100 employers are here today for the White House Apprenticeship Summit.

 

What's that mean, exactly? Employers who have committed to expanding their apprenticeship programs and promoting apprenticeship to other employers are gathering together at the White House to talk about what's working, and what the Administration has done so far to prioritize job-driven training.

Great to see the progress that #PAGE ambassadors are making for entrepreneurs http://t.co/c4os7RrMhy

— Penny Pritzker (@PennyPritzker) September 8, 2015

 

One of the President's and Vice President's top priorities is creating more opportunity for hardworking Americans by advancing job-driven training initiatives that help workers acquire the skills they need to succeed in good jobs that are available right now. Hands-on apprenticeships, where workers earn and learn at the same time, are a proven path to good, secure middle class jobs — and yield an impressive return on investment for employers through increased productivity, reduced waster, and greater innovation.

Here's what you need to know about why expanding apprenticeship opportunities is so important:

 

Today, Mike Breen — an Iraq war veteran from New Hampshire — shared his perspective on the lessons we've learned from the Iraq war and why we must remember them when considering the Iran deal. Didn't get the message? Sign up for email updates here. 

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This week, critics of the Iran deal — including Former Vice President Dick Cheney — are gathering in Washington.

It's a safe bet that they will call for abandoning our diplomatic deal with Iran and the world, and call for a dangerously simplistic vision of American “leadership” based on unilateral action that would ultimately leave us with a choice between accepting a nuclear Iran or using military force.

This is no abstract debate. Those, like me, who have served, understand all too well the sacrifice that is required when diplomacy is abandoned. I have spent much of my adult life attempting to redeem the aftermath of a deeply unnecessary and misguided war in Iraq in the name of non-proliferation. Having served in Iraq myself as an Army officer, and then worked with Iraqi refugee families facing desperate circumstances in Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan, I believe we must ask a simple question of anyone wishing to be taken seriously on matters of national security today: What have you learned from the Iraq war?

Some, it is clear, have learned disturbingly little. You can see what I mean here.

Some of the same people who supported premature military action in Iraq, based on faulty intelligence, remain eager to reject tough diplomacy now. Remarkably, many of them have made clear that they reject the very idea of negotiating with Iran at all.

We must remember how radical that view truly is.

Presidents from Eisenhower to Nixon to Kennedy, from Reagan to Bush Sr., knew that sometimes, facing our adversaries across the negotiating table is a better way to advance our interests, promote our values, and improve our security than rushing to face them on the battlefield. They understood that tough, principled diplomacy is a hallmark of our strength — and that exhausting diplomatic options before asking our men and women in uniform to confront the awful face of battle is a basic responsibility of leadership.

Embracing the use of force as a first option, while rejecting the very idea of tough negotiations with dangerous countries, is a departure from our nation's best strategic traditions and most essential moral values. The costs of that departure have been great, and remain with us to this day. We who have spent our lives since 9/11 on the front lines of a dangerous world have learned from our shared experience that America can — and must — do better, and be smarter.

Using tough, principled diplomacy, backed by strength, to reduce the threat posed by our enemies is one of America's greatest bipartisan traditions.

You can learn more about how the Iran deal reflects that tradition and how it will work here: http://ift.tt/19MYvxU

This deal with Iran reflects the painful lessons of our recent past, and represents a higher form of renewed American leadership. America rallied support for sanctions around the world, forced Iran to the table, and delivered a tough deal based on verification — not trust. If Iran abides by the terms, that leadership will have improved our security and safeguarded our allies without putting American lives at risk. If Iran cheats, or threatens our security in other ways, we will be watching – with every tool of our national power remaining at our disposal, much better intelligence, and the world committed to standing with us in our response.

We must remember our essential goal: To prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. This deal accomplishes that goal.

And if Iran does choose conflict, there is nothing in this deal that gives away the power and resolve of our military, or our commitment to defend our nation and our allies. Make no mistake. The men and women I was once privileged to serve alongside will fight and win on any battlefield our elected civilian leaders may choose. That is their responsibility. Ours is to learn from painful experience, and choose with wisdom worthy of their service.

The radical worldview that led to the Iraq war belongs to the past. Our generation has charted a new course for the future. Embracing tough, principled diplomacy as a first resort is the best way forward for our nation and the world.

Thanks for listening,

Mike

Mike Breen
Portsmouth, New Hampshire

Today, we celebrate Labor Day – a day to honor America’s workers and mark their social and economic achievements.

     
Tomorrow, Members of Congress return to work and face a pretty sizeable piece of business — enactment of a budget for the fiscal year that starts October 1. Unfortunately, the Republican budget plans launch a double-pronged attack on the workers we are celebrating today.  
    
The Republian appropriations bills are stacked with ideological provisions known as “riders” that are unrelated to spending levels and  weaken basic protections for workers, the backbone of our economy. These riders undermine worker safety, the ability of workers to save for retirement, and workers’ ability to have a meaningful, unionized voice in their workplaces. On top of that, the bills cut funding for key agencies that are charged with enforcing these and other worker protections — including basic requirements that workers be paid what they earn and work in a safe environment. And they also underfund programs that help workers obtain the skills and knowledge they need to succeed in today’s economy.

In other words, the Republican budget plan would weaken worker protections, weaken enforcement of those weakened protections, and deny training to workers who want to build skills and a career. That’s just one reason the President has said that the Republican budget plans are unacceptable.

Here are eight key ways Republican budget plans would hurt working Americans:

 

1. They’d weaken the Department of Labor’s ability to protect wages for more than 135 million workers, costing workers an estimated $70-$80 million in back wages.

 

The Senate bill cuts $67 million from the Wage and Hour Division, the part of the Department of Labor that enforces wage protections like the minimum wage, overtime pay, and the right for workers to be paid what they have earned. That’s a 24 percent cut compared to the President’s Budget. The House bill cuts the Division by $62 million, or 22 percent, below the President’s Budget. These bills would weaken the Division’s ability to protect wages in more than 7.3 million establishments for over 135 million workers, including the ability to recover back wages for workers.  
 

2. They’d cut funding for workplace inspections and enforcement of standards that prevent illness, injury, and fatalities on the job.

 

The House would cut funding for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) by $57 million – or 10 percent – compared to the President’s Budget. The Senate cuts OSHA funding more deeply, by $68 million, or 11 percent. This means fewer inspections of dangerous workplaces, a slower response to fatalities and serious injuries, and diminished protections for workers who report unsafe and unscrupulous behavior.
    
The cuts in the Wage and Hour Division and OSHA are part of a larger cut to the Department of Labor’s worker protection efforts under the Republican budget plans.  The Senate cuts $260 million from these worker protection agencies in total, while the House cuts about $200 million.
 

3. The House would reverse an existing policy that lets independent experts accompany workplace safety inspectors.

 

This would deny OSHA and workers the help of industrial hygienists and safety engineers who provide expertise, and translators and worker advocates who help ensure that workers have a voice in identifying and understanding hazards in their workplace. These third-party experts would not be allowed to participate without a vote being organized among workers first – a requirement that would unnecessarily delay the identification and abatement of hazards that put workers at risk of harm.

4. The Senate would effectively block, by endless delay, a rule to protect workers from carcinogenic silica dust. OSHA needs to update a decades-old rule limiting workers’ exposure to this known lung carcinogen.

 

But the Senate rider would delay improving protections for workers until unnecessary, additional studies are completed. 
    

5. They’d make it harder to prevent unlawful treatment of workers who take action to improve their working conditions.

 

The House and Senate bills slash funding for the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) by 28 percent and 11 percent, respectively, below the President’s Budget. At this level of funding, the Board would be forced to reduce its staffing level by up to one-third, severely hindering its ability to investigate and litigate unfair labor practices and conduct secret ballot elections, as required by law, around the nation.

6. They’d use multiple riders to further disempower the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

 

Both the House and Senate bills include numerous riders that would block common-sense rules to level the playing field for workers who want to vote on whether or not to form a union, and interfere with the Board’s adjudicatory functions by prohibiting it from considering cases regarding joint-employer standards or the appropriate size of a bargaining unit.

7. They’d block protections for workers saving for retirement.

 

The Department of Labor’s “Conflict of Interest” rule would protect those saving for retirement from being steered into investments that are in their advisors' financial interest but not theirs. The Council of Economic Advisers has estimated that conflicted advice leads to annual losses of about $17 billion for IRA investors.

8. They’d underfund employment and training programs that employers need to build a skilled workforce and workers rely on to prepare for 21st-century jobs, depriving at least 2 million workers of job training and employment services.

 

The Senate and House bills fail to support the bipartisan Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), which last year passed the Senate in a 97-3 vote, and other key employment services. The Senate funds employment and training programs at $650 million less than the President’s Budget level, while the House bill reduces the funding level by nearly $500 million. Under the Republican bills, at least two million fewer workers would receive job training and employment services, as compared to the President’s Budget. The Republican bills also deny funding for the Administration's proposed Apprenticeship Grants, depriving American workers of the chance to participate in this proven learn-and-earn model, which offers a clear gateway to the middle class. The Senate bill in particular also slashes funding for targeted grants to help workers whose jobs are lost as a result of mass layoffs and natural disasters, providing only $74 million for program year 2016 – $167 million (69 percent) less than the President’s Budget.

The President takes a very different approach. 

 

The President’s Budget would reverse sequestration, continue to cut the deficit, and invest in areas that are critical to our economy. 
     
It’s a budget that makes significant new investments in employment services, job training, and apprenticeship programs and provides sufficient funding to support strong enforcement of our nation’s labor laws. It’s a budget that builds on — rather than tears down — efforts to strengthen protections for America’s workers in today’s economy. The President supports ensuring that retirement investment advisors are free from conflicts of interest that shade their recommendations to workers trying to save for retirement. He believes we should protect workers from carcinogenic dust. And he supports American workers’ right to choose whether to organize into unions in a timely and efficient manner. (Learn more about the President’s proposed budget here.)
     
The bottom line is this: Worker protections and job training are critical for workers, families and our economy. The Republican budget plans seek to underfund and undermine these key priorities. 

Any Republican members of Congress purporting to support American workers today ought to turn to the real work of helping them out tomorrow.

 

 

In this week's address, the President recognized Labor Day by highlighting the economic progress our country has made, and underlining what needs to be done to continue that growth. Our businesses have created 13.1 million new jobs over the past five and a half years, the unemployment rate is the lowest it’s been in seven years, and seventeen states across the country have raised the minimum wage.

The President stressed that to continue this progress, Congress needs to avoid a government shutdown that would hurt middle-class Americans and pass a responsible budget before the end of September. The President emphasized that Congress should not play games with our economy, and instead pass a budget that invests in our middle-class and helps those who work hard and play by the rules to get ahead.

Transcript | mp4 | mp3

Welcome to a very special Dispatches edition of West Wing Week, where we go behind the scenes as the President travels in Alaska to shine a spotlight on what Alaskans in particular have come to know, that climate change is one of the biggest threats we face, it is being driven by human activity, and it is disrupting Americans’ lives right now.  During the visit, the President shares his experience with people around the country first-hand, even going behind the camera himself. Follow along as he travels to Anchorage, Seward, Dillingham, and Kotzebue, and becomes the first president to travel above the Arctic Circle. 

Our economy has now added 8.0 million jobs over the past three years, a pace that has not been exceeded since 2000. And while the economy added jobs at a somewhat slower pace in August than in recent months, the unemployment rate fell to 5.1 percent—its lowest level since April 2008—and the labor force participation rate remained stable. Our businesses have now added 13.1 million jobs over 66 straight months, extending the longest streak on record. In addition, hourly earnings for American workers continued to rise. But there’s more work to do to ensure that America’s domestic momentum can continue to offset some of the headwinds from the global economy. That starts with avoiding self-inflicted wounds: Congress needs to pass a budget that reverses the sequester and avoids shutting down the government. But it’s also why the President is committed to pushing Congress to increase investments in infrastructure as part of a long-term transportation reauthorization, open new markets with expanded trade, and raise the minimum wage.

FIVE KEY POINTS ON THE LABOR MARKET IN AUGUST 2015

 

1. The private sector has added 13.1 million jobs over 66 straight months of job growth, extending the longest streak on record. Today we learned that private-sector employment rose by 140,000 in August, below the recent pace. Despite the monthly volatility in employment growth, long-term trends remain strong. The unemployment rate declined to 5.1 percent, its lowest level since early 2008, while the labor force participation rate remained stable. Wages continued to rise, with average hourly earnings for all private-sector workers up 2.2 percent over the past year.

2. Over the past twelve months, rising real hourly earnings accounted for close to 40 percent of the increase in real aggregate weekly earnings. Aggregate weekly earnings are the total wages and salaries paid to all private employees on nonfarm payrolls. Changes in aggregate earnings can be driven by contributions from employment, from the length of the average workweek, and from average hourly earnings. The large contribution of rising hourly earnings is a recent trend. Aggregate earnings reached a cyclical trough in December 2009, and over the following year-and-a-half, real hourly wages declined. The aggregate earnings increase during that early period was more than accounted for by a combination of rising employment and a longer workweek. Over the next three years, both hourly earnings and the workweek were largely stable, with rising employment accounting for more than 80 percent of the growth in aggregate earnings. Real wage growth over the past year has been a major contributor to the speed-up in aggregate earnings, due to both rising nominal wages and slowing consumer price growth as oil prices have declined. 

3. Across most industries, real weekly earnings for production and nonsupervisory workers have grown at a faster pace during this business cycle than the previous cycle. Real weekly earnings have grown faster since 2008—including both recession and recovery—than during the previous recession and recovery. Wage gains relative to the previous business cycle have been especially pronounced in the transportation, wholesale trade, retail trade, financial activities, and other services sectors, while mining & logging, education & health services, and leisure & hospitality are the only sectors to have underperformed. Relative employment trends are more diffuse, with some industries growing at a slower pace during this cycle (such as financial activities and construction, which grew quickly during the 2000s). Notably, manufacturing contracted during the 2000s but has since reversed that trend and outpaced the previous business cycle.

4. Summer seasonal fluctuations in auto manufacturing employment have moderated during this recovery as demand for autos continues to grow. Historically, large auto manufacturers tended to shed jobs in July and recoup many of them in August, as manufacturing plants typically shut down temporarily in July. But over this recovery, auto manufacturers have reduced these seasonal fluctuations. During the previous business cycle, July losses tended to exceed August gains, with auto manufacturing losing jobs on balance over the summer. But since the financial crisis, July losses and August gains have tended to balance one another. The summer turnover has decreased against a backdrop of continued strong growth in auto sales. Indeed, 2015 is on pace to be the strongest year for car and truck sales since 2001. Overall, the auto industry has added over 600,000 new jobs since Chrysler and General Motors emerged from bankruptcy in mid-2009—including solid growth in both the manufacturing and retail sectors.

5. The distribution of job growth across industries in August generally followed recent trends, with this month’s slower growth affecting a number of industries. Despite the overall slower pace of job growth, above-average gains relative to the past year were seen in State and local government (+31,000), financial activities (+19,000), utilities (+2,000), Federal government (+2,000), and health care and social assistance (+56,000). August was an especially weak month in manufacturing (-17,000), information services (-7,000), professional and business services (+22,000, excluding temporary help), and other services (-4,000). Across the 17 industries shown below, the correlation between the most recent one-month percent change and the average percent change over the last twelve months rose to 0.92 from 0.68 last month, well above the average correlation over the past two years.

As the Administration stresses every month, the monthly employment and unemployment figures can be volatile, and payroll employment estimates can be subject to substantial revision. Therefore, it is important not to read too much into any one monthly report, and it is informative to consider each report in the context of other data as they become available.

Jason Furman is Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers.

Today, we were lucky enough to spend a beautiful summer morning with 65 fourth-grade students from West Preparatory Academy, a Title 1 public school in East Las Vegas, Nevada. The kids were enthusiastic about being outside and going on a hike to explore the stunning desert landscape, Native American rock art and surprise pockets of lush green plants at Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, only a 20-minute drive from the Las Vegas Strip.

 

Thanks to President Obama’s visionary Every Kid in a Park initiative, which officially launched yesterday, all fourth graders and their families will be entitled to a free pass for a full year to visit federal lands and waters that belong to all of us. Before our hike, we distributed free passes to some very excited students!

At a time when youth spend more and more of their free time inside in sedentary activities on computers and smartphones and watching TV, this program will help close the gap between children and nature by introducing kids from all backgrounds to our nation’s great outdoors.

Fourth graders across the country can visit the Every Kid in a Park website to complete a short, educational activity to obtain their free pass to more than 2,000 federal sites, including national parks, forests, wildlife refuges, marine sanctuaries and other federal lands and waters. The pass is valid for the 2015-2016 school year and grants free entry for fourth graders and three accompanying adults (or an entire car for drive-in parks). Educators can also access educational activities and print passes for their students.

And since we know a big reason why many kids don’t visit public lands and waters is that they can’t get there easily, the National Park Foundation (NPF) – the congressionally chartered foundation of the National Park Service – will award Every Kid in a Park transportation grants to participating federal agencies to help support travel for those kids with the most need.

 

The Every Kid in a Park initiative is designed to continue beyond just this year, so that every fourth grade child in America will have the opportunity to visit their public lands and waters for free, inspiring the next generation to be stewards of our nation’s shared natural, historical and cultural heritage.

Parks and outdoor spaces are living classrooms, and the awesome students we met today from West Preparatory Academy are well on their way to becoming lifelong learners and champions of America’s treasured landscapes.

Let’s get every kid in a park!

As Air Force One neared Anchorage, Alaska, President Obama grabbed a shot of Denali from the window. Just that day, the tallest mountain in North America was given back its native name.

During his visits to Seward, Dillingham and Kotzebue, President Obama is seeing the effects of climate change firsthand — and is sharing it directly with Americans across the country. For the first-time ever, the President is taking over the White House Instagram (and personally taking the photos!) to give you a look inside the trip, from the window of Marine One to a selfie with survivalist Bear Grylls. You can also check out his video updates and daily travelogue on Medium.

Take a look at what the President has posted so far and double tap his photos if you agree we need to take action on climate change. And be sure to keep following along at http://ift.tt/1X1OnWI.