Green Jobs

Keystone XL Opponents Need a Jobs Program

By Jeremy Brecher and Brendan Smith
Grist
February 1,2012

http://grist.org/green-jobs/keystone-xl-opponents-need-a-jobs-program/

Opponents of the Keystone XL pipeline are taking a
well-deserved victory lap. The Obama administration's
decision to reject TransCanada's pipeline proposal - at
least for now - represents an historic win for the
environmental movement, and reveals the potency of the
emerging alignment between the environmental, anti-
corporate, Occupy, and other movements.

Real strides were also made to bridge the divide
between environmental groups and unions. While
Republicans relentlessly attacked environmentalists as
"job killers," groups like 350.org, Sierra Club, and
NRDC reached out to unions early and often, and as a
result, six labor unions came out in support of
President Obama's decision to oppose the permit.. Not
since the "Battle in Seattle" have we seen such diverse
and robust coalitions.

But the Keystone campaign also exposed the perennial
Achilles' heel of those who are fighting against
climate change: We are often painted by our opponents
and perceived by the public as caring more about the
environment than about jobs. In a press release titled
"U.S. Chamber Calls Politically-Charged Decision to
Deny Keystone a Job Killer," the Chamber of Commerce
said President Obama's denial of the KXL permit was
"sacrificing tens of thousands of good-paying American
jobs in the short term, and many more than that in the
long term." And its messaging worked, with the media
repeating the jobs vs. environment frame again and
again. NPR's headline was typical of many: "Pipeline
Decision Pits Jobs Against Environment."

This frame also resonated with the public. A recent
Rasmussen Reports poll found that 59 percent of likely
U.S. voters believe that creating new jobs is more
important than environmental protection. Twenty-nine
percent disagree and say protecting the environment is
more important. That frame was directly reflected in
their opinions about the pipeline. In a poll taken Jan.
19-20, 56 percent of likely voters think the pipeline
will be good for the economy and favor building it.
Only 27 percent are opposed.

Keystone opponents responded to the "job-killer" attack
by undercutting TransCanada's inflated employment
numbers. They pointed out that the State Department
estimated the pipeline would produce only 6,500 jobs,
most of them temporary. Cornell University's Global
Labor Institute released a study [PDF] showing that
Keystone XL may generate no more than 50 permanent jobs
when the work is done.

But showing that fewer jobs would result than
proponents have claimed is only half the job. That's
not enough to win over the hearts and minds of workers
who have been struggling for decades under the weight
of stagnant wages and unemployment. From a worker's
perspective, Keystone jobs were good-paying union jobs
in an economy that increasingly offers up only minimum-
wage service work.

And opponents' argument that the pipeline offered up
only temporary jobs shows a lack of understanding of
the industry - virtually all construction jobs are
temporary. But rather then substandard Walmart jobs,
these temporary jobs come with health care, pensions,
and middle-class wages. As AFL-CIO President Richard
Trumka explained, "we need to be honest that mass
unemployment makes everything harder and feeds fear .
we cannot have a trust-building conversation about
[Keystone] unless opponents of the pipeline recognize
that construction jobs are real jobs, good jobs."

However inflated TransCanada's employment figures, the
promise of several thousand well-paying jobs represents
a glimmer of hope in a dismal economy. And opponents of
the pipeline appear to be snuffing out that hope. We
need to honor the fact that jobs are central to
workers' identities and aspirations.

Environmentalists often respond to charges that their
policies are "job killers" with research demonstrating
that investment in solar, wind, and other forms of
renewable energy and conservation creates far more jobs
than equivalent investment in fossil fuels. This is a
well-documented fact, but a hypothetical future job
doesn't put food on an empty table today. In fact,
we've had discussions with union officials who strongly
supported climate protection legislation - but
simultaneously argued heatedly for the Keystone XL
pipeline as a source of immediate jobs for their
desperate members.

There are a host of reasons to oppose the pipeline,
from protecting native people in the tar-sands region
to avoiding spills into a critical aquifer to
preventing a catastrophic increase in climate-changing
carbon emissions. But none of them will cut much ice
with people who start from the assumption that jobs are
simply more important right now than the environment.

The neglected half of the job for environmental
advocates is to ourselves become the voice for job
creation. We need to develop robust programs to put
unemployed pipefitters, teamsters, and others back to
work. Indeed, the prerequisite for every environmental
campaign should be a plausible and detailed jobs
program. The sustainability movement must be a voice
for workers, students, and others who want to both save
the earth and promote appropriate economic development.
Our goal must be to transform the debate from "jobs vs.
the environment" to "our credible jobs program vs. the
climate deniers' fraudulent ones."

Where should those proposals come from? As the six
labor unions that opposed the KXL pipeline permit
pointed out, one source can be the jobs programs that
Republican politicians are currently blocking in
Congress, like the Restore the American Dream for the
99% Act, which would boost employment by almost 2.3
million jobs in 2012 and almost 3.1 million jobs in
2013; the extension of the Highway Trust Fund, which
would create hundreds of thousands of jobs and provide
for critical infrastructure repair; and initiatives to
fund jobs for teachers, firefighters, and police. It's
time for the environmental movement to put the
spotlight on the way climate-denying politicians are
crying crocodile tears over a few hundred or thousand
jobs while blocking millions of jobs unemployed
American workers could be hired to do right now.

Other proposals can come from environmentally friendly
projects that also create jobs, like the transition
from coal to wind energy now underway in Delaware, or
efforts to renew water infrastructure in California.

As Trumka of the AFL-CIO recently remarked, "We are
headed ever more swiftly toward irreversible climate
change - with catastrophic consequences for human
civilization." Addressing that means "every factory and
power plant, every home and office, every rail line and
highway, every vehicle, locomotive, and plane, every
school and hospital, must be modernized, upgraded,
renovated, or replaced with something cleaner, more
efficient, less wasteful."

Our job is to translate that vision into concrete
proposals that provide an alternative to destructive
KXL pipeline projects seductively packaged as jobs
programs.

If we fail to become the voice for both the planet and
workers, our movement risks losing the support of
increasing numbers of workers, unions, and their
political allies. The fossil-fuel industry and its
allies know that working families are likely to
prioritize bread-and-butter issues over environmental
protection, especially in recessionary times. Right-
wing forces are counting on the "job killing" message
to drive ordinary Americans into the arms of the
climate-denying Republican Party. Together,
environmental and labor movements can defeat them by
presenting a better jobs program to American workers -
one that addresses the climate and economic crises at
the same time.
___________________

Jeremy Brecher's new book Save the Humans? Common
Preservation in Action addresses how social movements
make social change. Brecher is the author of more than
a dozen books on labor and social movements, including
Strike! and Global Village or Global Pillage, and the
winner of five regional Emmy awards for his documentary
movie work. He currently works with the Labor Network
for Sustainability.

Brendan Smith is a cofounder of Voices for a
Sustainable Future. He is a Brooklyn-based green artist
and oysterman. He has published two books and his
commentary has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, The
Guardian, The Nation, and CBSNews.com. He is a graduate
of Cornell Law School.

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