Air of Hopefulness at Obama Wall Street Speech – National Consumers League

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By Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director

New York, NY – There was an air of excitement at historic Federal Hall yesterday – a historic setting for President Obama’s “tough love” speech delivered on Wall Street at the place where George Washington took the oath of office. Yes, despite reports in the major newspapers of a grim-faced audience hearing the President’s words, I was there for the speech with NCL Board member Sam Simon, and we both thought there was an air of hopefulness among the Wall Street audience. There was a sense that we’ve turned a corner and that there are better economic times ahead. The president received sustained applause as he walked in and stood at the podium: as if the audience was saying – “we know you are under attack by the right – and maybe you’re disrespected in other parts of the country – not here in New York City – here we support you!”

The audience included the President’s economic team – Treasury Secretary Tim Geitner, Christina Romer, Paul Volcker and a host of New York officials – Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silvers and Mayor Michael Bloomberg, among them, and Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee Barney Frank (D-MA).

This was the one-year anniversary of the Lehman Brothers’ collapse. After chronicling the crisis of a year ago, Obama noted, “We helped to restore capital and confidence… We’re putting people to work, repairing roads and bridges and hospitals. Eight months later this effort continues. We can be confident that the storms of the last few years are beginning to break.” He noted that consumer advocates had played an important role in working for legislative reforms.

But the president also admonished Wall Street not to return to some of their worst practices. “Normalcy cannot lead to complacency. Some are misreading this moment. They are choosing to ignore those lessons at our nation’s peril. I want everyone to hear my words. We won’t go back. . . too many were motivated by an appetite for quick kills. And expect taxpayers to break their fall.”

Ultimately the President wants to create a Consumer Financial Protection Agency, and consumer groups strongly support such an entity – whose primary function will be to protect consumers against intentionally complex agreements with “gotcha” clauses that bury information about fees while creating uniform regulations so banks and financial firms can’t shop around for the most hands-off regulatiors, as they do today, exploiting loopholes in the system.

The President closed with this message to Wall Street: You don’t have to wait for government to force you to act responsibly, do it on your own! For example, he told them “put your 2009 bonuses up for shareholder vote.”

We thought the President hit all the right points, cajoling Wall Street, while affirming the good things about our economic system when it is working effectively: stimulating competition and spurring innovation. It was important to mark the one-year anniversary of a darker time, and highlight government’s role in protecting companies and consumers from what might have been a more prolonged and far harsher economic toll.

NCL praises DOL for new weapon in the fight against child labor – National Consumers League

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September 14, 2009

Newly released DOL list of goods produced by child labor and forced labor may help reduce the number of exploited child and adult laborers

Contact: 202-835-3323, media@nclnet.org

Washington, D.C.—The National Consumers League (NCL) today hailed the release of a long-awaited report identifying over 100 goods produced by child or forced labor in more than 50 countries around the world.

“According to the International Labor Organization, extreme poverty compels more than 200 million children to perform child labor around the world. This new list of products tainted by child labor will be an invaluable tool for consumers who want products free from forced and child labor,” said NCL’s Executive Director Sally Greenberg.

“Most Americans and most consumers in the world market would not choose to purchase goods known to be produced by exploited children or forced laborers—at any price,” noted Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis in a foreword to the report, which was produced by DOL’s Bureau of International Affairs Office of Child Labor, Forced Labor, and Human Trafficking.

Of the 122 goods indentified in the report, the majority are in agriculture, an industry in which, globally, seven in 10 working children toil. Many of the most common agricultural products end up in the homes of American consumers, including cotton, sugar, tobacco, coffee, rice, and cocoa.

“Manufactured goods” (including clothing, footwear, and carpets) and “mined or quarried goods”—bricks, coal, gold, and minerals such as coltan used in electronics —follow as the next two leading categories of child labor.

Founded in 1899, NCL, the nation’s oldest consumer advocacy organization, has historically fought to reduce abusive child labor and to increase protections for American workers. For the last 20 years, NCL has coordinated the Child Labor Coalition (CLC), a group of 20-plus organizations committed to reducing exploitative child labor and child trafficking. The CLC and its members are working to decrease child labor in many of the products and countries cited in the report including cotton in Uzbekistan, cocoa in West Africa, rubber in Liberia, and shrimp in South Asia.

Mandated by language in the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Acts of 2005 and 2008, the report is is charged with examining foreign child labor; however, it briefly notes that the United States is not without child labor problems. DOL’s Wage and Hour Division found 4,734 minors illegally employed in fiscal year 2008. In 40 percent of the child labor violations cited, children were working in hazardous conditions or using equipment deemed too dangerous for minors to use.

“Hundreds of thousand of children are allowed to work in American agriculture on non-family farms at very young ages because of loopholes in U.S. child labor law,” said Reid Maki, NCL’s Director of Social Responsibility and Fair Labor Standards. “Many of these child farm workers are only 12- and 13-years-old, and they work because they are from poor families. We should clean up our own child labor problems if we are going to ask other countries to stop the exploitation of child workers.”

Enhanced enforcement efforts at DOL have begun to address concerns about very young children working in agriculture. Earlier this year, DOL fined five North Carolina blueberry growers for employing minors under the legal age.

“We’re encouraged by expanding enforcement efforts, and this list is a great starting point for consumers, companies, and government officials to devise strategies to reduce child and forced labor in specific products,” said Greenberg. “As the report points out, ‘When problems are known and understood, they can be addressed’.”

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About the National Consumers League

The National Consumers League, founded in 1899, is America’s pioneer consumer organization. Our mission is to protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad. For more information, visit www.nclnet.org.

Social networking security and safety tips – National Consumers League

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Social networking sites enable people to post information about themselves and communicate with others around the world. While you can make new friends through social networking sites, you may also be exposed to embarrassing situations and people who have bad intentions, such as hackers, identity thieves, con artists, and predators.

Protect yourself by taking some common-sense precautions.

  • Guard your financial and other sensitive information. Never provide or post your Social Security number, address, phone number, bank account or credit card numbers, or other personal information that could be used by criminals.
  • Picture social networking sites as billboards in cyberspace. Police, college admissions personnel, employers, stalkers, con artists, nosy neighbors – anyone can see what you post. Don’t disclose anything about yourself, your friends, or family members that you wouldn’t want to be made public. And remember that once information appears on a Web site, it can never be completely erased. Even if it’s modified or deleted, older versions may exist on others’ computers. Some social networking sites allow users to restrict access to certain people. Understand how the site works and what privacy choices you may have.
  • Be cautious about meeting your new cyber friends in person. After all, it’s hard to judge people by photos or information they post about themselves. If you decide to meet someone in person, do so during the day in a public place, and ask for information that you can verify, such as the person’s place of employment. 
  • Think twice before clicking on links or downloading attachments in emails. They may contain viruses or spyware that could damage your computer or steal your personal information – including your online passwords and account numbers. Some messages may “spoof,” or copy the email addresses of friends to fool you into thinking that they’re from them. Don’t click on links or download attachments in emails from strangers, and if you get an unexpected message from someone whose address you recognize, check with them directly before clicking on links or attachments.
  • Protect your computer. A spam filter can help reduce the number of unwanted emails you get. Anti-virus software, which scans incoming messages for troublesome files, and anti-spyware software, which looks for programs that have been installed on your computer and track your online activities without your knowledge, can protect you from online identity theft. Firewalls prevent hackers and unauthorized communications from entering your computer – which is especially important if you have a broadband connection because your computer is open to the Internet whenever it’s turned on. Look for programs that offer automatic updates and take advantage of free patches that manufacturers offer to fix newly discovered problems. Go to www.staysafeonline.org or www.onguardonline.gov to learn more about how to keep your computer secure.
  • Beware of con artists. Criminals scan social networking sites to find potential victims for all sorts of scams, from phony lotteries to bogus employment and business opportunities to investment fraud. In some cases they falsely befriend people and then ask for money for medical expenses or other emergencies, or to come to the United States from another country. Go to www.fraud.org to learn more about how to recognize different types of Internet fraud.

Slaughterhouse in Iowa takes advantage of child labor – National Consumers League

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Immigration officials raided the Agriprocessors kosher meat plant in Postville, Iowa, uncovering health and safety violations and illegal, dangerous employment of minors. NCL sent our child labor expert Reid Maki to Postville report on a community still reeling.

Since the immigration raid on the Agriprocessors kosher meat plant in Postville, Iowa last May, the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, which maintains a seat on the board of the National Consumers League (NCL), has diligently been trying to alert the nation that minors were working in the plant, which it had been trying to organize (along with an Agriprocessors plant in Brooklyn) since 2005. Because of its child labor work, the staff at NCL took great interest in the possibility of child labor at the plant.  In late August, the state of Iowa announced the findings of its child labor investigation, concluding that 57 minors, aged 14 to 17, were employed illegally in the slaughterhouse under working conditions rife with health and safety violations. With dozens of articles about the working conditions and child labor at the plant in the national media, including extensive coverage in the New York Times, Sally decided that the story was too big for NCL not to take action, given our history of advocacy on child labor, sweatshops, and worker rights. The nightmarish working conditions seemed eerily similar to those NCL’s founders fought 100 years ago.

I flew out for a two-day visit to do our own investigation.

Immigration Raid Nearly Destroys Town

Three months after the raid in May, the families of primarily Guatemalan workers who were detained were still reeling. I visited St. Bridget’s Catholic Church where I found a long line of women, about 30 in all—mostly indigenous people from Guatemala— patiently waiting for help. Unable to work—their husbands in prison—the women were facing deportation with only the church standing between them and starvation.

The church was paying their rent, utilities, and food bills. Many wives had not even been told what penal facility their husbands were being held in. They could only hope and pray that they—and their children (many of whom were born in the United States and are citizens of this country)—someday, somehow will be reunited with their husbands. I had extensive conversations with members of the clergy. One priest had been in the plant and confirmed the unsafe, unsanitary conditions that have been suggested by the fines levied by the state of Iowa. 

Accomplished with assault rifles and a helicopter, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raid clearly cost the federal government several million dollars to perform. Only the future will determine whether it deters future illegal immigration. But by threatening to charge the workers with aggravated identity theft and forcing them to agree to a five-month prison sentence, ICE had been overzealous in the minds of many advocates in Postville and beyond. The workers were processed for arrest at a livestock facility in Waterloo—the National Cattle Congress—leaving many advocates to wonder if ICE viewed the workers as less-than-human.

The approach ICE took in the courts certainly raised questions about whether the workers received a fair day in court. Essentially, ICE told them that they should plead guilty to intentionally using false Social Security Numbers—the workers were merely using numbers to work, not to commit fraud and steal funds—for which they would be sentenced to five months in prison. If they decided to fight the charge, they would be held indefinitely in jail until their trial date (there would be no opportunity for bail because they were deemed to be in the country illegally). They would then be charged with aggravated identity theft. If found guilty, they would likely receive a stiffer sentence and then be deported. The workers, who had very little time to discuss the case with their federally-appointed attorneys, decided they had little choice but to plead guilty.  They were “tried” in court in groups of five or six. Attorneys and judges were provided with scripts by ICE prosecution teams. As Erik Camayd-Freixas, an interpreter for the immigrants who was hired by ICE, has noted in an important essay about the raid, the men were “caught between hopelessness and despair”. Many wept in fear of what would become of their families while they were imprisoned. Despite their guilty pleas, the workers, argued Camayd-Freixas, were most likely innocent. They did not seem to understand what a Social Security Number was or how the numbers got on their applications so in Camayd-Freixas’s view they could not “knowingly” have used the fake numbers—criteria of the charge. 

One supervisor at Agriprocessors has pled guilty to falsifying paperwork and knowingly hiring undocumented workers. Another awaits trial. However, ICE has not gone after the owners of Agriprocessors who benefited the most from the illegal labor. Agriprocessors is still open for business, although its output has been diminished. Plant managers are struggling to find workers. In their desperation, they are importing a group of impoverished Micronesians who are allowed to work in the United States under treaty agreements. Local radio personality Jeff Abbas fears that the workers will be little more than indentured servants, trapped halfway around the world from their island homes.

The ICE raid has clearly devastated the town of Postville, removing a third of the population of 2,500 people overnight. Businesses have had to close. Others are trying to hang on. The schools are wondering how they can absorb the loss of state funding that accompanies such a massive drop in enrollment. Some have wondered if the town will survive the raid. If not for the church’s assistance, the workers’ families would have faced hunger and homelessness.

Child Labor

Despite a gag order placed on the child laborers by their attorney, one of the reporters I met during my visit was able to take me to the home of a 16-year-old who had worked in the plant up until the raid. She would not talk to me because of the gag order but her brother, Esteban, 18, had worked in the plant two years ago when he was 16. He was willing to talk.

Esteban told us that he worked long 12-hour days cutting cow legs. He showed us a nasty scar on his elbow where he had stabbed himself accidentally while cutting meat. His supervisors at Agriprocessors quickly bandaged up his wound and told him to go back to work. He said cuts were common because the line of moving meat went so quickly. 

State labor law prohibits minors from working in the slaughter and packing areas of plants because the labor is deemed too dangerous for minors. His employers knew he was underage but didn’t care, said Esteban, whose hourly pay was $6.25. His employer required him to purchase the knives that he used in the plant at a price of $60 and then they took out another $80 for gloves. He was routinely shorted a few hours of work in every paycheck. The plant refused to pay him and his mother, Veronica, for the overtime work they performed. The supervisors would tell them that “if they didn’t like it, they didn’t have to work there,” said Veronica.

According to a New York Times report published August 6, another youth, Elmer, said that when he was 16 working in the plant, a supervisor kicked him, causing a knife to cut his elbow. Elmer reported that he worked 17-hour shifts, six days a week. His life consisted of nothing but work and sleep, he testified in an affidavit. “I was very sad,” he said, “and I felt like a slave.” 

“It was no big secret that kids were working at the plant,” Jeff Abbas of Postville’s KPVL radio station told me.

Plant management denied knowingly hiring minors. Getzel Rubashkin, the grandson of Agriprocessors’ founder, told NCL that the underage hirings were the result of paperwork errors and not any intent to employ minors.

Many of the young workers—mostly from Guatemala—were undocumented. Because of their age, ICE officials who raided the plant in May did not detain and charge them with identify theft as they did the adults detained.

Despite fears, the raid did not destroy the state’s child labor investigation, which ultimately revealed a problem that American consumers should consider far more serious than the employment of a few hundred undocumented immigrants: the employment of nearly 60 children in one of America’s most dangerous work places.

For the National Consumers League the discovery of such a large group of children working in slaughterhouse raises the possibility that minors may be working in other meat packing houses. 

Unfortunately, according to a hearing in the House of Representatives held this summer, the U.S. Department of Labor has only one labor inspector for every 10,000 businesses. One witness, Kim Bobo, the director of Interfaith Worker Justice (and a speaker at our June centennial conference on Muller v. Oregon), told representatives that if the ratio of investigators to businesses that existed in 1941 held today, we would have 34,000 investigators. Instead, there are fewer than 750.

One might also speculate that if the Agriprocessors plant had been unionized, the child labor violations would have been prevented and the plant’s awful track record on health and safety violations would have been mitigated.

 Our next advocacy steps

  • We have submitted an op-ed to several newspapers, including the New York Times, USA Today, and The Christian Science Monitor, discussing Postville and using it as an argument for doubling the number of federal child labor investigators.
  • We will ask U.S. DOL by letter to conduct a targeted investigation of meatpacking around the nation.
  • We have communicated our concerns to Iowa’s Senator Tom Harkin, with whom we work closely on child labor issues.
  • NCL also plans to continue efforts to get the Department of Labor (DOL) to increase the number of jobs that are defined as “hazardous” —and prohibited—for teenagers. Despite strong recommendations to enhance these “hazardous orders” from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) and NCL’s Child Labor Coalition, DOL has dragged its feet on improving the “Hazardous Orders” and refused to act to protect working children.
  • NCL will also pursue strengthening state child labor laws. I recently attended the national convention of the Interstate Labor Standards Association, a gathering of the state officials who enforce child labor laws, to help further that purpose. We are also conducting a review of state labor laws to help us target those states whose laws need the most improvement.
  • On September 23, Sally Greenberg is scheduled to testify before the House Subcommittee on Workforce Protections on behalf of the Child Labor Coalition. Sally will push for an increase in the number of federal child labor investigators and prod U.S. DOL to implement NIOSH’s recommendations to improve the Hazardous Orders and further protect working children. NCL is working with congressional staff to organize the hearing and ensure that the “Children in the Fields” issue and the Postville issue are highlighted during the hearing.

 

 

Don’t fall for fake check scams – National Consumers League

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If someone you don’t know wants to pay you by check but wants you to wire some of the money back, beware! It’s a scam that could cost you thousands of dollars.

  • There are many variations of the fake check scam. It could start with someone offering to buy something you advertised, pay you to do work at home, give you an “advance” on a sweepstakes you’ve supposedly won, or pay the first installment on the millions that you’ll receive for agreeing to have money in a foreign country transferred to your bank account for safekeeping. Whatever the pitch, the person may sound quite believable.
  • Fake check scammers hunt for victims. They scan newspaper and online advertisements for people listing items for sale, and check postings on online job sites from people seeking employment. They place their own ads with phone numbers or email addresses for people to contact them. And they call or send emails or faxes to people randomly, knowing that some will take the bait.
  • They often claim to be in another country. The scammers say it’s too difficult and complicated to send you the money directly from their country, so they’ll arrange for someone in the U.S. to send you a check.
  • They tell you to wire money to them after you’ve deposited the check. If you’re selling something, they say they’ll pay you by having someone in the U.S. who owes them money send you a check. It will be for more than the sale price; you deposit the check, keep what you’re owed, and wire the rest to them. If it’s part of a work-at-home scheme, they may claim that you’ll be processing checks from their “clients.” You deposit the checks and then wire them the money minus your “pay.” Or they may send you a check for more than your pay “by mistake” and ask you to wire them the excess. In the sweepstakes and foreign money offer variations of the scam, they tell you to wire them money for taxes, customs, bonding, processing, legal fees, or other expenses that must be paid before you can get the rest of the money.
  • The checks are fake but they look real. In fact, they look so real that even bank tellers may be fooled. Some are phony cashiers checks, others look like they’re from legitimate business accounts. The companies whose names appear may be real, but someone has dummied up the checks without their knowledge.
  • You don’t have to wait long to use the money, but that doesn’t mean the check is good. Under federal law, banks have to make the funds you deposit available quickly – usually within one to five days, depending on the type of check. But just because you can withdraw the money doesn’t mean the check is good, even if it’s a cashier’s check. It can take weeks for the forgery to be discovered and the check to bounce.
  • You are responsible for the checks you deposit. That’s because you’re in the best position to determine the risk – you’re the one dealing directly with the person who is arranging for the check to be sent to you. When a check bounces, the bank deducts the amount that was originally credited to your account. If there isn’t enough to cover it, the bank may be able to take money from other accounts you have at that institution, or sue you to recover the funds. In some cases, law enforcement authorities could bring charges against the victims because it may look like they were involved in the scam and knew the check was counterfeit.
  • There is no legitimate reason for someone who is giving you money to ask you to wire money back. If a stranger wants to pay you for something, insist on a cashiers check for the exact amount, preferably from a local bank or a bank that has a branch in your area.
  • Don’t deposit it – report it! Report fake check scams to NCL’s Fraud Center, at www.fraud.org. That information will be transmitted to the appropriate law enforcement agencies.

Check out NCL’s new brochure.

Consumer group sues General Mills for deceptive claims on Cheerios – National Consumers League

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September 10, 2009

Contact: 202-835-3323, media@nclnet.org

Washington, DC, September 10, 2009—The nation’s pioneering consumer organization, the National Consumers League (NCL), is taking cereal giant General Mills to court for claiming that eating its cereal, Cheerios®, would reduce total and “bad” cholesterol. The NCL filed its case in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia on August 20, 2009.

NCL is suing under the DC “private Attorney General” statute, alleging that General Mills falsely represented that Cheerios possessed drug-like anti-cholesterol properties without being approved as a drug by the United States Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”).  On the packaging, the cereal company claimed “Cheerios is … clinically proven to lower cholesterol.  A clinical study showed that eating two 11/2 cup servings daily of Cheerios cereal reduced bad cholesterol when eaten as part of a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol.”

Earlier this year, in response to a letter sent by NCL, the FDA notified General Mills that at least some of Defendant’s health benefit claims violated the Food, Drug, and Cosmetics Act.  The FDA issued a cease-and-desist letter stating that the health claims “exceed those permitted for products that have not obtained FDA approval for marketing as a drug.”

“Putting a stop to false and deceptive advertising is a cornerstone of consumer protection,” said the NCL’s Executive Director Sally Greenberg. “In this case, General Mills has really gone overboard with these claims about Cheerios’ drug-like anti-cholesterol properties. They should know better, and we hope the action we’ve taken will deter such exaggerated claims in the future.”

Headquartered in the District of Columbia, the NCL filed its case under the District of Columbia Consumer Protection Procedures Act, DC Code Section 28-3901 et seq. which makes it an “unlawful trade practice …whether or not any consumer is in fact misled, deceived or damaged thereby,” to “represent that goods or services have a source, sponsorship, approval, certification, accessories, characteristics, ingredients, uses, benefits or quantities that they do not have.”

The NCL is represented by Finkelstein Thompson LLP, a firm with extensive experience in the field of consumer protection law.  The National Consumers League has represented the interests of consumers and workers since 1899, and throughout its history has worked to combat false and deceptive advertising, particularly in foods products.

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About the National Consumers League

The National Consumers League, founded in 1899, is America’s pioneer consumer organization. Our mission is to protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad. For more information, visit www.nclnet.org.

The Great Unfinished Business of our Society – National Consumers League

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Last night, the President addressed Congress and the American people to discuss the issue of health reform, address the misinformation that has circulated this summer, and remind us what this fight is all about … the people.

As the President spoke last night, he walked us through the “history of our progress,” which includes battles to enact Social Security and Medicare.  President Obama reminded us that the “concern and regard for the plight of others … is part of the American character.”  Quoting from a letter from the late Senator Kennedy, President Obama said that health reform is the “great unfinished business of our society,” which “concerns more than material things.”

According to the President, the consequences of doing nothing will include a growing deficit, a rise in bankruptcy and an increase in the loss of coverage among American families, more Americans will see their health deteriorate, and many businesses will be forced to close.

The President called for a health reform plan that:

  • gives coverage to those who do not have it
  • gives Americans the benefits they are promised
  • promotes choice and competition
  • holds insurance companies accountable
  • improves efficiency and quality
  • prohibits discrimination
  • prohibits caps on benefits
  • limits the amount of out-of-pockets expenses American families face
  • requires preventive services be provided at no extra cost

The President also said, “if you misrepresent what’s in this plan, we will call you out.”  This is great news for the American people, who will benefit from a truthful and meaningful debate.

As the President said, again quoting from the late Senator Kennedy, “at stake are not just the details of policy, but fundamental principles of social justice and the character of our country.”   We are hopeful that we can keep this debate centered on you, the American people.

National Consumers League launching 2009-2010 LifeSmarts year – National Consumers League

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September 9, 2009

National teen consumer initiative kicks off for new academic year with new resources and supporters for biggest year yet

Contact: 202-835-3323, media@nclnet.org

Washington, D.C.—The National Consumers League announced the start of the 2009-2010 LifeSmarts season, with a new competition year beginning Sept. 14 at the program’s online home, www.lifesmarts.org, along with a variety of new resources for state coordinators, educators, and youth. LifeSmarts is an educational competition that tests middle school and high school students nationwide on real-life consumer issues through online quizzes and live contests. While the competition formally begins Sept. 14, students and coaches may register online and begin taking practice quizzes and downloading resources today.

“We’re thrilled to be launching the 16th year of LifeSmarts,” said Program Director Lisa Hertzberg. “This program delivers real-world knowledge to students and then allows them to shine in competitions where they demonstrate all that they have learned,” said Hertzberg. In its first 15 years, LifeSmarts has steadily grown in numbers of student and adult participants, state partnerships, and corporate sponsorships. “Most importantly, the breadth and depth of the program’s content has continued to evolve, too” said Hertzberg. “We’re proud to be preparing our teens and tweens to become the next generation of smart consumers and workers” she added.

Each year, thousands of students answer millions of questions on consumer issues ranging from personal finance and health and safety to the environment, technology, and consumer rights and responsibilities. Starting online each fall, the competition progresses to live state play-offs, and then builds to a high-spirited National Championship, which will be held in 2010 in Miami Beach, FL. At last year’s national competition held in St. Louis, MO, students on the state champion team from Oconto High School in Wisconsin were crowned the 2009 national champs.

NCL partners with coordinators in 30 states, including Better Business Bureaus, credit unions, state attorneys general and consumer protection agencies, State FCCLA organizations, Jump$tart Coalitions, and others, to staff and promote the program. Interested students and adults can visit the LifeSmarts Web site to connect with the program in their state.

“The National Consumers League’s mission is to inspire confidence and safety in the marketplace,” said Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director. “The LifeSmarts program, our consumer education initiative for youth, gives students the tools to make smart decisions and feel confident about their place in today’s fast-paced marketplace.”

New this fall at www.lifesmarts.org are dozens of up-to-the-minute teaching resources for coaches, including innovative personal finance lessons made possible by an unrestricted educational grant from Visa. Other major LifeSmarts contributors include Experian, American Century Investments, American Express, Bridgestone/Firestone, McNeil Consumer Healthcare, Monsanto, NextGen Web, Procter & Gamble, Toyota Financial Services, Toys“R”Us, Vreizon, and Western Union.  To see a full list of current LifeSmarts contributors, visit www.lifesmarts.org. To test your LifeSmarts abilities, take a sample quiz at https://start.lifesmarts.org/. From there, click on “Daily Quiz” to get started.

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About the National Consumers League and LifeSmarts

The National Consumers League, founded in 1899, is America’s pioneer consumer organization. Our mission is to protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad. For more information, visit www.nclnet.org.

LifeSmarts is a program of the National Consumers League. State coordinators run the programs on a volunteer basis. For more information, visit: www.lifesmarts.org, email lifesmarts@nclnet.org, or call the National Consumers League’s communications department at 202-835-3323.

Landscaping and Lawn Care Dangers for Teen Workers – National Consumers League

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By Lauren Perez, NCL Intern

The last in our five-part series about the 2009 Five Worst Job for Teens

As summer is winding to a close, we’ll take a look at the last job on NCL’s 2009 Five Worst Jobs for Teens: landscaping or lawn care, which can include many hazards, ranging from driving to using heavy equipment, exposure to heat and working dangerously unsupervised. Working outside increases a worker’s risk of heat stress, which occurs when the body is unable to cool itself by sweating. Heat stress can lead to heat exhaustion or heat stroke and can eventually lead even to death. Warning signs includes headaches, dizziness, lightheadedness, weakness and moist skin, confusion, vomiting, dry, hot skin with no sweating, and seizures or convulsions. Heat stress can be prevented by monitoring oneself and others for symptoms, using cooling fans/air-conditioning; rest regularly, drinking lots of water and wearing lightweight, light colored, loose-fitting clothes. 

Youth workers in landscaping and grounds keeping also face many of the same hazards of working with machinery as youth in agriculture. A 16-year-old landscape laborer was killed when he was pinned underneath the front-end loader he was driving. The worker and his supervisor had been trimming and removing trees from a residential property and were returning their equipment into storage. The worker lost control of the front-end loader, causing it to rollover. The equipment did not have a rollover protection system and the worker had not been trained in using the equipment. According to The Fair Labor Standards Act, employed youths under the age of 16 may not operate “power driving hoisting apparatuses” in nonagricultural jobs.

Young workers in the landscaping and lawn care industry need to be aware of how to protect themselves from heat, pesticides, electrical hazards, noise, cuts, and operating or driving heavy equipment. Youth over the age of 16 may operate power mowers, chain saws, wood chippers, and trimmers. They may not drive ATVs or tractors for non-agricultural labor if the equipment is used for transporting passengers. 

Both teens and their parents should think carefully when choosing a job. Parents and teens need to be aware of potential dangers such as working with equipment or in extreme heat. Youth workers should never hesitate to ask for more training. Young workers and their employers need to be aware of labor laws and it’s up to good employers to abide by them. Being employed can be a safe and rewarding experience for teens and provide them with skills they will use in future jobs, but it’s important that everyone work together to ensure safe working environments for all.

Labor Day Reflections – National Consumers League

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By Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director

As we observe Labor Day today, Monday, September 7, it’s interesting to think back on the work of NCL’s founders. In 1899 a group of women associated with the Hull House social settlement and led by Hull House member Florence Kelley established the advocacy group, the National Consumers League (NCL). Kelley’s objective as head of NCL was focused on improving the pay and working conditions of those who toiled in sweatshops and factories, and most important, getting children out of the workplace and into schools. Kelley traveled the country lecturing on working conditions in the United States. She also initiated the NCL White Label, and employers whose labor practices met with the NCL’s approval for fairness and safety were granted the right to display it.

NCL’s constitution stipulated that it was “concerned that goods be produced and distributed at reasonable prices and in adequate quantity, but under fair, safe, and healthy working conditions that foster quality products for consumers and a decent standard of living for workers.” By any measure, Kelley’s work advanced the interests of children and workers enormously.

I believe that Florence Kelley would applaud NCL’s being part of a coalition of unions, environmental and religious groups this Labor Day that are renewing a call on the world’s largest retailer and private employer, Wal-Mart, to use its power in the marketplace – as a corporate citizen and employer – for the good of workers and communities. Leading the charge is the United Food and Commercial Workers, which also runs the “WakeUpWal-Mart.com”. UFCW holds a seat on the NCL Board.

As UFCW has observed,

“Nobody wants an economy where workers earn wages that can’t support a family. Nobody wants an economy where people who goto work everyday and work hard have to turn to public assistance for basic needs. We are trying to engage Wal-Mart, not isolate it. With 1.4 million Americans working in its stores, Wal-Mart bears a unique responsibility to its workers and our communities, and we’re asking them to embrace this challenge.”

Though it has a few modern touches, Florence Kelley could have made that statement. The groups in the coalition – which are named below –  have issued direct challenges to Wal-Mart in five key areas: worker rights, quality jobs, equal opportunity, corporate responsibility and a healthy environment. As part of this renewed effort, WakeUpWal-Mart.com will be releasing two new television advertisements called “Common Sense Economics Rules” calling on Wal-Mart to offer quality, affordable health care coverage to all its employees. Both ads highlight Wal-Mart’s failure to cover 700,000 of its employees, nearly half of its workforce. They end with the message “Wal-Mart can afford to be a better employer; Now would be a good time to start.”

We join our coalition partners in this campaign with new energy – working for the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act in Congress, inspired by the tasks left undone by labor champion Senator Teddy Kennedy, and vowing to improve conditions for workers at Wal-Mart and so many other workplaces in the United States where benefits are scarce or nonexistent, the work dangerous or mind-numbingly tedious, and the pay low. Certainly since Florence Kelley’s time we’ve made progress, but there is so much more to do. Happy Labor Day to all from the National Consumers League.

Coalition members include: AFL-CIO, Change to Win, Sierra Club, Campaign for America’s Future, National Education Association, American Federation of Teachers, National Consumers League, AFSCME, American Rights at Work, Communications Workers of America, Interfaith Worker Justice, LIUNA, National Labor Coordinating Committee, Service Employees International Union, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, United Auto Workers, United Farmer Workers and United Steel Workers.