“There are only three ways to create wealth: You either make it, you mine it or you grow it,” says Robert Trouskie, director of field services for the Workforce Development Institute, a New York nonprofit focused on growing and retaining well-paying jobs in the state. “The one that’s really lagged behind in the last two or three decades has been the making of things, but I think the pendulum is starting to [swing].”
Indeed, the U.S. saw about 5 million manufacturing jobs disappear between 2000 and 2014. But despite the loss, 400,000 positions still sit unfilled across the country. Most are for jobs that require special training — a need WDI has been addressing since 2003 by working with other organizations and unions to connect willing workers to available positions.
One such worker is Todd Holmquist, a recent graduate of WDI’s Accelerated Machinist Partnership, which combines classroom education with hands-on training in factories. After the aircraft plant where he worked closed in 2013, Holmquist’s income plummeted from about $80,000 a year to $20,000. He enrolled in the program just a week before his wife was diagnosed with ovarian cancer.
Watch the video above to see how WDI helped turned Holmquist’s life, and employment prospects, around.
Tag: labor
Two Leaders in Labor Rethink Social Safety Nets in a Freelance Economy
When Sara Horowitz founded Freelancers Union 20 years ago in New York City, her initial members had one clear need that stood out amongst the rest: Healthcare.
“I thought, oh my God, how boring is that? Let’s just get that done and move onto the next issue,” says Horowitz, the daughter of a labor lawyer and granddaughter of a former vice president of the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union. However, she quickly discovered that the health care needs were just one example of what she saw as the lack of a safety net that millions of Americans were coming to terms with. “So that became the central core piece of what we do.”
Twenty years after its founding, the Freelancers Union has around a quarter of a million members and has just launched a national healthcare program for freelancers living in any state.
As part of our Up-and-Comers series, Ai-jen Poo, director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, sat down with Horowitz to discuss labor issues in a 21st century “gig” economy.
3 Reasons Why Sunday’s Historic Climate March Could Be the Start of Something Huge
Thousands of protestors will cram the streets of New York City this Sunday, calling on world leaders to help stop climate change. But they’ll also have another message: “Welcome to a new chapter in the fight against global warming. This time it’s going to work.”
The People’s Climate March is expected to be the biggest-ever collective action against global climate change, and organizers are hoping the protest will mark a watershed moment in their fight.
For years, scientist and activists have been pleading for coordinated action to halt the warming of the planet, but world leaders have repeatedly failed to rise to the challenge. Since the disastrous United Nations Climate Conference in Copenhagen in 2009, global summits have not forged worldwide consensus on how to achieve the U.N.’s stated goal of restricting any future global temperature increase to no more than two degrees Celsius.
This weekend’s march is set to coincide with another one of these global meetings: The U.N. Climate Summit 2014. No decisions will be made at the event, which will be attended by 125 world leaders, including President Obama. But the summit will lay the groundwork for landmark U.N. climate conferences this December in Lima and next year in Paris.
Despite the failures of the past, organizers of the People’s Climate March see at least three reasons to hope this year.
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