Vice President Biden makes the case for Green Jobs as a pathway to a strong middle class in the following op-ed, which appears in the Philadelphia Inquirer this morning.

Green jobs are a way to aid the middle class

Joseph R. Biden Jr.

Today, in Philadelphia, the White House Task Force on Middle Class Families is holding its inaugural meeting. Our charge is to assess current polices and develop new ones aimed at helping the middle class, the economic engine of this country.

The economic-recovery package that President Obama signed into law last week contains more than $20 billion for investment in a cleaner, greener economy, including $500 million for green job training. The task force’s first order of business is to evaluate how investing in green jobs will help build a strong middle class.

So what exactly are “green jobs”? They provide products and services that use renewable energy resources, reduce pollution, and conserve energy and natural resources.

Investing in green jobs also means keeping up with the modern economy. At a time when good jobs at good wages are harder and harder to come by, we must find new, innovative opportunities.

According to the Council of Economic Advisers, green jobs pay 10 to 20 percent more than other jobs. They also are more likely to be union jobs. Building a new power grid, manufacturing solar panels, weatherizing homes and office buildings, and renovating schools are just a few of the ways to create high-quality green jobs that strengthen the foundation of this country.

More green jobs can also mean more money in consumers’ pocketbooks at the end of the month. They can reduce your electric and heating bills, leaving you more disposable income for other things.

Right here in Philadelphia, for example, there are 400,000 rowhouses that could be weatherized and made more energy-efficient. Just doing that would lower household energy consumption by 20 to 40 percent, saving families hundreds of dollars a year.

Fortunately, as we will stress in our meeting here today, Mayor Nutter, Gov. Rendell, and other state and city officials across the nation are ready to help us build a greener economy. Philadelphia, for example, is working with its unions, universities, and community colleges to impart green skills to workers from all walks of life. The city is also proposing a new public authority to support large-scale green investment, especially in weatherization, building retrofits, and infrastructure.

We’re excited to be in Philadelphia promoting an idea that has so many benefits. We’re starting to make the investments needed to leave a cleaner world to our children while also creating good jobs right now. When you’re creating green jobs, you’re doing well by doing good.

Joseph R. Biden Jr. is the Vice President of the United States.

• Education Secretary Duncan highlights changes to student aid in the budget, following on OMB Director’s theme of simplification.
• The Chicago Bulls were at the White House today to present the 44th President — and proud Chicagoan — a custom jersey. Pictures below.
• The Vice President met at the White House with President Fatmir Sejdiu of Kosovo.
• Yesterday Secretary of State Clinton released the Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2008, watch the video.
• Check out photos of the Department of Labor welcoming Hilda Solis.
• Read DHS Secretary Napolitano’s confirmation testimony.

President Barack Obama with members of the Chicago Bulls basketball team Thursday, Feb. 26, 2009, in the Blue Room at the White House. (White House photo 2/26/09 by Pete Souza)

The 44th President holds up a custom jersey alongside members of the Chicago Bulls basketball team Thursday, Feb. 26, 2009, in the Blue Room at the White House. (White House photo 2/26/09 by Joyce N. Boghosian)

Vice President Joe Biden, right, meets with President Fatmir Sejdiu of Kosovo, second from left, in the Roosevelt Room of the White House Thursday, Feb. 26, 2009.  (White House Photo 2/26/09 by Sharon Farmer)

Along with thanks and congratulations, First Lady Michelle Obama today appealed to employees of the Environmental Protection Agency to strive for excellence for the sake of the next generation.

“I’ve often spoken about my most important job — being a mom — and like mothers and fathers everywhere, the health and safety of our children is our top priority,” the First Lady said on a visit to EPA headquarters. “This is what it is all about: the future. And in many ways, it starts with all of you. You ensure that the water we drink is safe, that the air we breathe is clean, and that the polluted fields and abandoned factories in our neighborhoods all over this nation are cleaned up and restored.”

Hundreds of employees turned out to see the First Lady, whom EPA administrator Lisa Jackson introduced as “an icon” of grace, class and style. And some took heart in what the First Lady assured them would be “a new day” at the EPA.

“We are just thrilled to be working for an administration that respects the work we do, environmental work but public service more specifically,” said Beth Hall, who works in the ground water and drinking water office (pool report).

Top photo: First Lady Michelle Obama applauds the staff members at the Environmental Protection Agency Thursday morning, Feb. 26, 2009, thanking them for their work during her visit to the EPA headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Bottom photo: A staff member wipes away tears as she meets First Lady Michelle Obama at the Enivironmental Protection Agency Thursday morning, Feb. 26, 2009, where Mrs. Obama thanked the employees for their hard work during her visit to the EPA headquarters in Washington, D.C.

(White House photos 2/26/09 by Joyce N. Boghosian)

If you’re interested in applying for a White House internship, the application process is now open.

Take a look at the instructions for how to apply for a White House internship, download the application, and learn more about the White House departments you could work in.

Applications are due March 22, 2009. A couple of important things to keep in mind:

In addition to normal office duties, interns will supplement their learning experience by attending a weekly lecture series hosted by senior White House staff, help at White House social events, and volunteer in community service projects.

White House Internships are unpaid positions and participants are responsible for arranging their own transportation and housing for the duration of the program.

“I think it’s fair to say that had I not been a Stevie Wonder fan, Michelle might not have dated me. We might not have married. The fact that we agreed on Stevie was part of the essence of our courtship,” President Obama said last night at a White House ceremony presenting the singer with the 2nd annual Gershwin Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Library of Congress.

The First Lady echoed her husband’s sentiments.

“Tonight it is a huge thrill for me as we honor a man whose music and lyrics I fell in love with when I was a little girl,” she said. “Years later, I discovered what Stevie meant when he sang about love. Barack and I chose the song, ‘You and I’ as our wedding song.”

An all-star lineup of singers performed some of Wonder’s biggest hits, including Tony Bennett, Diana Krall, Will.i.am, and Paul Simon (who won the first Gershwin Award last year).

“I accept this in memory of my mother. I know that Lula Mae is smiling right now,” Wonder said. “And Mr. President, I know that if she were here, she’d say, let me get him a peach cobbler.  And she would say ‘peach cobblah.’ But what’s really exciting for me today is that we truly have lived to see a time and a space where America has a chance to again live up to the greatness that it deserves to be seen and known as, through the love and the caring and the commitment of a President, as in our President, Barack Obama.”

Last night’s event, the first in the “In Performance at the White House” series since President Obama’s inauguration, airs tonight on PBS stations around the country.

To a lot of people, the budget can seem dry or wonky, and a lot of time it doesn’t get the attention that other major legislation does. But the truth is that as heavy on numbers and figures as it is, it’s a profoundly moral document, it’s a blueprint for the nation’s priorities.

The overview for the proposed budget released by the President today is as good an example of that as you could find. For just a few examples: It sets aside more than $630 billion over ten years as a down payment towards fundamental health care reform. It makes permanent the $800 “Making Work Pay” tax cut for working families. It begins a comprehensive transformation of our energy supply by committing to a cap-and-trade system to be worked out in conjunction with Congress. The President has made clear he believes all of these issues are intertwined, so addressing these issues together represents a new comprehensive vision for the country’s future.

All of that said, the budget is no free lunch. It makes hard decisions, eliminating hundreds of billions of dollars over the years in waste and inefficiencies in the health care system, asking those making more than $250,000 per year to chip in a little more. And as OMB Director Peter Orszag explained in a press conference with CEA Chair Christina Romer this morning, this budget proposal abandons reams of budget gimmickry practiced in previous years to hide true costs:

“All told we are showing $2.7 trillion in costs in this budget that were excluded from previous budgets and I think that is a mark of the honesty and responsibility contained in this document.”

One of the things Orszag was known for at his last position in the Congressional Budget Office was his ability and commitment to explaining the details of budget evaluations in a straightforward way, whether that was in a Congressional hearing or on his CBO blog. He’s showing his continued commitment on that front today by launching his own blog and the newly redesigned OMB site. He has his first post up walking through the context and the outlook on the budget — it’s worth reading in full, here’s his take on the health care provisions in the budget:

Reforming health care. At the President’s direction, we have begun the process of doing a line-by-line review of the Budget. One of the lines we’ve started with is among the most important to the budget and to many other aspects of our economy: health care.

As I have long said, health care is the key to our nation’s fiscal future – and there are substantial efficiency improvements that are possible to deliver better results at lower costs in the health system. In the Recovery Act and in this Budget, we begin to make the investments necessary to bring about these efficiencies over the long-term—such electronic health records and comparative effectiveness research—and also identify more immediate saving measures to slow the growth of Medicare and Medicaid spending. These savings are devoted to a health reserve fund, which will be available as we work through the legislative process on health care reform this year. This proposal is a starting point, not an ending point, for health reform as additional resources will be needed to improve and expand health care for all Americans.

Orszag also talked on video to us about why he thinks blogging is so worthwhile:

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Looking for more in-depth information on the budget? The OMB site has you covered and then some, including fact sheets relating to federal every agency.

Green jobs are going to be one of the primary ways the middle class benefits from the economic recovery. That’s why they’re the focus of the Middle Class Task Force’s first meeting tomorrow, in Philadelphia.

But even though the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act was just signed, there are previews of the impact all over the country.

The Philadelphia Inquirer today profiles Suechada Poynter, a 39-year-old woman who is a home energy auditor — she checks for air leaks and improperly functioning furnaces to make buildings more energy efficient — exactly the kind of job the ARRA will create:

“Green jobs have opened a lot of doors for a lot of lower-class people to get into this field,” said Poynter, a Thai immigrant and mother of seven who lives in Philadelphia’s Logan section and earns $11 an hour for her work.

“I’d tell him to open more doors to get more people into this field,” she said. Passionate about the environment, she is studying architecture in college. “This is just the beginning of a bigger door,” she said.

Much more info on the budget for Fiscal Year 2010 is available on the website of the Office of Management and Budget, OMB.gov.

UDPATE: The President and his top economic advisers have spent weeks devising the outlines of this budget. White House photographer Pete Souza tells the story of that process in a slideshow of behind-the-scenes images.

Good news:

Bad news:

Short term v. long term:

Big picture:

Professor James E. West

James “Jim” West co-inventor of the electret microphone knows what it is to be challenged and how to overcome those challenges.  He grew up in the south before the Civil Rights Movement but was nevertheless able to go to college and study physics.  His father wanted him to become a doctor but he knew that he would only be happy studying physics and “tinkering”.

As a young boy of just 8-years old, he inadvertently conducted his first scientific experiment.  He conducted 120 volts of electricity through his body when he attempted to plug the cord of a radio he had repaired into an electrical outlet.  Instead of being shocked into fear of electricity, he became more fascinated with it and was determined to learn all he could about it.

Jim West is dyslexic so he memorized his textbooks in an effort to disguise his reading disability from everyone.  People with learning disadvantages often see the world through different glasses and this difference can make them very successful inventors.  The moral of Jim’s story is to embrace your differences and face your challenges head on finding ways to overcome them and make them work in your favor. Today, James E. West is a research professor at John Hopkins University.

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