keep a close eye on politicians this year. For example, Romney’s stance on Social Security does not match his telling a group of seniors on the eve of the Florida primary, “We will never go after Medicare or Social Security.”

Social Security is not just another pension fund for the Bain Capitals of the world to raid. Social Security is how each day—while Mitt Romney earns another $59,360—millions of retirees are able to pay their bills and put food on the table.

Barbara J. Easterling is president of the Alliance for Retired Americans. She was previously the secretary-treasurer of the Communications Workers of America. For more information, visit www.retiredamericans.org or call 1-800-333-7212.

In a nationwide advertising campaign getting underway this weekend, AFGE members are calling out Republican lawmakers for supporting a plan to pay for the payroll tax relief extension by slashing federal employee wages.

The new ads feature a Veterans Affairs nurse, a Defense Department worker and a federal corrections officer. They want GOP lawmakers to “explain it to me” how cutting federal pay and benefits helps put Americans back to work. Asks Minnesota VA nurse Teresa Capecchi:

Twelve percent of the salary I earn caring for veterans goes to my retirement. Explain it to me, GOP, how cutting my retirement puts people to work.

Republicans in Congress have proposed paying for the payroll tax relief extension by freezing federal employee salaries for another year. Says AFGE National President John Gage:

Federal employees already have given up their pay raises for two years in a row and many are in danger of losing their jobs because of drastic agency downsizing efforts. Freezing their wages for another year adds insult to injury and does nothing to get Americans back to work.

Hundreds of AFGE members will be in Washington for the union’s annual Legislative and Grassroots Mobilization Conference Feb. 12-15. Members will meet with their congressional representatives during the week to address the attacks on federal employees’ pay, pensions and benefits.

In New York and Philadelphia, TWU members have been a big part of the fair contract fight by CWA and Electrical Workers (IBEW) members at Verizon and Verizon Wireless. In the Midwest, where TWU represents transit workers and CWA represents university and public workers, there’s a lot of common ground.

TWU President James C. Little says the two unions share “common values and principles that should intuitively benefit our members through working together.” CWA President Larry Cohen says partnerships like this “are the only way we will make progress for workers.”

Full of tea party zeal after voting to repeal lunch hours for all employees, the House Labor Committee took up a new so-called right to work “RTW” bill today over the loud objections of union members, business owners and faith leaders.

As state House Speaker William O’Brien (R) did last fall, Labor Committee Chairman Gary Daniels invited political candidates to stump on the floor of the House in return for their endorsement of RTW. Gubernatorial candidates Ovid Lamontagne and Kevin Smith did the honors.

Never mind that business owners and labor leaders think it’s time to move on from the contentious battle over RTW that shook the Legislature last year.

As Mark MacKenzie, president of the New Hampshire AFL-CIO, testified:

We have lower poverty levels, higher graduation rates, and higher wages than any right-to-work state. We have negotiated thousands of successful collective bargaining agreements. This law is not broken. There is no need for right-to-work.

Peter Church, owner of a small union printing shop in Manchester, agreed.

This is not something that New Hampshire needs. It’s certainly not something that anyone operating a business in New Hampshire wants.

And we can’t forget about Robert Lynch, staunch Libertarian and celebrated author, who used his 15 minutes at the microphone to promote both RTW and his new book, “Guardrails, God and Santa Claus,” on the importance of freedom.

The overarching arguments haven’t changed much from last year. Opponents say that “right to work” for less will take away workers’ rights and lower their wages.

Proponents, on the other hand, will try to sell you something: either a book, or a candidate, or a complete fallacy about what our economy needs and how it works.

Donna Gratehouse, who blogs at DemocraticDiva and elsewhere on all things Arizona, sends us this.

It’s time for us to say enough! Let’s not let these bills see the  light of day. Let’s focus on the real priorities of the state of Arizona—jobs,  the economy, health care, education. Those are the priorities of Arizona, not the type of legislation that is pushed by the Goldwater Institute.

Gallardo went on to demand that the Goldwater Institute register as a lobbyist, as every other organization that influences legislation in Arizona has to do. (Watch his speech here.)

Some local reporters covering the press conference were surprised that much more ire was directed at the Goldwater Institute and the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) than at Republican state senators. This might serve as a cue to them to go after these powerful groups with more vigilance than they’ve shown up to now.

The mobilization is aimed at lawmakers who are back in their districts for the President’s Day Recess that begins  tomorrow, and it’s a  partnership between USAction, the AFL-CIO, the National Employment Law Project (NELP), community and other groups.

If the Feb. 29 deadline passes without Congress taking action to extend UI coverage, 1.2 million jobless workers will lose their benefits by the end of March and 3.3 million by the June. (Click here tell your congressional representatives to act now.)

In a telephone press conference today, Gary Polvinale, an Ohio IT manager who has been out of work nearly a year said,

Congress is doing something corporations do, exploiting and bullying the helpless. We need them to act now So we can survive until till can find something.

Congressional Republicans are holding hostage an extension of  the UI  program by insisting that any UI renewal cuts as many as 40 weeks of benefits, imposes onerous restrictions on jobless workers and even makes them pay for re-employment services. Christine Owens, executive director of the (NELP) calls the Republican proposals “punitive and unnecessary.

As AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker says, “We don’t have time for sideshow fights that scapegoat workers.”

Unemployment insurance is the one thing that stands between them being out on the street, hungry and going with basic necessities. Tell Congress to do their jobs and stop penalizing workers and  rebuild the economy so that works for all of us, not just those at the top.

In Columbus, Progress Ohio will erect a stand and dangle shoes from it in front of Sen. Bob Portman’s (R) district office. In Concord, N.H., Citizen Alliance for Action will create an obstacle course using hula hoops to symbolize the “hoops” conservatives in Congress want to force jobless Americans to jump through. In Newtown, Pa., Penn Action is collecting stories from unemployed workers, wrapping them in red tape and delivering them to Rep. Mike Fitzpatrick (R).

The Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) will get a warm labor union, progressive welcome tomorrow at its annual conference in Washington. D.C., and we will keep you updated with a live Twitter feed ( hashtag #OccupyCPAC ) courtesy of  Metropolitan Washington [D.C.] Council AFL-CIO.

The Who’s Who of the 1 percent–like Mitt Romney, Scott Walker, Newt Gingrich, Paul Ryan, Ann Coulter, Grover Norquist and other stars of the extremist rogue’s gallery–will be on hand.  But so will representatives of the rest of us, the 99 percent, with big puppets, inflatables, chants, songs and of course tents to Occupy CPAC.

If you happen to be in the D.C. area tomorrow and want to join in the fun, events are set for noon and 5 p.m. (EST) at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel (2600 Woodley Rd. at Connecticut Ave. N.W.). The nearest Metro stop is the Woodley Park station.

More horrors out now from the Chinese serf-labor system involved in creating Apple products like iPads, iPhones and Kindles. It turns out many of the workers churning out millions of the devices in unendurable conditions at Foxconn and other factories are also forced laborers as young as 16.

The Hong Kong-based Students and Scholars Against Corporate Misbehavior (SACOM) says, “Legions of vocational and university students, some as young as 16, are forced to take months-long “internships” in Foxconn’s mainland China factories assembling Apple products,” according to Alternet. One study found in some Foxconn factories, which employ 1.3 million people in China, up to 50 percent of the workforce were students.

SACOM and others report that schools teaching journalism, hotel management and nursing threatened students with failure if they did not take a factory position. The Chinese government-owned Global Times noted that “automotive majors at a vocational school in Zhengzhou, capital of Henan, were also forced to serve as interns for Foxconn before they were given their diplomas.

Apple’s formula for mammoth profits, which topped $13 billion last quarter, depends upon a steady supply of forced laborers who are put through a torturous training to accustom them to the factory working conditions.

To meet production goals, Foxconn relies on “military-style management…on the shop floor.” Workers say “military training” starts during the recruitment phase, such as being forced to stand in the sun for hours with no water. In Chengdu, some workers claimed that for up to one month before work began they had to line up in formation and “stand still as a soldier for hours.” Even the China Daily reported that the state-controlled Shenzhen Federation of Trade Unions said Foxconn has a “quasi-military management system.” According to scholars as well as business publications, Taiwanese managers in China refer to their management style as militaristic.

Vocational schools force their students into Apple slavery because they get a huge cut: While students receive less than $80 a month for working 11 hours a day, seven days a week, “over the course of a year, 500 students could net a school more than a million U.S. dollars in income.”

Often, corporate apologists in industrialized nations will counter that low wages paid to workers in developing nations are justifiable because cost of living is lower. Another study, also in the Alternet report, refutes that claim. Migrant workers at the iFactories in the Shenzhen Province, even with overtime, are paid 47 percent of what city residents earned and amounted to only two-thirds of the living wage calculated by SACOM.

Alternet writer Aryn Gupta also makes the connection that a nation whose political policy endorses low-wage labor is one that also seeks to cut off workers’ voices by choking their unions.

The use of hundreds of thousands of students is one way in which China’s state regulates labor in the interests of Foxconn and Apple. Other measures include banning independent unions and enforcing a household registration system that denies migrants social services and many political rights once they leave their home region, ensuring they can be easily exploited.