It’s nice and hot here in Bali where 13,000 people have gathered for the U.N. climate change meeting (The UN has graciously informed people that they can dispense with jackets and ties, not that yours truly planned on wearing such insane grab for this weather). A quick report here. Tomorrow will be the first preparation meeting for the International Trade Union Confederation delegation so I hopefully will have a better feel where people are coming from after we start meeting. The crux of the debate is pretty simply: no one in the labor delegation disputes that the planet faces a grave crisis BUT there is some disagreement about how quickly we need to act.

   I’m one who believes that we need to take the most aggressive action possible–but we can’t do that absent some real governmental engagement…need I say "industrial policy"? If, for example, some workers are going to lose their jobs in order to respond to climate change, then, there should be a government effort to place those folks in equally-paying jobs–UNIONIZED–jobs…and/or make sure they have lifetime pay.

   The natural reaction is to say that is not possible–which shows the limitations of our thinking at this time in history. Think about it: if we stopped relying on the "free market" to dictate the lives we live (and, how many more times does that strategy need to fail–subprime mortgages anyone?–before we give it up), we could take care of this problem fairly easily. Here, for example, is a press release from United Nations Environment Programme:

“Millions of new jobs are among the many silver, if not indeed gold-plated linings on the cloud of

climate change,” said Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary General and Executive Director of the

United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).

“New research reveals that these jobs are not for just the middle classes – the so-called ‘green

collar’ jobs – but also for workers in construction, sustainable forestry and agriculture to

engineering and transportation,” he said.

“Talk of environmental sustainability and climate change often emphasizes the costs, but

downplays the significant employment opportunities from the transition to a global economy that

is not only resource efficient and without the huge emissions of greenhouse gases, but one that

also restores environmental and social values,” Steiner continued.

    The rest of the release and the study it is based on is here. I don’t think the "green jobs" is totally without complications. But, couldn’t a president declare that that the country was going to invest billions of dollars in advancing new "green"technologies and that the government would help guide the placement of those jobs in communities–say, coal mining communities–that might get hit as we try to save the planet?

   I’d say, for those of you out there who care about this, the real issue is that most U.S. unions are not paying attention to the debate in a real way. Few were interested in sending representatives to this crucial meeting and I’d bet that most union leaders have any idea the meeting was taking place. On the other hand, this UN confab does conflict with a large international global summit the AFL-CIO is hosting but…at the very least, unions should have sent some staffers to engage.