Frequently asked questions about chemicals in clothing.

Natural Gas pipelines explode with alarming frequency in the US, killing and injuring people, and causing millions of dollars in damage. Interstate pipelines are permitted by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), which has approved all but one pipeline over the past 30 years, and routinely rejects legitimate concerns raised by impacted communities.

In just 2015 to 2017, there were 12 deaths and 10 injuries reported from natural gas pipelines in the US. Pipeline explosions also cause millions of dollars in damage and evacuations. This list does not include the many injuries, deaths, and extensive property damage reported from natural gas explosions reported at homes, apartment buildings, businesses, from local natural gas infrastructure.

From June 2015 to June 2017, the following incidents have been documented

February 17, 2017: A natural gas pipeline operated by Kinder Morgan in Refugio Texas exploded creating a massive fire. The explosion shook homes 60 miles away.

February 10, 2017: A natural gas pipeline operated by Phillips 66 Pipeline in St. Charles Parish, LA exploded, injuring 3 workers.

February 1, 2017: A DCP pipeline in Panola County TX exploded and created a crater in an airport runway, shutting down the airport for a month. (Editor's Note 1/13/20: Two stories no longer available online)

January 17, 2017: A natural gas pipeline operated by DCP Midstream exploded in Spearman, TX, which led to multiple fire crews being called to the scene.

August 20, 2016: 10 people in New Mexico were killed when they were camping near an underground natural gas pipeline operated by El Paso Energy that suddenly exploded.

April 18, 2016: 2 workers were killed when they struck a pipeline at the Southcross Gas Processing Plant in Bonnie View, TX.

April 29, 2016: A 30-inch pipeline in Salem Township, operated by Spectra, exploded, severely injured a worker, and caused the evacuation of local businesses and homes.

January 9, 2016: A 30-inch pipeline operated by Atmos Energy in Robertson County, TX exploded and forced the evacuation of several families.

August 26, 2015: Two workers were injured when a Boardwalk/Gulf South Pipeline Co underwater pipeline off the coast of Louisiana ruptured and exploded.

June 27, 2015: Four workers were injured when a pipeline exploded at a gas booster station in White Deer Texas.

June 17, 2015: A pipeline operated by Energy Transfer Partners ruptured in Cuero, TX and caused a massive blaze and the evacuation of 7 families. 165,732 pounds of volatile organic compounds may have burned.

The incidents documented above represent a continuation of and ongoing trend of repeated natural gas pipeline disasters in the US

From 2010 to 2016 -- Gas companies reported 35 explosions and 32 ignitions at their transmission pipelines, according to federal records. The explosion killed 17 people and injured 86. A September 2010 explosion in San Bruno, Calif., killed eight and injured 51 people.

Dangers From Liquified Gas

In addition to pipeline explosions, there are risks from compressor stations and liquefied natural gas export facilities, including a 2014 explosion at a rural Washington State LNG storage facility that injured several workers and resulted in evacuations. The explosion called into question the safety of LNG storage facilities located near population centers nationally.

Q. What are sweatshops and how bad is the problem?

A. The US Department of Labor defines a sweatshop as any factory that violates two or more labor laws, such as those pertaining to wages and benefits, working hours, and child labor. Anti-sweatshop advocates go further to say that beyond following the letter of the law (which can be very weak in many countries that attract sweatshops), a factory must pay a living wage in safe working conditions, enforce reasonable work hours, provide for sick leave and maternity leave, and allow workers to organize to avoid being labeled a sweatshop.

Because no single definition exists (and because sweatshop owners don't want their factories to be revealed), it’s difficult to assess the worldwide scope of the problem. Compounding this difficulty is the “race to the bottom,” which means that companies don’t always let their sweatshop factories stay in one place, if they can shift their manufacturing to ever-cheaper and less-regulated locations. For example, the number of sweatshops in Mexico soared in the 1990s after NAFTA enticed companies to close their US operations and move south. As global manufacturing costs continued to shift, many companies then moved their operations from Mexico to even more attractive Asian countries. And more recently still, after the US-Jordan Free Trade agreement went into effect in 2000, the number of sweatshops in that country exploded as well. Between 2000 and 2005, apparel exports from Jordan to the US soared 2000 percent, often due to the round-the-clock labor of guest workers from poor Asian countries who were following the jobs as they moved.

Q: But if companies have to cut costs to stay competitive, aren’t sweatshops inevitable?

A: No. Low prices are only one of many factors consumers take into account when they shop, and most consumers don’t intentionally purchase goods made in sweatshops.

Reporting for Dollars and Sense magazine in 2006, sweatshop expert John Miller, a professor of economics at Wheaton College, explained how paying decent wages to workers at the beginning of the supply chain has little effect on a company’s competitiveness. “In Mexico’s apparel industry, economists from the Political Economy Research Institute found that doubling the pay of non-supervisory workers would add just $1.80 to the cost of a $100 men’s sports jacket,” explained Miller. “And a recent survey by the National Bureau of Economic Research Found that US consumers would be willing to pay $115 for the same jacket if they knew it had not been made under sweatshop conditions.”

Living wages and reasonable working hours would not threaten companies’ overall profitability. No one should have to work 17-hour days just so Americans can save a few dollars on clothes.

Q: Doesn’t low-wage sweatshop employment help alleviate poverty? Aren’t sweatshops a necessary step on the road to economic development?

A: No. Sweatshop workers are trapped in a cycle of exploitation that rarely improves their economic situation.

“In many cases, countries’ minimum wages are insufficient to climb out of poverty,” says Todd Larsen, Green America’s Executive Co-Director for Consumer & Corporate Engagement. “What’s more, sweatshop watchdog groups continually find factories that pay illegal wages, lower even than the minimum.”

Consider the example cited in a 2003 National Labor Committee report on a Honduran worker sewing clothing for Wal-Mart at a rate of 43 cents an hour. After spending money on daily meals and transportation to work, the average worker is left with around 80 cents per day for rent, bills, child care, school costs, medicines, emergencies, and other expenses.

If sweatshops were a necessary step toward economic development, they would not exist in the world’s most developed economies; however, sweatshops continue to be uncovered even in the United States. The US Department of Labor regularly uncovers sweatshop abuse in American factories, which are often contracted to make fast fashion clothing for American brands.

Q: Isn’t it time-consuming and expensive for corporations to track their goods’ origins?

A: No, most corporations already track their goods to the subcontractor or factory level in order to monitor the quality of their products.

“In competitive industries like the apparel industry, all companies have quality control,” says Nikki Bas, executive director of Partnership for Working Families. “If companies are able to send representatives to inspect the quality of a garment, they can inspect the quality of their factories as well.”

Q: Do some companies track their goods to keep sweatshop labor out of their supply chains, and mark their products with a special label?

A: Unfortunately, no overarching “sweatshop-free” label exists, though a union label is a good indicator that at a minimum workers are free to organize and have a voice. In addition, since the mid-1990s, a number of “social auditing” organizations have emerged, and companies may now coordinate with one to inspect their factories for sweatshop abuses, to greater or lesser degrees of success.

These organizations operate under a number of different structures. For example, Verité, operates as a nonprofit organization, inspecting factories on behalf of their client companies, which pay Verité a fee to perform audits and help facilitate follow-up correction programs for violations. (Verité does not make its findings public because conditions can change so quickly in faraway factories.)

Another example, Worldwide Responsible Apparel Production (WRAP), operates as a 501(c)6 corporation, and makes its list of inspected and certified factories available on its website, searchable by country, as a resource for companies in search of factories. Established by the American Apparel and Footwear Association, WRAP has come under fire from anti-sweatshop organizations as having weak codes of conduct and operating too closely with the apparel industry.

Similarly, the Fair Labor Association, which contracts with specific companies to perform inspections, has fallen out of favor with many activists over concerns about poor enforcement and corporate influence.

Whichever monitoring organization a company might use (and there are many more), the bottom-line concern among anti-sweatshop activists lies in the lack of transparency to the consumer of the findings, as well as the inability of inspectors to stay aware of factory conditions at all times. Instances of factories improving their conditions specifically for inspections are well-documented, and critics further charge that monitoring organizations lengthen the supply chain, relieving companies of their responsibility to vouch personally for the conditions of their factories.

Q. If something is made in the USA does that automatically mean it is sweatshop-free?

A: Unfortunately, just because something is Made In The USA doesn't mean it isn't made in a sweatshop. In general, countries with strong labor laws (not just the US, but several European countries, Cambodia, and others) may produce fewer sweatshop abuses than countries with weaker or non-existent laws, but no one country is automatically sweatshop-free.

For instance, the Department of Labor conducted random inspections on 77 garment factories in southern California in November 2016, and discovered that 85% of the inspected factories were violating federal labor laws. Major retailers including Forever 21, Ross, and T.J. Maxx, contracted these factories to create bargain-price clothing, at the expense of the industry's primarily immigrant workforce.

Grievous sweatshop abuses have not only been uncovered in U.S. factories, but also in factories located in U.S. territories. These factories may also use the "Made in the USA" label, despite being exempt from certain U.S. labor laws.

For example, for many years garment workers in Saipan, in the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas Islands (CNMI) have been exploited under the islands’ exemption to US labor laws. Efforts to bring CNMI under US law have long been stymied by lobbyists and lawmakers sympathetic with exploitative garment businessess, though as this guide was going to press, the US Senate voted to finally extend federal labor and immigration laws to CNMI.

Q. How do I learn more?

There may be common items or foods you did not know were made with working conditions that endanger people and the planet. Here are eight things made with sweatshop labor. Green America is working to end sweatshop labor. Join us! Here are steps you can take to end sweatshop labor.

When you hear the word “sweatshop,” what comes to mind?

Most likely shadowy factories in faraway places like China or Bangladesh, where exploited workers are packed into small spaces with their machinery, breathing in dust-filled air and working 14- to 18-hour days for poverty-level wages. Anyone who has ever read about sweatshops knows that abusive working conditions are the norm in such places.

But they’re “over there,” not here in America, right? With our better labor and environmental laws, surely sweatshop conditions don’t occur on US soil?

It’s a popular myth that even the most knowledgeable Green Americans may believe. In fact, after Green America’s online editor Andrew Korfhage posted a link to a story on the Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh back in April, one commenter urged people to buy “Made in the USA” to avoid purchasing from companies that do business with sweatshops.

If only it were that easy. Unfortunately, exploiting workers—horrific, inhuman abuse—does occur in the US, and it’s more prevalent than you think.

“Fair Labor at Home,” the July/August issue of the Green American covers in-depth how workers in US restaurants, farm fields, domestic labor situations, and workplaces tied to national corporations like Walmart, McDonald’s, and Wendy’s are regularly subjected to sweaetshop-style working conditions. Because they may still be learning English or may be unfamiliar with US labor laws, recent immigrants, both documented and undocumented, are among the most exploited workers in the country, enduring wage theft, dangerous working conditions, discrimination, and even physical assaults.

In 2012, student guest workers from Latina America and Asia on J-1 cultural visas won a settlement against McDonald’s, which agreed to pay them $213,000 in stolen wages and $141,000 for health and safety violations the students endured in the workplace.

Warehouse Workers for Justice (WWJ), a coalition of workers at US warehouses in Walmart’s supply chain, has, to date, recovered over $700,000 in stolen wages through lawsuits against Walmart-contracted warehouse companies, with more suits pending. The majority of the workers are people of color, says WWJ’s Leah Fried, with up to half of them being immigrants.

And farmworkers picking tomatoes for Wendy’s say the company isn’t doing enough to protect workers from abuse and assault, and it hasn’t raised its wages of 50 cents per 32-pound bucket of tomatoes for 30 years. Almost all of the top fast food chains in the country have signed onto the Fair Food Program—an agreement spearheaded by the Coalition of Immokalee Workers in which they agree to pay a penny per pound premium to tomato pickers and implement real protections for workers. Wendy’s, however, is the lone holdout, and has faced campus protests in 2019 over their refusal to join the Program, which would guarantee that laborers are paid at least the local minimum wage.

The “Fair Labor at Home” Green American has more details on each of these cases. But imagine our editors’ surprise (not really) when, as we sent the issue to the printer, news broke that 7-11 was being investigated for luring more than 50 Pakistani immigrants into the country to work for 14 7-11 stores in New York and Virginia. Upon their arrival, the workers had to put in 100-hour workweeks (That’s right—at least 14-hour workdays.). In addition, they were forced to live in employer-owned boarding houses and had “rent” money deducted from their paychecks. In fact, the money that was left over was so miniscule that the New York Times referred to the scheme as a “modern-day plantation system.” The federal government is also investigating allegations that the 7-11 employers stole additional, “substantial” money from the workers’ paychecks.

The 7-11 franchise owners also stand accused of committing identity theft to give the workers false identifications and conceal their trafficking scheme. The 7-11 corporation did little to monitor the situation, even though its records showed that stores in two different states had several workers with the same name and Social Security number on their employee rolls.

7-11 stores in at least seven other states are under federal investigation for similar trafficking and labor violations.

As we noted in the Green American, “The immigrant rights movement is not about handouts, but about ensuring that every US immigrant’s situation is handled fairly and with compassion—and that exploitation of this vulnerable worker population comes to an end.”

As we work together to promote Fair Trade and stop worker exploitation around the world, join with us at Green America to also call for the rights of workers inside our borders.

How you save and invest your money has as much an effect on the world as how you spend your money. If you’re tired of seeing your banking and investment dollars support projects you don’t believe in (like fossil-fuels or weapons manufacturing) or practices you can’t endorse (like deceptive lending or huge bonuses to their CEOs), then make this the year you break up with your mega-bank and start investing in communities.

Green America’s Community Investing Guide provides an introduction to community development financial institutions, or CDFIs – banks, credit unions, and other financial groups with a mission to direct your banking and investing dollars into projects that improve people’s lives.

Download the PDF

Whether you need a bank for depositing a weekly paycheck, or an investment opportunity for a larger sum – or anything in between – our Community Investing Guide gives you the resources you need. With the global economic crisis focusing even more public scrutiny on the greed and mismanagement of the corporate mega-banks, it’s clear: community investing is more important now than ever before.

Did you know there is a whole sector of American workers who do not have the right to organize, to overtime pay, or legal protection from workplace discrimination and harassment?

Domestic workers, such as those providing care for children and the elderly, are actually exempt from a large number of the employment rights many Americans take for granted. Excluded from the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) of 1938, this sector was left out of many of the legal protections.

This means that many domestic workers

• Do not have a right to minimum wage
• Do not have a right to unpaid maternity leave
• Do not have a right to weekends or time off
• Do not have a right to overtime pay
• Often face sexual or emotional harassment

The potential for exploitation faced by domestic workers is made even more dire by the fact that many of these workers are recent immigrants without the English language skills and supportive social networks to fight back against abuse.

Fortunately, activists have already successfully passed a bill in New York, making it the first state to recognize domestic workers as real workers under state law and granting the sector many of the protections that other workers enjoy.

Now they’re taking the fight to California, Illinois, and Massachusetts — here’s how you can get involved.

California

Go to the National Domestic Workers

Alliance’s California Bill of Rights campaign page to:

• Take part in their letter -writing campaign
• Take part in their phone-in campaign
• Make a donation to Mujeres Unidas y Activas
• Promote this bill through your social media handles

Illinois

Are you an Illinois resident? Click here to tell your representative to support the Illinois Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights (note that while the website notes an April date, the bill is still in the works and you do have time to make your voice heard) . Also — go to the NDWA’s campaign page or Arise Chicago to stay in the loop about developments on Domestic Worker Rights in that state.

Massachusetts

You can support the Massachusetts campaign in a number of ways.

Go to NDWA’s campaign page to

• Sign a pledge card
• View photos
• Learn more about the campaign

You can also stay in the loop by liking the Massachusetts Coalition for Domestic Workers’ Facebook page.

Fair Labor in the USA

In the Fair Labor at Home issue of the Green American, we highlighted the sweatshop conditions, wage theft and slave labor that occur right here in the USA. Providing legal protection for domestic workers is a key part of creating fair labor in America.

We’ve been blogging about labor issues in the USA — check out our other posts, may of them written by our editorial fellows, Krisna Bharvani and Sierra Schellenberg:

• Sweatshop Conditions in the US — the problem of wage theft
• Buying Sweatshop-Free in the USA
• An Employer’s Guide to Internships
• Sexual Harassment and Violence Against Immigrants
• Your Rights as an American Worker

Members make Green America’s fair trade programs possible. That’s why we’re sharing an incredible opportunity to make a difference while shopping. In celebration of Fair Trade Month, INDIGENOUS organic + fair trade fashion is offering 20% off to Green Americans, while donating 25% of each purchase to our fair trade programs on purchases made through November 15.

To INDIGENOUS, fair trade means much more than fair wages in the local context. It’s about providing good work to some of the poorest communities in the world, and transforming lives through opportunity. It’s the right to work in safe, clean conditions. And at its core, fair trade is about treating workers not as another commodity, but as humans worthy of respect.

INDIGENOUS makes stylish organic + fair trade clothing in Peru, location of the world’s longest history of textile design. In many Peruvian cultures, textiles were valued above all other treasures. It’s no surprise that imaginative and complex textile work is still found throughout the region, from small markets to high-end boutiques.

Traveling through South America in 1993, INDIGENOUS co-founder Scott Leonard was struck by two things: the amazing textiles that surrounded him, and the extreme poverty of the region. From this trip was born INDIGENOUS, one of the first eco-friendly and fair trade clothing companies.

The fast-fashion industry is notorious for environmental and human rights abuses. The quick turnover of the fashion cycle, combined with the race to profit, have led to an industry that hides its shame behind glitz and glamour. Sweatshops, child labor, rivers polluted with toxic dyes, and unsafe working conditions cannot and should not be ignored.

You deserve

to wear clothing that suits your morals as well as your style. That’s why INDIGENOUS, a long-time Green America member, has been doing things differently for over twenty years. Using fair trade principles as a guide for better business, INDIGENOUS invests in its artisans by providing skills training, access to grants and no-interest loans, fair wages, and safe working conditions—artisans like Ana (pictured left), a single mother who lives with her two children and her visually impaired father in a community for blind people and their families. Ana provides work for the people in her community, allowing them to help support their families. Fair wages and no-interest loans have helped her buy new knitting machines to take on more intricate work.

The INDIGENOUS line is made from 100 percent natural and organic fibers, including organic cotton, eco-friendly Tencel™, and free-range alpaca. Each piece is dyed with safe, low-impact dyes, or kept PURE with no dyes at all. Best of all, each piece is carefully created by artisans earning a fair wage.

By wearing clothing that honors both people and planet, you support a movement away from fast fashion, and toward a more sustainable and equitable future. During Fair Trade Month, celebrate with both Green America and INDIGENOUS. Through November 15, when you use your special Green America Member code at purchase, you will save 20%, and INDIGENOUS will donate 25% to our fair trade Initiatives on your behalf. These contributions will benefit Green America’s campaigns to end sweatshop labor. So what are you waiting for? Do some good. Get shopping!

INDIGENOUS makes natural-fiber clothing using the softest organic cotton and sustainably raised alpaca. Each piece is dyed with safe, eco-friendly dyes, or created PURE, with no dyes at all. Shop gorgeous sweaters, boiled alpaca wool coats, chic ponchos, and more.

Apple made headlines last week when it announced record-setting profits from its most recent business quarter (Oct-Dec 2014, Apple’s fiscal Q1).

$74.6 billion revenue
$18 billion in pure profit
$142 billion net cash reserves
74.5 million iPhones sold
Apple fiscal Q1 numbers, as reported by BBC

These figures blew past many analysts’ predictions and Apple’s previous records for the same quarter last year.

On the micro level, there are also some important numbers to pay attention to:

Number of workers in “final assembly” plants: 500,000
Hours worked per week: 72 – 105
Hours are higher during peak production seasons. The following calculations are based on 84 hour work weeks. (12 hour days, 7 days per week).
Monthly base wage: $244 (1530 yuan)
Overall monthly wage (including overtime): $582 (3650 yuan)
Hourly wage: $1.62 per hour (10.13 yuan/hour)
Labor cost per iPhone assembled: $0.27
Recommended living wage: $725 (4537 yuan)
Calculated by Asia Floor Wage for a 48 hour work week.
Recommended Hourly Wage: $3.77 (23.6 yuan)
Recommended labor cost per iPhone assembled: $0.63
Cost difference for assembly labor per iPhone: $0.36
Exchange rate used: $1 = 6.26 yuan

Explanation of Calculations:

Young workers assembling iPhones. Credit: SACOM

According to Apple, 1.5 million people work in their supply chain, a third of which work in “final assembly” mega-factories. This means that during the same three months Apple set these financial records, 1 million Apple workers made the parts for these phones and 500,000 put them together.

Workers at one assembly factory make base wages of 1530 yuan ($244) per month (This is the minimum wage in Suzhou, China). With lots overtime, workers can increase these earnings to roughly 3650 yuan ($582) per month, according to a 2014 investigation by Students and Scholars Against Corporate Misbehaviour (SACOM). This was at Pegatron, one of Apple’s main suppliers in China, which handles the final assembly of Apple’s iPhones. Other final assembly plants include Foxconn and Quanta.[1]

The living wage in China, as calculated by the Asia Floor Wage in 2013, is approximately 4537 yuan ($725 USD, PPP). This is based on working 48 hours per week at a rate of about $3.77 per hour.

However, workers in Apple’s supplier factories, do not work 48 hours per week, especially during peak production times. SACOM’s investigation found that some workers at Pegatron worked for 10 weeks without a rest day and often for 12-15 hours a day, sometimes up to 17-18 hours a day. This means that during peak production time, workers at Pegatron were working between 84 and 105 hours per week. This is more than double a typical workweek around the world.

Taking a conservative estimate of (12 hours/day, 30 days per month) workers earn approximately 10.13 yuan/hour, or roughly $1.62 per hour. This is less than half the recommended living wage of about 3.77 per hour.

According to a 2008 study published by MIT’s Sloan school of Business, which looked at the value chain of iPods, the assembly time required for one device was 10 minutes, or six iPods per hour. Which means, if comparable, the cost of labor per iPhone assembled is roughly 27 cents.[2]

Apple’s profit margin, or the money in pure profit it makes on every iPhone sold, is 39.9%, according to BBC. The industry average for consumer electronics is below 10%, according to Standard & Poor’s. The iPhone 6 costs between $199 and $749 at Apple’s online store, which means that depending on which phone you buy and the amount of storage you elect, Apple could be pocketing somewhere between $79 and $299 in profit. Apple’s margins are high for any sector, let alone a sector that requires the work of millions of human beings to make a product. The per piece labor of just $0.27 (for assembly) helps explain how Apple is able to achieve these remarkable margins.

Labor is one of the highest costs that any business will incur in any sector. One of the reasons, and usually the primary reason, a business may choose to manufacture in one particular country is the relative “cheapness” of labor costs there—meaning low wages. But at what point does the pursuit of lower wages move from a “savvy business scheme” to full-on exploitation?

In China, where Apple’s iPhones are made, wages are relatively low. So low in fact that workers must rely on overtime pay to get by. Electronics brands argue that workers like to work overtime so they can save for their future, but if workers base wages were raised to provide a living wage to begin with, would they elect to work such exhausting hours?

In these mega-electronics factories, there are typically 2 shifts, day and night. Workers either work 12 hours during the day, or 12 hours straight through the night. This often does not include time that workers may need to dress/undress, pass through security, or attend pre- or post-shift meetings. With either shift, little time is left over for recreation, personal development, or even rest.

Exhausted from long shift, many workers fall asleep on the job. Credit: BBC Panorama

In fact, in a recent BBC expose of Pegatron, one of the most apparent problems was the amount of workers falling asleep on the job, some while operating or working near dangerous equipment.

A recent letter written by nine non-profit and workers organizations called on brands to address the poverty wages in the manufacturing sector by paying “living wages, according to a credible benchmark, throughout their operations and supply chains… and structur[ing] their business relationships with suppliers, both in terms of price and volume, in such a way that living wages can feasibly be paid.” For electronics in China, this would mean paying the living wage for 48 hours of work–not poverty wages that rely on excessive overtime to get even close to this figure.

$1.62 per hour, or less, is just too little to compensate someone who works six+ days a week, for 12+ hours a day, in exhausting and often dangerous conditions. As documented by Green America and allies, toxins are prevalent in Apple supplier factories (many of which are suppliers for Apple’s competitors as well), and workers are developing cancer and other devastating diseases as a result. Apple announced in 2014 that it would ban two harmful chemicals in its final assembly plants to protect workers, however, there are hundreds of hazardous chemicals used in electronics manufacturing, particularly at parts and semiconductor manufacturers.

36 cents, the amount it would cost Apple per iPhone to pay final assembly workers a living wage

The trade-off workers in these factories must make for these meager wages is one that arguably no worker in the United States would willingly accept.

So when does the pursuit of lower wages move from a “savvy business scheme” to full-on exploitation? In the case of Apple, who made $18 billion in profit last quarter and who could spend just 36 cents more per iPhone to ensure living wages, it’s painfully clear it has crossed this line. And what better company to fix this error than the most profitable company in the history of the world?

[1] In 2012, the New York Times did a thorough job analyzing workers hourly wages at Foxconn, another final assembly factory.

[2] This estimation is imperfect. It does not include the cost of labor further down the supply chain, at parts manufacturing plants. (Though the MIT study estimates these workers earn even less than assembly workers, due to greater competition among parts manufacturers). It also bases the assembly time required on iPods, not iPhones. Finally, it relies on exchanging yuan to US dollars, a rate that is not constant. ($1=6.26 yuan was the exchange rate at the time of writing.)

Regenerative agriculture* harnesses the relationships between plants and soil microbes to pull excess carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and store it in plants and soils where it is a useful nutrient for farmers.

You may have noticed that we’ve been talking about regenerative agriculture a lot lately, especially its amazing potential to reverse climate change and bring numerous benefits to farmers, consumers, and local environments. 

Today, we’re focusing on the how of regenerative agriculture—we’ll dive more into the specific practices that farmers and gardeners alike can use to not only reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but also draw down excess carbon while bringing about many other ecosystem benefits at the farm and landscape level. Many of these practices have been around for ages; they’re proven to improve resiliency to ever increasing weather extremes and enhance long-term farmland values, which makes them good for the farmer and good for the planet.

Here are the practices explained below (click each method for more information):

• Composting

• Zero to Low Tillage and Mulching

• Cover Cropping and Crop Rotation

• Perennial Plants and Diverse Crops

• Managed Grazing

Composting

Compost is made up of rich organic material, the end result of decomposed kitchen scraps, manures, and yard wastes. When added to agricultural fields or mixed with garden soils, compost supplies a variety of nutrients, providing food for soil microbes, and creating healthier soils and crops.

The benefits for farmers and fields range from reduced costly off-farm inputs to greater resistance to pests and plant diseases to increased moisture retention. This is a win for climate change too, resulting in soils with living ecosystems of micro-organisms that capture and store excess carbon, taking it out of the atmosphere and sequestering it where it can be used to enhance a farm’s productivity. This reduces the need for adding harmful, energy-intensive petrochemical pesticides and fertilizers. Diverting organic wastes from landfills also results in fewer methane emissions, helping reduce another more potent greenhouse gas.

Many agricultural practices are site-specific, but composting is one fundamental element of organic and regenerative agriculture that can be adopted by anyone growing and/or eating food.

Zero to Low Tillage and Mulching

Conventional and organic farms that use invasive tillage methods to prepare fields release significant amounts of stored carbon into the atmosphere, damaging soil structure.

New studies show that certain types of low to zero tillage—especially single pass no-till—provide significant carbon storage potential while reducing the amount of carbon released into the atmosphere. In this practice, crop residues and cover crops are rolled flat and left to keep soil surfaces covered year-round, where they effectively become mulch that feeds healthy soil micro-organisms and speeds up the process of storing more carbon in the soil. Crops are then planted into the mulch, keeping weeds to a minimum. These practices also increase rainfall infiltration to help prevent storm flooding and limit soil erosion, while enhancing soil moisture retention—adding protection for the farmer against drought. Reduced tillage and mulching increase the soils’ ability to sequester carbon and reduces greenhouse gas emissions coming from the soil, farm vehicles, and the factories that produce synthetic fertilizers and pesticides.

Cover Cropping and Crop Rotation

Farmers can enhance their carbon storage potential further by adding mixed species of cover crops and diversifying cropping rotations—both build soil health, store more carbon, and help keep soils covered and their micro-biome (communities of microbes) nurtured year-round.

In modern-day industrial agriculture, lands are often planted with a single crop and/or tilled and left bare (fallow) for long periods of time (aka monocropping). Cover cropping—the growing of beneficial plants during these times of rest or in combination with the primary crop—significantly reduces soil erosion and agricultural runoff after rainstorms or irrigation. Cover crops include wheat, barley, peas, clovers, and many others (often grown in mixes), and can also be used in consumer products like beers and cereals. While many farmers recognize these benefits, current crop insurance policies limit farmers’ use of cover crops. 

Rotating crops rather than planting the same monocrop year after year is another practice that encourages restoration of healthy soil ecosystems. This method rebuilds farm systems that provide more nutrient-dense crops for our own healthy diets. Crop rotation also helps farmers reduce the need for petrochemical-based pesticides because their whole farming system provides more natural resistance to pests—this is critical for the health of our communities, as chemical drift and contaminated surface and ground water is a major health threat.

Regenerative agriculture incorporates the wisdom of including both diverse cover crops and crop rotations. It helps farmers choose cover crops that use nature to supply their crops with organic nitrogen and rebuild many other key aspects of soil health at the same.

Perennial Plants and Diverse Crops

Diversity above ground encourages diversity in the soil. Perennials—plants that provide harvests for multiple growing seasons—range from berries to tree crops and can be integrated into any size farm or garden. Because perennial plants don’t need to be planted each year, soil disturbance is minimized and soil organisms thrive. The plants themselves take carbon out of the atmosphere and store it in their trunks and stems, as well as in their deep root systems.

Perennials often have extensive root systems, with the added benefit of storing carbon deeper in the soil where it is more stable. Diverse crops in general support healthy, carbon-sequestering soils because they encourage diverse soil communities and distribute carbon at varying depths underground. They also are better able to resist extremes in weather like droughts and floods, and have the ability to defend themselves from pests. Perennials function best when planted using regenerative organic approaches that include adding pollinator habitat and intercropping with nitrogen-fixing support species.

Managed Grazing

There are many types of grazing systems that rotate livestock to maximize animal and soil health. Adaptive multi-paddock grazing (AMP) is a system where the animals are managed in ways that mimic the constantly moving, vast herds of wild herbivores to draw down and store carbon. Under this method, soil microbial communities are diverse and healthy enough even to mitigate the methane produced by the livestock in real time, contrary to what has previously been understood about these systems. 

AMP grazing and other methods of intensely managed grazing decrease the need for conventionally grown, annual feed crops that emit carbon and other greenhouse gases, because the animals are eating directly from the land in ways that restore ecosystem function and health. The high-quality feed also reduces methane emissions from livestock, as it is easier for them to digest, also decreasing the need for antibiotics. It lessens the need for energy-intensive petroleum-based chemical fertilizers and herbicides, because the animals are enriching the land naturally as they forage and leave manure and urine behind. Their impact on the land restores a healthy soil micro-biome, increases the density of plants that cover the land surface, and—when incorporating perennial and native forages or trees—are able to store even more carbon deep underground, increasing its long-term stability.

All agriculture sequesters carbon from the air through photosynthesis, but it is a combination of the above practices that ensure more carbon is stored than released, and that the drawn down carbon stays underground where it is beneficial. There are many valuable tools and practices in regenerative agriculture that can help us win the fight to reverse climate change. These tools, combined with organic production methods, also bring many benefits to farmers, while providing healthier landscapes and more nutritious foods to consumers.

Regenerative organic agriculture is a win-win-win opportunity, but consumers must speak up with their dollars to scale it up fast. Without strong signals from consumers, not enough farmers will switch to these practices in the timeframe needed to reverse current climate trends that threaten food security and the future of our planet.

*This is an exciting time in the worlds of sustainable agriculture and climate change mitigation, when these two fields have the opportunity to collaborate and reinforce one another. This partnership is in its early stages, and terminology is constantly evolving. Regenerative agriculture is a new term that is still being defined and debated. Green America is proud to be a part of this discussion and stands behind agriculture that builds healthy farmlands, supports farmers and farmworkers, protects local environments, benefits consumers, and contributes to the fight against climate change—regardless of the term used to describe it. The organization recognizes that implementation of these agriculture methods will always be site specific and depend on soil characters, crops grown, and local climates. Green America's long-term goal is agriculture production that is regenerative and meets the USDA organic standard, the best way to achieve this is through the Regenerative Organic Certification. Green America supports all farms reducing chemical inputs and enhancing soil preservation techniques to move closer to those twin goals.   

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Natural gas is marketed as a clean energy source, but the reality is very different than the marketing. Natural gas is a highly polluting fossil fuel.

The impacts of natural gas include:

Climate change

The burning of fossil fuels releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, increasing CO2 levels, trapping heat, and contributing to global climate change.

• While natural gas is a cleaner burning resource than coal and liquid petroleum, it still emits a large amount of carbon into the atmosphere in the form of both CO2 and methane.

• CO2 is released during combustion, the process used to generate electricity.

• Methane is leaked in large quantities during extraction and transport of natural gas. Methane is a greenhouse gas that is about is about 87 time more potent than CO2 over a 20 year period (1).

• Studies show that global methane emissions have spiked dramatically since 2002. This is mostly due to the boom in natural gas extraction in the U.S. Leaked methane cancels out any reduction in CO2 emissions brought about by replacing coal with natural gas (1,2).

Air pollution

Air pollution is another side-effect of fossil fuel use. Air pollution is generally more regional than the effects of carbon dioxide, and can have devastating impacts on local populations and ecosystems.

• When natural gas leaks at extraction sites, pollutants such as volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are emitted to the atmosphere. VOCs, like trimethylbenzenes, xylenes, and aliphatic hydrocarbons react to form ground-level ozone, also known as smog. Smog can cause a variety of respiratory and cardiovascular effects and is especially dangerous to the elderly, young children, and people with asthma (3,4).

• Diesel fumes from the operation of trucks and machinery and gas leaks on drill sites pose a hazard to workers and nearby residents. People who live near areas of high oil and gas activity have been found to be at greater risk for chronic illness and cancer (5).

Water pollution

Like air pollution, water pollution is another more localized effect of fossil fuel use. Water is usually polluted during the process of extraction or in the handling of waste products. Water pollution can also have devastating impacts on human health the the environment.

• Hydraulic fracturing, also known as fracking, is a process by which natural gas is extracted from wells. Fracking is a dangerous practice for a number of reasons:

• Depending on location and well-type, fracking can use between 1.5 and 15.8 million gallons of water per well (6).

• Wastewater from these wells is often disposed of by injecting it deep underground into what are called Class II injection wells. Evidence suggests that these wells can cause earthquakes in the surrounding area. This not only puts people and buildings at risk, but it also increases the potential for groundwater contamination with wastewater (7,8)

• Accidents or poorly built wells can lead to contamination of groundwater by additives in fracking fluid (9). These additives can contain dangerous chemicals such as benzene and lead, which are toxic to humans (9,10).

• Extraction companies are not required to disclose all the components of fracking fluid. Many components are considered “trade secrets” and are never reported to regulatory agencies (10).

• Naturally occurring radioactive materials often come to the surface where they can build up in wastewater pipes. This can lead to maintenance workers being exposed to higher than normal levels of radiation (11).

(1) "Overview of Greenhouse Gases." EPA. Environmental Protection Agency. Web. 23 Aug. 2016.

(2) Turner, A. J., D. J. Jacob, J. Benmergui, S. C. Wofsy, J. D. Maasakkers, A. Butz, O. Hasekamp, and S. C. Biraud. "A Large Increase in U.S. Methane Emissions over the past Decade Inferred from Satellite Data and Surface Observations." Geophysical Research Letters 43.5 (2016): 2218-224

(3) “Health Effects of Ozone Pollution.” EPA.gov. Environmental Protection Agency. Web. 23 Aug. 2016

(4) "Health Effects of Air Pollution". CalEPA.gov. California Environmental Protection Agency, Air Resources Board. Web. 23 Aug. 2016

(5) Mckenzie, Lisa M., Roxana Z. Witter, Lee S. Newman, and John L. Adgate. "Human health risk assessment of air emissions from development of unconventional natural gas resources." Science of the Total Environment. (2012)

(6) Haines, S.S. "Methodology for assessing quantities of water and proppant injection, and water production associated with development of continuous petroleum accumulations." USGS. U.S. Geological Survey (2015): 1117-18

(7) Ellsworth, W. L. "Injection-Induced Earthquakes." Science 341.6142 (2013): 1225942.

(8). "Minimizing and Managing Potential Impacts of Injection-Induced Seismicity from Class II Disposal Wells: Practical Approaches, EPA.gov. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. (2015)

(9)"Assessment of the Potential Impacts of Hydraulic Fracturing for Oil and Gas on Drinking Water Resources" EPA.gov. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (2015)

(10) "Chemicals Used in Hydraulic Fracturing." U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on Energy and Commerce (2011)

(11) "TENORM: Oil and Gas Production Wastes." EPA.gov. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Web. 23 Aug. 2016.

If you are not finding a financial institution that meets your needs from our database, you can use the links below to search a larger field of small banks and credit unions. Remember, while any smaller bank will have far less negative impacts than a megabank, you may not approve of all of their lending practices (even if local).

Other links:

• National Community Investing Fund : Use NCIF’s Bank Impact Tool to find mission-oriented banks that support low-to-moderate income communities.

• Better Banking Options From Just Money Advisors 

• Independent Community Bankers Association
   
• My Credit Union database
   

(Note: with credit unions you will need to ask if you meet their eligibility criteria)

“There are very few African American men in this country who haven’t had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store. That includes me.” It’s been seven years since President Barack Obama spoke these words, and sadly, they never stopped being relevant.  

The killing of George Floyd, after the murders of several other Black Americans, amplified a national (and even international) conversation about systemic racism, and racial profiling in stores is part of that. Racial discrimination ruins people’s shopping experience as they are treated unfairly while shopping. Beyond that, it can result in customers feeling unwelcome or even unsafe in stores as discrimination can threaten their physical safety if a manager calls law enforcement.  

Racial profiling should not be seen simply as inconvenient for people; it can cause long-lasting harms and even life-threatening events. Studies have shown that discrimination is uniquely painful for Black people, increasing the likelihood of depression and capability of suicide. 

Skipping the Slip Can Put People of Color at Risk 

When Green America started our Skip the Slip campaign where we encourage retailers to preference a no receipt or digital option for customers checking out, we initially did not take account of the fact that the move away from digital receipts, which is good for the environment and human health, could endanger the lives of Black and brown shoppers. But, when California was considering the Skip the Slip legislation that at first mandated digital receipts for most retailers, and as we talked to organizations in the state about the impacts of that mandate, we quickly realized that, due to racism, people of color could be at risk walking out of a store without a paper receipt. In fact, paper receipts are a necessity for customers who are asked for proof of purchase, and Black and Latinx shoppers are asked this at disproportionately higher rates. 

According to a 2018 Gallup Poll based on 6,000 U.S. adults, 30% of Black respondents said they were treated less fairly than white customers when shopping. 

Such experiences include everything from “slights, like being ignored in favor of a white patron, to serious attacks on dignity and liberty, like being detained and questioned after making a purchase or handcuffed on suspicion of shoplifting.”  

Current System is Reinforcing Racial Profiling in Stores 

Additionally, there are stores that have been rolling out facial recognition technology largely in non-white, low-income communities. The cameras alert security agents if the system matches customers' faces to ones that have been previously caught engaging in criminal activity. Although the system aims to prevent theft and protect customers and employees, the fact that it’s predominantly used in communities of color is concerning. The system reportedly “doesn’t pick up Black people well”, which can cause the system to misidentify people, ruining their shopping experience and might even lead to arrest of an innocent person, or physical harm. 

In some cases, employees are told by management to follow people of color, which may indicate that the issue is reinforced by a greater systemic racism. According to the National Association for Shoplifting Prevention (NASP), there is no profile of a shoplifter and it should not be correlated with race, age, gender etc., therefore, stores should put neutral policies and practices in place that monitor behavior of customers to catch shoplifters, not engage in racial profiling. 

Companies should also provide easily accessible channels for employees or customers who see or experience harassment to file complaints. Additionally, companies must have processes and enforce policies to ensure that these complaints will be taken seriously, as well as conducting random third-party audits to ensure individual store compliance.

The problems with bias generally flow from the top of the organization and it can even be unconscious, which make prescriptive bias trainings largely ineffective. Instead, organizations should encourage “normalized, nonthreatening conversation about bias”. Cultivating an environment where such discussions are normalized brings more awareness to the issue and is more likely to achieve the behavior change intended: “The most effective learning happens over time, with topics surfaced and revisited repeatedly. These habits then need to be supported by systems that reduce bias at the source.” Eradicating these kinds of discrimination is key to ensuring lasting social peace in our society and will give everyone the same privileges, including something as leaving the store with digital or no receipt, and not worrying about it. 

Stores Need to Stop the Discrimination 

Because of accusations of racial profiling, some stores that used to check customer receipts upon leaving are putting an end to this policy.  

For instance, Lowe’s suspended its receipt checking practice nationwide after customers complained Lowe’s was only checking receipts in specific stores in “high-theft” and “inner-city” locations.   

Green America advocates for solutions that benefit the well-being of people and the planet, and no one should be left out of accessing these solutions. All customers should have a right to proceed in a store without fear of harassment or racial profiling. This shift in store practices needs to exist to create an environment that allows all customers to shop safely. Until these issues are tackled, electronic receipts are not a viable option for many, exposing them to human health risks from paper receipts coated in toxic chemicals. Green America will urge retailers to adopt anti-discriminatory practices and advocate for a more equitable and inclusive society. Retailers can also do more to advance racial equity by taking the Fifteen Percent Pledge and dedicating 15% of their shelf space to Black-owned businesses.  

To learn more about the fight against racial profiling and how retailers can implement the policies proposed, we urge you to explore the following resources: 

• What We Can Do About Racial Profiling in Retail Stores – Loss Prevention Magazine  

• Born Suspect Report – National Association for the Advancement of Colored People  

• Teach kids, Not Stereotypes – American Civil Liberties Union 

• Customer’s Bill of Rights – National Action Network 

• SPEAK UP! – Teaching Tolerance 

Why Paper Receipts?

Our Skip the Slip campaign tackles the unnecessary environmental waste and toxins used in thermal paper receipts. Every year in the US, receipt use consumes over three million trees and nearly nine billion gallons of water. Receipt production creates nearly 300 million pounds of solid waste and emits the greenhouse gas equivalent to over 400,000 cars on the road each year. And the majority of thermal paper receipts are coated with BPA or BPS, exposing those who regularly touch receipts to these toxic chemicals.

Green America urges retailers to provide a digital receipt option and a phenol-free (meaning no BPA or BPS) paper receipt upon customer request. You can find out more details on our campaign here, along with our report that lays out the issue in detail.

We want to make sure that all customer preferences are met by receipt options, so we asked Americans what they prefer and want to see from receipts in the future. Here's what they told us. 

Survey Results

1. What is your preferred receipt method?

When asked this question, 42 percent of respondents said they prefer paper, 34 percent prefer both paper and digital, 17 percent prefer digital, and 7 percent prefer no receipt at all. Broken down by age group, we see that preference for digital is highest among those aged 44 and younger, and the preference for no receipt is highest for those aged 16-24. 

2. Why Do You Prefer Digital or Paper Receipts?

Of respondents who prefer digital, 70 percent say it's because they're better for the environment and easier to store.

As for respondents who prefer paper receipts, 64 percent say it's because they feel more secure with a physical copy, and 39 percent say they feel paper copies make it easier for them to monitor their spending. 

3. How often do you lose or throw away paper receipts?

Respondents who take paper receipts say they lose receipts that they intend to keep an average of 5 times a month.

Most respondents estimated that they throw away or lose over half of paper receipts that they receive, with 28 percent saying they throw away or lose nearly all paper receipts that they receive. Almost half of respondents said they "feel guilty" throwing away paper receipts. 

4. Would you like retailers to offer digital receipts as an option to customers?

Of all respondents, whether they prefer digital or paper, 89 percent would like retailers to offer digital receipts as an option, with the majority saying it should "definitely" be an option. 

5. Additional Findings

Over a third of respondents often throw away paper receipts without thinking about it. Also, a third want to see companies do more to reduce the number of paper receipts. More than a quarter of respondents expressed being concerned that the US consumes 256,300 tons of thermal paper for receipts every year. And 20 percent of respondents don't know why we still use paper receipts. 

So, What Did We Learn?

• The majority of Americans want to see digital receipt options at stores. 
• One quarter of people prefer digital or no receipt options, the majority of this group aged 44 years or younger. Just less than half of respondents prefer paper receipts, with the majority in age groups 45 years and older.
• Customers report losing receipts they intended to keep 5 times a month. 
• More than 37 percent of customers throw away or lose nearly all or all of the paper receipts they receive. 

These findings are in line with the goals of Skip the Slip. We want retailers to offer: a digital option; phenol-free paper receipts by customer request; and an option for no receipt so that customers can have the choice. Forward-thinking retailers are already looking to offer paperless options, as preferred by many younger customers. By offering these options, stores can reduce paper waste and save money by not printing receipts people do not want.

Take action: Tell companies to Skip the Slip today!

This research was conducted by Censuswide, with 1,011 general respondents in the US in July of 2019. Censuswide abide by and employ members of the Market Research Society which is based on the ESOMAR principles. See full results summary here. 

2020 has thrown everyone for a loop. But Green America has been steadfastly advocating for a just, inclusive, and green recovery from the pandemic economy. Our vision is the same as ever: We work for a world where all people have enough, where all communities are healthy and safe, and where the abundance of the Earth is preserved for all the generations to come.

Look to Your Green Life for ideas on how to make a difference from home, get inspired by dozens of eco-projects, find tips to stay connected, and build your green, resilient community. 

Together with our members, we’re getting the largest companies on the planet to change the way they do business for the better—sourcing clean energy, engaging in agriculture that protects the soil and sequesters carbon, and ending practices that harm workers, communities, and consumers. This is the green economy.

Indeed, our successes come from our 200,000+ members sending tens of thousands of messages to corporate CEOs, the hundreds of news and social media stories we generate each year, the guidance we provide companies to adopt truly green practices, and all the information we provide to families to deepen their green journeys for people, planet, and economic justice.

At a time when covid-19 is exposing and increasing the inequalities in our country and world, Green America’s work to create a green economy is more important than ever. Here are just a few of our successes from the past year.

We’re getting the telecom giants AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile/Sprint to rapidly adopt renewable energy to power their massive networks. Thanks to our campaigns, T-Mobile/Sprint is nearing 100 percent renewable energy, Verizon is committed to 50 percent renewables, and AT&T is sourcing over 25 percent renewable energy. This is all up from the industry using near zero percent just three years ago. 

We successfully pushed Amazon to commit to 100 percent renewable energy by 2030 and to finally disclose the company’s massive climate impacts and plans for addressing them. 

Walmart announced it would be transitioning to low-impact refrigerants by 2040, but does not specify what refrigerants it will use or provide solutions to its current refrigerant leaks. Our Cool It! campaign will keep the pressure on Walmart to accelerate its timeline and provide a more detailed plan to end its HFC emissions. 

We’re helping companies like food industry giant Danone North America make their brands regenerative and carbon positive—that is, removing more carbon from the atmosphere than it takes to grow, make, and transport the products. For example, Danone’s Horizon brand announced it will be “climate positive” by 2025. As the largest organic dairy brand in the world, this marks a key shift for the dairy industry. 

We’ve reached millions of people with our Climate Victory Gardens campaign and there are now over 4,050 registered Climate Victory Gardens in the US. These gardens are drawing down 10,855 tons of carbon every year, which is the equivalent to eliminating emissions from nearly 90,000,000 miles driven. And, gardeners nationwide are growing healthy foods for their families. 

We pressured JPMorgan Chase, the world’s largest funder of fossil fuels, to stop financing fossil fuels; the bank has agreed to end new financing of coal and arctic drilling, and to phase out existing financing for coal mining by 2024. 

We’re working with leaders in the banking and investing community worldwide to promote climate safe lending—ending the financing of fossil fuels and rapidly scaling up renewable energy in the entire banking sector. 

We pressured Carter’s, the largest baby and kid’s clothing retailer in the US, to restrict the toxic chemicals used in their clothes, protecting the most vulnerable consumers and the workers making these baby clothes. 

We’re working with the largest tech companies—including Apple, Dell, and HP—to remove the most toxic chemicals from their supplier factories to protect millions of workers worldwide. 

Join us and our work for a more just world by voting with your dollars and supporting small, sustainable business to help build the green economy and generate more green victories!

Last year, Green America launched a new tradition for Thanksgiving: crowning CEOs leading the way in bad business practices as Corporate Turkeys of the year. This year’s winners distinguished themselves through their failures in corporate responsibility. They didn't treat workers well in the pandemic, take action on the climate crisis, and continued to pump toxic chemicals into the world. 

And the Corporate Turkey winners are: 

1. For failure to protect workers in the pandemic: Jeff Bezos, Amazon.  

When the pandemic broke out, orders to Amazon increased, which put more pressure on workers and upped the hours worked in Amazon’s warehouses (where working conditions were already hazardous, pre-COVID-19). Warehouse workers repeatedly called on Amazon to protect them from COVID-19 and offer paid time off for workers who needed it.  Amazon responded by firing several workers who raised concerns.  As a result of Amazon’s inaction, over 19,000 Amazon workers have contracted COVID-19. Join Green America in pushing Amazon to protect its workers. 

2. For continued efforts to market poisons: Werner Baumann, Bayer Monsanto. 

Even though Bayer-Monsanto is likely to pay over $11 billion to settle lawsuits stemming from Roundup’s cancer-causing properties, the company continues to forge ahead with GMOs and the toxic pesticides that are tied to them, including a new GE corn that resists five toxic chemicals.  At a time when more and more farmers are calling for regenerative agriculture, we need to end Bayer-Monsanto’s toxic reign.  Find out more about GMOs and pesticides. 

3. For driving the climate crisis: Doug McMillon, Walmart.

Walmart talks a good game on climate change, but the mega-retailer is refusing to act fast on its biggest source of emissions: refrigerants.  The HFCs that cool Walmart’s fridges and freezers are a major source of the climate crisis, but unlike Target and Aldi, Walmart is moving too slowly to set a clear goal for climate-friendly refrigerants in all of its stores and facilities.  Since Walmart is the nation’s biggest grocer, join Green America in urging Walmart to act fast on refrigerants. 

While these three corporate CEOs are all Corporate Turkeys of the year, there are many more. Last year’s “awards” went to the CEOs of Amazon, Godiva, Walmart, and Carter’s for their negative impacts on people and the planet. 

Check out all of Green America's actions and join us in pushing corporations to make progress on major social and environmental issues. 

And, if you are not currently a member of Green America, please consider making a donation to support our campaigns calling on corporations to be more responsible. 

As public outrage on the plastic pollution crisis has grown, businesses are now grappling with how to reduce their plastic footprint. Meanwhile, misleading claims and plastics greenwashing by manufacturers pose challenges to customers and businesses trying to make sustainable choices.

Plastics manufacturers and trade groups are working to improve the reputation of their products and have used the coronavirus pandemic to boost production. In some cases, misleading and false information is being pushed to present plastics in a better light.

The National Association for PET Container Resources (NAPCOR) has a new marketing campaign called Positively PET, positioning it as the plastic “everyone can feel good about.” PET is one of the most ubiquitous forms of plastic – people drink from it, eat from it, and even wear it.

What is PET?

PET (polyethylene terephthalate) is a plastic resin that’s frequently used to package food and beverages. It’s also used in carpet, apparel, and automobile parts. Its first use was as polyester textile fibers in the 1940s and by the 1970s, chemists developed a way to mold it into bottles.

You can identify PET by the small number 1 in the recycling symbol on a container – these numbers are just plastic resin identification numbers and do not mean that an item is recyclable. This confusing labeling causes contamination for recyclers, as recycling bins are filled with many plastics that can’t be recycled or have no end markets.

The industry is attempting to separate PET from other plastic types, with a narrative that it’s high-performing, environmentally friendly, and chemically safe. But how accurate are these claims?

“Infinitely Recyclable”

When materials are “infinitely recyclable,” they can be recycled time and again down to their raw state. Glass and metal fall under this category, but plastic can only be recycled once or twice and often requires new plastic modifiers to be added to strengthen the recycled plastic. Paper fibers also slightly weaken when recycled, but these fibers can be reused roughly seven times in a cascading process from products with longer fibers (magazines and copy paper) down to lower grade items that use shorter fibers (cardboard or tissue paper).

Claims of infinite recyclability for plastics hinges on the use of chemical recycling, which returns plastics to their basic molecular state. It’s estimated that even with the expansion of chemical recycling, only 20 percent of plastics could effectively go through this process because of contamination or limited recycling collection. But GAIA reports that chemical recycling is more energy-intensive, ineffective, and bad for the climate and communities. It releases air pollutants and most plastic waste is lost or burned in the process rather than becoming new usable plastic. Until strict regulations on toxic chemicals, emissions, residue management, and other concerns are passed, GAIA advises that mechanical recycling is a better option with a smaller carbon footprint.

Scaling up recycling capability is a necessary piece of addressing waste, but it alone will not be an effective solution to eradicating plastic pollution. Manufacturing with virgin plastic is cheaper than using recycled and the petroleum industry is increasing its reliance on plastic as a source of revenue. If nothing changes, new plastic production will surpass 400 million metric tons a year by 2040, releasing over 2 billion tons of greenhouse gases and leaking over 29 million tons into our environment.

Even if plastics recycling technology improves, if the economics are still preventing a decrease in virgin production, we will continue to see a flood of plastic waste.

“High Recycling Rate”

In an effective recycling system, we would use fewer new materials and reduce resource extraction. But new plastic production is expected to triple by 2050 and the overall recycling rate for plastics is a dismal 8 percent. The claim that PET is the most recycled plastic is accurate, but it’s misleading to suggest PET recycling rates are “high.” Each year, just 29 percent of PET bottles and jars are recycled in the United States.

For decades, the plastics industry has increasingly filled our waste streams with a range of items, insisting that recyclers deal with any mold of mix of plastic resins. The oil industry makes more than $400 billion a year making plastic, showing little incentive to boost recycling rates that would compete with new plastic production. Industry records prove that there has always been “serious doubt” that plastic recycling could ever be viable on an economic basis. Despite this knowledge, the industry has continued to mislead the public.

“Fewer Environmental Impacts”

Plastic is lightweight, durable, and flexible, which are incredible qualities for packaging but also why managing plastic is so difficult. The variety of plastic molds and resins is a challenge for recyclers to sort and sell. Small, light plastic items can be lost in the management process or be erroneously sorted and end up contaminating other recyclable materials at sorting facilities.

The plastics industry cites the lower transportation emissions from plastic, but life cycle models show that even if some materials slightly increase transportation impacts, the savings on the production and disposal phases compared to plastic still generate overall emission savings.

The industry claims PET causes fewer impacts than other forms of packaging, such as aluminum, but this claim doesn’t reference disposal. Recycling plastic poses technical and economic challenges, but aluminum can be recycled time and again without loss of quality and beverage cans have on average 73 percent recycled content.

We can’t compare materials without considering their market demand, current recycling infrastructure, and risks they pose when polluted into the environment. The industry says that aluminum cans polluted into waterways sink while plastics float near the surface, presumably making plastic easier to remove from the environment. The reality is that a dump truck worth of plastic enters our oceans every minute. An estimated 99 percent of this plastic ends up buried on the sea floor or suspended deep below the water’s surface, posing grave threats to wildlife. Some items break down over time only to become microplastics in the air we breathe and the food we eat.

This crisis is caused by a deluge of plastic items that manufacturers are churning out at increasing speed. The plastics industry has continued to push recycling as the solution while also blocking efforts to improve recycling and reduce waste at every turn.

Real Solutions for Plastics Greenwashing

Greenwashing industries have no place in a truly green economy. While plastic tries to fix its public image, its wave of pollution continues to surge. Many businesses want to shrink their plastic footprint but are uncertain of which solution fits their unique packaging needs. The good news is that packaging solutions exist that reduce greenhouse gas emissions and serve a more circular, responsible management of materials.

• Go package-free. Sustainable businesses know that naked products are easier on production costs and better for the planet – and conscious consumers are willing to spend more on brands that care about the environment. Many of Green America's certified Green Business Network members opt out of packaging or choose easy-to-recycle options like paper or cardboard. LUSH is a major retailer that sells many of their products without excess packaging.
• Explore reusables. Innovative companies have ideated reusable packaging into their business models. Fresh Bowl is a company that offers healthy foods via vending machines, packaged in reusable containers that can be returned for credit. Deposit schemes, take-back programs, and bulk options are viable alternatives, too.
• Right-size and redesign. Rethinking products at the development phase can also reduce plastic packaging waste, such as Seventh Generation's Zero Plastic Homecare line. Seventh Generation removed the need for plastic altogether by eliminating water from their cleaners, delivering powders that work just as efficiently as liquid formulas.
• Support the Break Free From Plastic Pollution Act. The legislation pulls from the success of state and local initiatives to reduce plastic, such as developing a 10-cent nationwide container deposit system, bans non-recyclables, and tackles petrochemical pollution. Your company can join Green America, as well as 470 other organizations, in voicing your support for the act.
• Design for circularity. For any plastic items that you cannot find alternatives for, use recycled content to avoid plastic designs with dyes, pigments, and additives. Look to recyclable inks and labels for marketing on your packaging. 

Green America works with many partners all along the supply chain from farmers to consumer products to create a safe, just, and sustainable food system. We know that some communities are often left out of important conversations and are striving to build an inclusive and diverse society where all people have an equal place at the table.

Here are some resources about this important work for equity, justice, diversity, and inclusion including great allied organizations that are spearheading change.

The Fight for Food Justice

Without access to fresh food, health and wellbeing is bound to suffer. But to truly tackle food access, activists take on racist systems and language, too.

Turning “Food Prisons” into Gardens

How urban gardening is regenerating L.A.’s soil—and community

Leah Penniman, Soul Fire Farm

Soul Fire Farm is a force to be reckoned with, tackling racism and injustice at all levels of the food system. 

Unearthing the Legacy of Black Farmers

For Black American farmers, turning to the soil can mean confronting painful history. Some farmers are reclaiming that past as they use regenerative farming techniques to take on food insecurity and the climate crisis.

Urban Farm Grows Good Food and Good Mental Health

Imagine you’re new to a community. But it is plagued by poverty, conflict, and oppression. Parts of your neighborhood are covered in trash, and abandoned homes are a common sight. 

Health in the Hood

Meet the South Florida Organization Combatting Food and Health Injustice.

Essential Agriculture workers need our support during COVID-19

Our path forward together on climate and race - November 9, 2020 Trump’s Department of Labor Fast-tracks Rule to Undermine Socially Responsible Investing

Communities on the Frontlines of the Climate Crisis (Magazine)

The warming climate is already affecting families from the oil fields of North Dakota to the rising waters of the Gulf Coast. But climate warriors are reclaiming spaces and fighting for our future.

Economic Action for Social Justice

From 1964 to 1992, the oil giant Texaco extracted billions of barrels of oil from the Amazonian rainforests of Ecuador. 

Environmental & Climate Justice

Communities of color are disproportionately impacted by climate change and toxic pollution. These communities are also forging the path toward environmental and climate justice for all.

Voices for Justice

We have had many big breakthroughs recently. Major companies across all industries are changing -- proof of the power of consumer pressure. We are witnessing how our economic power is truly changing the world for good and towards a simpler, more sustainable way of living.

Green America's statement on Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion

Green America believes we must work together to build a truly green economy that values all people and the planet.

Work of Our Allies

Kiss the Ground

Intertribal Agriculture Council

The Organic and Non-GMO Report

Mercaris

Freedmen Heirs Foundation

Soul Fire Farm

National Black Farmers Association

Rise and Root Farm 

Ron Finley HQ 

Agriculture Justice Project

Bread for the City 

La Via Campesina 

Video: Plantation Economics and Historical Discrimination in the USDA

Chris Newman on The Checkout Podcast

Identifying and Countering White Supremacy Culture in Food Systems - Duke University (PDF)

Agricultural Diversity Facts

Veteran's Day honors the US soldiers that have served in times of war and peace.

Veteran’s Day originated as “Armstice Day” on November 11, 1919 to mark the ceasefire between the Allied nations and Germany that took place on the “eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month” during World War I. In 1926, Congress passed a resolution making the date an annual observance, and November 11th became a national holiday in 1938. At the time, the day stood to honor the soldiers that fought in World War I. However, the name was changed to Veteran’s Day in 1954 to account for veterans of all wars. 

Today’s population of veterans includes people from all walks of life. There are 17.4 million veterans in the United States and 1.6 million of them are women. As of 2019, the top three states with the highest percentage of veterans are Virginia, Wyoming, and Alaska.  

Unlike Memorial Day, Veteran’s Day honors living veterans especially—many companies will offer discounts and free products and services to veterans on this day. Additionally, veterans are starting up their own enterprises, as the Small Business Administration reports that 25 percent of post-9/11 veterans want to be entrepreneurs.  

Veterans are important changemakers in our society and economy. Veteran-owned businesses employ 5.8 million individuals. Additionally, the Small Business Administration notes that military service exhibits one of the largest marginal effects on self-employment and veterans are 45 percent more likely to be self-employed than non-veterans. 

Green America gives veteran-owned companies a special shout out in our online directory of green businesses. Green Business Network members with veteran status can connect, network, and thrive in our community of companies for good. Here are a few veteran-owned green businesses that are certified with Green America:

Valley Isle Excursions

Valle Isle Excursions is a tour service that takes travelers on adventures through Maui on the Hawaiian Islands.  Experience a majestic Haleakalā sunrise or journey down the road to Hāna to find a black sand beach, waterfalls and incredible coastal vistas.

E&B Auto Repair

E&B Auto Repair is a general repair auto shop that goes the extra mile for sustainability. It is a NAPA AutoCare Center with ASE Certified Technicians located in Fort Bragg, California.

Conte Wealth Advisors

Christian Stearns, CFP(r), specializes in socially responsible investing and impact investing. He is located on the Gulf Coast of Florida.

Browse more veteran-owned businesses and find any sustainable product or service across the US by searching the Green Pages Online.

Contact Purrfect Play: Website | Etsy | Instagram | Pinterest

Pam Wheelock always loved cats but was disappointed when she saw that most store-bought toys were made in China from bright, synthetic materials. Since cats and dogs play with toys with their mouths, they ingest toxins from plastic and polyester. Additionally, she knew that dyes were polluting the rivers in China and affecting the people that used those water sources. So, she decided to make her own that would be healthy and fun.

“It may be cute that it looks like a piece of pizza, but it’s not really a fun toy for the cat,” she says. “When I design a toy, I ask myself, ‘what is the goal for the cat playing with this toy?’ Not how can I attract the human to buy the toy for the cat.”

From the beginning, Purrfect Play has been dedicated to a sustainable business model. Wheelock emphasizes social and environmental responsibility in every aspect of her company: from where she sources wool—from small family farms that are pasture-raised and name their sheep—to donating five percent of every sale to rescue organizations.

“If I can’t stick to my values, I don’t see the point in doing it,” she says. 

Sticking to her values has kept Purrfect Play running for over a decade. The company not only weathered the financial crisis of 2008, but sales have doubled in 2020 amongst the COVID-19 pandemic. Her advice for growing during tough times is to take it slow and be intentional.

“Take your idea and do something with it, even if it's small. See how that feels to you. Don’t convince yourself you have to survive on it,” she says. “Do it small, do it bootstrapped, learn as you go. When you don’t have a lot of skin in the game, you can afford to make mistakes.”

Keeping the business small also means Purrfect Play only wholesales one product, which is their hemp catnip carrot. Wholesaling requires marking up products five to ten times its cost to produce—and with the quality, organic hemp and cotton Purrfect Play uses, the final cost would be unattainable to the average person. So, Wheelock is happy to stay a maker-to-customer business so she can keep prices affordable for any pet parent.

Purrfect Play is also a longtime member of the Green Business Network at Green America. Wheelock notes how it has played a part in the company's growth over the years.

“Being a part of the Green America community is really important to us, especially in the beginning with the Green Festivals that we would attend and meet other producers,” she says.

Purrfect Play partners with another Green America business member, Mountain Rose Herbs, for their quality catnip. You can find their best-selling hemp catnip carrot on the Mountain Rose Herbs website.

The wool balls and the orca toy are the most popular toys for dogs and the wool dust bunnies for cats are bestsellers. Wheelock estimates thousands go out the door every year.

"A big part of your philosophy is that you can't make people care about the planet, but if they love their pets—and you help them see the value of loving one non-human being in their life—I think that spreads to how people view the planet," says Wheelock.

Clean Energy Credit Union is a unique, innovative, federally chartered credit union (aka not-for-profit, financial services cooperative) that is online/digital-only – i.e. it does not have any brick-and-mortar branches – and that focuses exclusively on providing loans for clean energy and energy saving projects such as electric vehicles, electric bicycles, residential solar electric systems, residential geothermal systems, and other green home improvements. Clean Energy Credit Union was started by a group of “clean energy geeks” who are passionate about clean energy and the environment. It is based in Colorado, but it serves members who live throughout the entire USA.

Clean Energy Credit Union’s vision is a world where everyone can participate in the clean energy movement, and our credit union helps make this vision a reality by: (1) making it easier for everyone to afford clean energy and energy saving products and services by offering clean energy loans with amazing terms; and (2) making it easier for everyone to invest in the clean energy movement by offering federally insured checking accounts, savings accounts, and clean energy CDs whereby the deposits are solely used to help others pursue their clean energy and energy saving projects.

Members of Green America, as well as members of their immediately family and household, are automatically eligible to join Clean Energy Credit Union. To join, you simply need to open a savings account and make a $5 minimum deposit via an online membership application at www.cleanenergycu.org/join. Membership in the credit union then provides you access to checking accounts, debit cards, money market accounts, and CDs – where your deposits would solely be used to finance clean energy projects – as well as access to clean energy loans that are designed to have the best loan terms in the USA. Please consider joining Clean Energy Credit Union and helping us to grow the clean energy movement!

Thank you to everyone who voted in last week’s election, and a big thanks to all who worked the polls or helped to get out the vote. 

Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have won the election.  This is an historic moment for the country, since Kamala Harris is the first woman and person of color to achieve such a high office in the US. 

We won’t know the full composition of the Senate until January, owing to run off elections in Georgia.  If Democrats control both Houses, it means that legislation on climate change, health care, police reform, immigration reform, worker’s rights, LGBTQ rights, and support for people and communities struggling with COVID-19 will move forward. 

We also know that even if the Senate remains Republican, Biden will take swift action through executive orders, including re-entering the Paris Accords, re-instating environmental regulations overturned by the Trump Administration, ending the travel ban on Muslim countries, re-instating the Dreamers program, and repealing the transgender military ban, to name a few. 

Biden and Harris have also promised to work towards larger climate goals, like phasing out fossil fuels in electric energy production by 2035 and to advance climate and racial justice. 

But progress won’t come automatically.  We’ll need to mobilize to urge Congress and regulators to act swiftly to undo the damage of the past four years and to chart a path forward for a truly green economy and country – one that values all people and the planet. 

Green America’s experience over nearly 40 years tells us that no matter who sits in the White House, it takes economic action to get corporations to be greener and more just – mobilizing the voices of people like you to demand change. 

With you by our side, we look forward to achieving our vision of a just, inclusive, green economy. 

On Friday afternoon, October 30, 2020 the Department of Labor (DOL) pushed through a new rule to undermine the ability of 401(k) and pension plans to include environmentally and socially responsible investments.  The rule is clearly a pre-election political move against corporate responsibility, in line with Trump administration actions that have consistently rolled back protections against corporate misconduct. No evidence has been brought forward that this fiduciary change is needed.

The DOL offered a very short public comment period for the rule, which nevertheless generated overwhelming opposition -- 95% against -- from investors large and small and concerned stakeholders, including thousands of Green America members.

“This rule works against the well-being of investors, companies, communities, and other stakeholders and should be reversed,” said Fran Teplitz, Green America’s executive co-director for business, investing, and policy. Reversal would be possible by a new Administration, through Congress, or the courts. “It is absurd and unconscionable that the DOL even fails to take the climate crisis into account as a concern of investors seeking long-term value,” she added.

While not referring directly to “socially responsible investing” or as it’s called in industry terms “ESG (environmental, social, governance) investing” the rule restricts the use of investments that offer “non-pecuniary” benefits – demonstrating the DOL’s failure to understand that attention to the social and environmental impacts of companies has real life financial implications for investors and society.

As Jon Hale of Morningstar stated “Most of what this rule implies as being non-pecuniary benefits, in the case of sustainable or impact strategies, are actually long-term benefits that should ultimately bolster rather than hinder the returns of retirement plan participants and their beneficiaries.”

The rule opposes the direction of the investment industry as more and more individual and institutional investors choose funds that integrate financial, social, environmental, and corporate governance criteria. In fact, the multinational financial services giant UBS has just decided to recommend ESG investing over conventional investing to its clients globally -- including to its retirement plan clients.

Smart investors and fiduciaries will continue to see that corporate responsibility is a win for investors and society.

Supporting small business this season (and for every special occasion) is a compassionate and fun way to invest in your community—and surprise your loved ones with more unique and impactful gifts.

The Department of Labor made final on Friday a rule making it harder for socially-minded investments to be included in select retirement plans, a move that some commenters welcomed, preferring return-driven decisions. Others objected, calling the Trump-led shift a misread of investing trends and preferences.

 “Financial Factors in Selecting Plan Investments” will discourage 401(k) and other qualified retirement plans from offering funds from managers that consider Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) factors in their due diligence, those opposed to the change have stressed. The proposal establishes burdensome requirements for analysis and documentation around inclusion of ESG options, those critics say. The Labor Department currently had no such requirements for any other kinds of funds.

The rule finalized Friday stipulates that fiduciaries for private pension plans covered by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) cannot invest in ESG vehicles that sacrifice investment returns or take on additional risk. It specifically requires that ERISA plan fiduciaries “select investments and investment courses of action based solely on financial considerations relevant to the risk-adjusted economic value of a particular investment or investment course of action.”

The rule was proposed in June and drew criticism from some in the retirement-planning community, including claims that the Labor Department did not sufficiently justify its reasoning behind the proposal and concerns that the proposal would add to fiduciary confusion regarding if and when ESG factors may be considered material.

The DOL received more than 8,730 comments. Most of the comments came from individuals —of which 96% opposed the rule change —and one petition from Green America drew more than 7,000 signatures, representing the mobilization of investor-led grassroots opposition, an analysis of the review period by Morningstar and US SIF showed. Opposing comments came not only from asset managers focused on ESG investing but also from many large conventional asset managers, including BlackRock, Fidelity, State Street Global Advisors, T. Rowe Price and Vanguard.

“This is another harmful action by the Trump administration, at a time when the global climate crisis looms large as another systemic risk upending lives, livelihoods and causing deadly devastation and damage,” said Mindy Lubber, president of sustainable investing advocate Ceres.

“This decision will impair the ability of pension funds to consider the short- and long-term financial risks posed by extreme weather, water shortages and human rights abuses in performing their investment analysis and allocations,” she said.

The rule-making comes as this investment focus gains interest from investors. Sustainable investing assets in the U.S. reached $12 trillion in 2018, up 38% from 2016, according to a recent US SIF Foundation’s Trends report.

ESG investments SUSA, +0.58% have been outperforming broader index funds so far in 2020, according to data from Standard & Poor’s and Morningstar. Those gains can be linked in part to a heavy concentration in high-flying tech stocks and away from oil during the COVID-19 shutdown.

Alicia Munnell, a columnist for MarketWatch and director of the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, welcomes the agency’s stance, she wrote at the time of the proposal.

“Pension fund investing is not the place to solve the ills of the world. ESG investing is a diversion that enriches financial managers, reduces participants’ retirement investment returns and makes people think they are addressing a problem without doing anything substantial,” Munnell said. “No one can seriously think that stock selection is going to fix climate change.”

Aron Szaprio, Morningstar’s director of policy research, said ESG risk analysis should be part of any prudent investment decision-making process as it is difficult to holistically assess a company’s long-term prospects without a clear view into the sustainability of its business.

Szaprio said in a recent commentary that regardless of the outcome of the election, Morningstar does not foresee a decline in investor interest toward sustainable funds.

"...if you come together with a mission, and it’s grounded with love and a sense of community, you can make the impossible possible.” –John Lewis 

Green America works to address multiple interrelated crises threatening our world. We believe we must work together to build a truly green economy that values all people and the planet. In doing so, we believe we must follow the lead of the people who are most disadvantaged by our current economic crises as we create a more just, equitable, and regenerative economy.  

At Green America, we embed social justice and equity in our work to create strong relationships among people of all backgrounds. We continue to join with, and learn from, the people, communities, businesses, and investors on the frontlines of fighting for social and environmental justice through collective economic action. Together, we are building a society that truly works for all people and the planet. 

Why Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion are Central to our Work 

Historically and to this day, Green America’s work focuses on economic systems because our national and global economies structurally disadvantage people of color; Indigenous peoples; ethnic and religious minorities; women; Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, and Intersex, Asexual, and Two-Spirit (LGBTQIA+ and 2 Spirit) people; disabled people; and create other vulnerable communities worldwide. These structural injustices are embedded in capitalism and the history of White supremacy and core to the production of wealth for the few at the expense of the many. In the US, this history includes the enslavement of Black people and the mass killing of American Indians and forced removal from their lands, followed by ongoing racism and discrimination against Black and Brown peoples; xenophobia and exploitation of immigrant populations; and discrimination against women and those identifying as LGBTQIA+ and 2 Spirit. These are just a few examples. 

The capitalist system privileges the wealthy and powerful at the expense of natural systems and workers worldwide. These power dynamics, deeply embedded in current systems, reinforce oppression and the commodification of natural resources and people. The rampant exploitation inherent in ever-growing capitalist economies is causing the climate crisis, the collapse of ecosystems worldwide, and the sixth mass species extinction. The impacts of environmental crises are and will continue to be felt most strongly by people with less wealth, who are disadvantaged by the capitalist economy and the most burdened by environmental injustices, both within wealthier countries and poor countries worldwide. 

Workers throughout the world experience oppressive and dangerous working conditions to meet the unrealistic demands of corporate supply chains that prioritize profits above human life. In the US, agricultural workers, service workers, caregivers, and many other people in professions that rely disproportionately on people of color, immigrants, and women, do not receive a living wage, health care, or paid sick leave. This puts millions of people in a precarious economic position and leaves them unable to build wealth.  

Our Commitment  

Green America is an organization that works for a socially just and environmentally responsible society through economic action. We believe that:  

• Our work is strongest when it fosters an inclusive and equitable society.  

• Understanding and celebrating diversity strengthens our connections with each other and with communities.  

• Continuing to learn from and partner with diverse communities creates inclusive solutions that incorporate the lived experiences and perspectives of these communities and deepens the impact of our programs and communications. 

• Strengthening an equitable and inclusive organizational culture at Green America, which includes ensuring leadership and staff work collaboratively, sharing experience and expertise, and holding one another accountable to a shared vision of Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion in our relationships with one another, and in all our work.  

Green America works for a world where all people have enough, where all communities are healthy and safe, and where the abundance of the Earth is preserved for all the generations to come. To achieve this mission, we need to ensure that we bring together people from all backgrounds to work for a world where people who are most disadvantaged are heard and their voices help lead the way to a truly equitable and green economy. 

Written by Jeremy Yamaguchi, the Founder and CEO of Lawn Love.

Some of my favorite memories as a child are playing on my grandparents' front lawn. I remember how expansive it seemed, and I loved the smell when it was freshly cut. My grandpa took great pride in his perfectly manicured grass as did all the neighbors; it was a unifying sense of pride for the neighborhood. I still get a rush of nostalgia when I think back on those times, even as I see the need for change in this industry. 

Today, over 80 percent of Americans have lawns. They became popular in the late 19th century with the advent of the lawn mower—a lush green lawn was a symbol of prosperity and the American Dream. However, rapid population growth and a better understanding of their environmental impacts have many reconsidering this tradition.

Lawns are Water Guzzlers

As vast regions of the western United States move into the grip of what Science Mag calls the first mega drought observed in 1,200 years, we must look critically at our traditional American lawn. 

Turf grass is the country’s largest irrigated crop—three times larger than any other—covering an area larger than the state of New York and demanding enough water every year to fill the Chesapeake Bay. According to the EPA’s nationwide estimate, that’s 9 billion gallons a day to keep our grass green. 

Outdoor water use often accounts for half or more of all residential water demand, especially in the hotter inland areas where population growth is fastest. We continue to see outdoor water usage rise as population growth drives development and single-family home construction. This is all happening against decreased water supply as global temperatures increase and freshwater basins dry up.

Lawns are Polluters

Water usage isn’t the only environmental issue associated with the traditional American lawn. Water pollution and climate emissions are also linked to our grass obsession. 

Homeowners use up to 10 times more chemical pesticides and fertilizers per acre on their lawns than farmers use on crops, and these chemicals can end up in our drinking water and waterways, harming human and ecosystem health. Production, transportation, and use of these chemicals also contribute to the climate crisis.

Americans use 800 million gallons of gas every year for lawn equipment and spill 17 million gallons just trying to refuel mowers—that’s more than was leaked by the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989. Hour per hour, gasoline powered lawn mowers produce 11 times as much air pollution as a new car. This is not sustainable.

Alternatives to the American Lawn

As we face the climate crisis and water shortages, many Americans are looking for ways to get rid of their lawn. 

Xeriscaping, a type of drought-tolerant landscaping that requires little or no irrigation, can reduce home water usage and costs by 50 to 75 percent. Well-designed, drought-resistant xeriscaping might include decorative rocks and beautiful, blooming native plants that are very low-maintenance and have a natural beauty that can certainly rival a green lawn. In California, many cities offer residents conservation incentives to replace their lawns with xeriscaping, and it works! In Novato, CA, for example, the city’s water department estimated that homeowners who chose xeriscaping saved 120 gallons of water a day. 

Replacing grass with a meadow is another option that requires no fertilizing, little to no supplemental watering, and minimal mowing, making this an appealing low maintenance option. Meadows provide habitat to pollinators and are capable of capturing carbon.

If you’re a fan of local foods, you can also try your hand at gardening or foodscaping—a type of home gardening that puts food-bearing plants front and center to maximize production while keeping aesthetics in mind. Replace your grass with a garden using Climate Victory Gardening practices and your yard goes from part of the problem to part of the climate solution. 

These alternatives to the traditional expansive green lawn and their related environmental and cost benefits can’t be ignored. Those who care about the planet and the people on it will come to see that the scientific evidence is irrefutable. We can help solve some of these environmental issues if we summon the collective will. 

The yards of the future will feature wildflowers, native grasses, succulent greenery, and edible plants, creating a space that’s far more interesting and better for our planet than just a plot of green grass.

Hours: Full-time (4-days, 32 hours/week)
Salary: $63,000 - $68,000, grant-track (contract option available, if preferred) 
Benefits: medical, dental, disability, vacation, holidays, sick days
Supervisor: Senior Director, Climate and Agriculture Network 

Green America is a non-profit organization dedicated to creating a just and sustainable society by harnessing economic power for positive change. Our unique approach involves working with consumers, investors and businesses to create a world that works for all. We deploy marketplace solutions to solve the most pressing social and environmental problems facing society today. 

The Center for Sustainability Solutions builds on Green America’s work over the years, where we’ve brought together industry groups across supply chains to create major shifts in such areas as solar, community investing, sustainable agriculture and fair labor. The Center supports Innovation Networks, focused working groups of stakeholders with the objective of making significant, industry-wide system change. Current networks focus on regenerative agriculture, carbon farming, clean electronics, climate and banking. 

The Soil Carbon Initiative (SCI) was co-developed by Green America and The Carbon Underground with input from key stakeholders from throughout the food supply chain.  SCI creates a framework that calls all who touch the soil to address the climate crisis by building soil health and increasing soil carbon sequestration through better soil health. This outcomes-based, scientific, agricultural standard is designed to help farmers and supply chains measure improvements in soil health and soil carbon.

The SCI Director will oversee the final phase of development and official launch of the Soil Carbon Index. The position will require both keen project management and organizational skills, along with a strong orientation towards stakeholder engagement and relationship development. As a key member of the SCI Design Team, the Director will need to be collaborative in nature, highly adaptable, and comfortable with complexity. 

Duties and Responsibilities:

• Develop a work plan for the final phase of development of SCI and work in tandem with senior staff and the SCI Design Team to ensure alignment and successful completion
• Provide input for the development, implementation, and execution of the Soil Carbon Index
• Oversee SCI Pilot Program, including the development of proposals 
• Track and manage deliverables and communications with pilot participants
• Work to ensure interoperability between SCI and other key food and carbon standards
• Draft reports and communicate to the SCI Design Team on a regular basis key updates and milestones
• Work with senior staff and industry advisors to resolve outstanding questions or areas for further development
• Design in tandem with industry experts an initial platform for pilot participant data
• Participate in Cross Departmental Teams: The success of our organizational work includes the voluntary participation of staff members from all levels of the organization in cross departmental teams addressing a range of issues to strengthen our impact and planning, as time and other work commitments allow.

Qualified Candidates should have the following skills and qualities:

• Strong program leadership skills, with 10+ years of experience directing complex programs and teams
• Familiarity with document control practice
• Deeply organized and oriented towards keeping projects and deliverables on track
• Comfortable with project management and reporting tools
• Experience with the development of standards, and more specifically standards in the food and agriculture space is a plus
• Strong interpersonal skills, including the ability to develop trusting relationships with senior executives and high-level leaders across a range of sectors
• The ability to understand and converse competently about complex supply chain issues with a broad range of stakeholders
• Proficient in Microsoft Excel, Word, PowerPoint and Outlook
• Familiarity with various farm management applications, a plus
• Strong research and writing skills
• Strong speaking skills
• Bachelor’s degree required; masters in a related field, including sustainable agriculture, agronomy or business management a plus. 

To Apply: Email your resume and cover letter to centerstaffing@greenamerica.org. No phone calls, please.

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Green America is an equal opportunity employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without discrimination regarding: actual or perceived race, color, religion, national origin, sex (including pregnancy, childbirth, related medical conditions, breastfeeding, or reproductive health disorders), age (18 years of age or older), marital status (including domestic partnership and parenthood), personal appearance, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, family responsibilities, genetic information, disability, matriculation, political affiliation, citizenship status, credit information or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. Harassment on the basis of a protected characteristic is included as a form of discrimination and is strictly prohibited.

Want your banking to build a better world? Find a bank or credit union near you that benefits people and planet.

Brady Quirk-Garvan is a business development associate at Money With A Mission [m], a socially responsible investing firm focused on divesting from destructive industries and making money work for progressive causes.  Quirk-Garvan has lived in Charleston, South Carolina for over 15 years and served as Chairman of the Charleston Democratic party from 2016 to 2020.  In 2019, Quirk-Garvan became one of Green America’s newest board members. Associate editor Sytonia Reid spoke with Brady to learn more about his background, expertise and vision for the future.

Green America: You went to the College of Charleston and served as Chairman of the Charleston County Democratic party.  What role has Charleston played in shaping your worldview and beliefs? 

Brady Quirk-Garvan: I grew up in a suburb of Boston, Massachusetts, and went to high school in Ithaca, New York. Until I went to college, I had lived in a very liberal bubble and moving to Charleston broadened my worldview as I started interacting with people who didn’t agree with me politically.

Charleston is also undergoing changes that are at the heart of the climate crisis. There are areas that are flooding that weren’t when I moved here 15 years ago, and there is this sense of pride in living in an environmentally beautiful area that   is constantly under attack by climate change and over-development. Charleston is on the frontlines of the climate crisis and climate justice because we have lower income neighborhoods that are rapidly flooding and communities of color that are hosting incinerators and trash operations.

Green America: As a financial planner, can you elaborate on some of the different ways people can give and what ways might be particularly impactful during these times? 

Brady Quirk-Garvan: There is no wrong way to give. People might volunteer their time at a nonprofit or those who get bonuses might decide to donate half of it. People who inherit large sums of money can give more through appreciated stocks or DAFs. With DAFs, people can designate money to charities in a tax-advantageous way and that makes it a great planning tool but we must make sure that money is actually flowing to the nonprofits they’re intended for.  I encourage those who have DAF’s to start distributing those funds now. What I think is most important is recognizing that most of us can give a bit more and that’s what this time calls for.

Green America: This summer, Natural Investments joined a group of SRI firms in an official statement confronting racial justice. Can you elaborate on the ways the investing community has historically aided racial injustice and how SRI can help correct it?

Brady Quirk-Garvan: Racial justice, environmental justice, and climate change manifest in various ways but at the core, are all deeply connected. The financial sector has historically been one of the worst drivers of racial wealth inequality, and we know that the investment choices of what banks and companies we support leads to huge decisions for entire communities.

For example, there are weapons manufacturers who are trying to drive up prices by turning police into para-military forces, and whether those companies thrive makes a difference in Black and Brown communities. We also know that mega banks not only heavily invest in fossil fuels but continue predatory and discriminatory lending practices toward non-white borrowers. So the SRI community must recognize that racial justice is intrinsically tied to the financial world and we are obligated to stand up and say we need to fix that.

Green America: How are you and your family staying green at home?

Brady Quirk-Garvan: Since we’ve been cooking more we’re cutting down on a lot of packaging and cognizant about buying things in bulk. My wife and I aren’t commuting to work anymore and that cuts 50 minutes of driving a day which is good for the environment but also our family dynamic because we’re all home together more. We’ve had more time to enjoy the surrounding outdoors and would like to sustain these things in the future.  

Green America: Your family has been involved with Green America since our beginning. What direction do you think Green America can go in in the future?

Brady Quirk-Garvan: Green America is demonstrating its understanding that the environmental movement isn’t just about saving trees or land, but what neighborhoods factories are put in and whether farms are open to non-white people in terms of land access and capital. My hope is that Green America will become the leader in helping even more people understand that while the movements for sustainability and for racial, climate and economic justice may have different goals, they are deeply related.

Green America: You have experience working on political campaigns. What do you think everyday people can do to bring out voters in 2020?

Brady Quirk-Garvan: When I talk to people about politics, they’re often not intrigued by a bill happening in the halls of Congress. It’s an asphalt plant being built a mile from my house, or a dump moving into a historically Black neighborhood, or marshes being filled with $800K condos. These are the issues that motivate voter turn-out, and I think we need to have conversations with people who aren’t motivated by the presidency about local issues that matter to them. 

Green America: What’s giving you hope during these peculiar times?

Brady Quirk-Garvan:  History shows us that out of dark times comes enormous burst of light and progress. After the Dark Ages, we had a time of creativity and enlightenment. Out of the despair of the Jim Crow era, we had the Civil Rights Movement with people stepping up and taking action. It’s clear to me that we are in a darker time of civil unrest and undemocratic government, and all in the midst of a global pandemic but what gives me hope is that we are likely to see incredible breakthroughs and societal transformations soon.

COVID-Fueled 10% Decline in Paper Receipts “Could Become Permanent”; Target Also Makes Progress.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – October 20, 2020 – As paper receipt usage sees a dramatic reduction because of the COVID-19 pandemic, CVS, the largest U.S. pharmacy chain, is responding to pressure from Green America and thousands of consumers and stopped using thermal receipt paper coated in Bisphenol S (BPS), an endocrine-disrupting chemical linked to health issues. The company has implemented phenol-free, recyclable paper in all its 10,000 stores across the country. Since 2017, Green America, the nation’s leading green economy organization, has urged CVS and other retailers to reduce paper receipt waste and toxicity through its Skip the Slip campaign.

Per Green America’s urging, CVS has also increased promotion of its digital receipt option which led to over one million new customer sign-ups in 2019. The company reports that its digital program has resulted in saving 49 million yards of receipt paper, which Green America estimates is more than enough paper to circle the globe.

Thousands of individuals have signed Green America’s petition to CVS and contacted the company on social media, which resulted in a dialogue between CVS and Green America to discuss receipt alternatives, reducing the length of receipts, providing digital opt-in prompts for customers to sign up for digital receipts, and switching to phenol-free, recyclable paper.

The new Skip the Slip report tracks the progress on receipt practices of 35 major companies, including CVS, Target, which has implemented phenol-free receipt paper and a digital receipt option, and Walmart, which offers a digital option at checkout (but still uses phenol-coated papers). Target received over 51,000 petitions from Mamavation urging the company to drop BPA and BPS from its receipts.

The report also discusses changes in thermal paper demand, which had been steadily increasing each year in the United States but declined since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. The U.S. used 280,000 metric tons of thermal paper for receipts in 2019, but this has dipped to an estimated 252,000 tons in 2020. The decline could become permanent if consumers continue increased shopping from home and declining paper receipts at the register post-COVID.

“CVS’ changes to its receipt practices reflect the growing consumer demand for digital options and non-toxic, recyclable receipt paper,” said Beth Porter, Green America’s Climate Campaigns director. “We encourage the company to build on this progress by identifying the many more opportunities to reduce waste across its operations.”

Since 2017, Green America has campaigned to raise awareness on the unnecessary environmental impacts of paper receipts and the toxins coating paper receipts, most commonly BPA and BPS. Green America estimates that in 2020, U.S. receipt consumption will use over three million trees and nearly nine billion gallons of water. Receipt production requires the energy equivalent to operating nine million refrigerators a year and generates 297 million pounds of solid waste. Receipt production generates the greenhouse gas emission equivalent to over 400,000 cars on the road each year.

“Retailers are spending an estimated $282 million on thermal paper for receipts this year,” said Todd Larsen, Green America’s executive co-director. “Companies should be looking to digital options that are safer, cheaper and better for the environment.”

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Green America is the nation’s leading green economy organization. Founded in 1982, Green America provides the economic strategies, organizing power and practical tools for businesses, investors, and consumers to solve today’s social and environmental problems. http://www.GreenAmerica.org  

MEDIA CONTACT: Max Karlin for Green America, (703) 276-3255, or mkarlin@hastingsgroup.com.

Imagine driving 45 minutes to buy a fresh tomato. That’s what Ron Finley’s South Central Los Angeles community had to do before he began growing food in a parkway next to his house in 2010. In that narrow strip of earth between the sidewalk and street opposite the Farmdale metro station, he sowed the seeds of a movement to convert these barren rectangles into gardens that serve people and the planet.

What is a parkway garden?

It’s all about intentionally growing vegetables, fruits, herbs, or flowers in that space between your sidewalk and street—the parkway, also called a planting strip, treelawn, hellstrip and dozens of other names.

Just like all other types of landscaping and gardening, your parkway garden will be unique to you. The plants that do best are adaptable, durable, and low-lying native plants that require minimal care. If your parkway is paved over, a container garden in this area could still be an option.

Parkway gardens and other forms of urban gardening are taking hold across the country. From California to New York, people are reclaiming previously ignored patches of dirt close to their homes, planting gardens to brighten America’s neighborhoods via these greenspaces. In suburban River Forest, Illinois, alone, the community’s Sustainability Commission has created 36 parkway gardens.

Why are parkway gardens important?

They may be small spaces, but taken together, parkway gardens can help solve some of the biggest human-caused ecological challenges, including polluted runoff, flooding, biodiversity loss, and the climate crisis.

Enhancing parkways with native plants can reduce the contaminants headed for our streams and seas since the vegetation intercepts and filters that runoff. The plants boost floodwater retention because their roots and soil biodiversity form conduits that enable the ground to soak up excess water.

Parkway gardens support aboveground biodiversity by providing food and habitat for at-risk pollinators, birds, and other wildlife. What’s more, these spaces can also draw down atmospheric carbon if grown using Climate Victory Gardening practices, locking planet-warming carbon dioxide in the soil.

And, of course, they beautify the stark pavement and foster passersby’s wellbeing. In fact, research shows that such greenspace can lower violent crime in cities.

How do you plant a parkway garden?

Follow these steps to turn an overlooked parkway near you into a lush garden:

1. Ask your local government whether you must obtain permission to modify the parkway or follow specific maintenance rules—every municipality is different, but you can start by contacting the sustainability, transportation, public works, or parks and recreation department. Before breaking ground, check with utility companies about cables and pipes to avoid hazardous accidents and service disruptions while digging. If your neighborhood has a homeowner’s association or similar regulatory body, consult them, too. Your city might also offer assistance. For instance, Washington, D.C. plants trees in parkways for free upon request. 
2. Choose up to a dozen species to start, Sunset Magazine suggests. It’s okay to keep it simple with fewer and expand later. Go for enduring plants like perennials, shrubs, and bulbs that are native to your area, don’t need much water, and stay below 3 feet tall without obstructing passersby’s path. You might choose a small fruit tree to provide food for the community and wildlife. To maximize beauty, harvest diversity, and consistent pollinator feed, incorporate a medley of shapes, textures, bloom times, and edible produce.  
3. Eliminate nonnative plants already growing in the area. Excavate them and cover the plot with sheet-mulching to build soil health and prevent future weeds. If you’d like, use stones or bricks to build a buffer around your garden.
4. If the earth is compressed and lifeless, add a couple inches of well-decomposed manure or compost. Avoid planting directly under trees and nearby shallow roots.
5. Put plants a little closer than usual to speed their spread and fill in the space. Add an inch of mulch to protect soils and decrease maintenance.
6. Water weekly for a few months if rain is infrequent, and continue weeding until the parkway fills in.

How else can you produce food with limited space?

If parkway gardening isn’t an option, there are still many easy ways to get your hands dirty growing food. Consider replacing ornamentals in your existing landscaping with food-bearing species. For a rewarding social experience, join a community garden, or find an empty lot to launch one yourself (abide by local restrictions). No matter how you decide to garden, have fun connecting with the earth and enjoy your delicious homegrown bounty.

Remember to add your garden to the Climate Victory Gardens map to showcase your commitment to curbing carbon pollution through building and harnessing the soil!

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The time for action has never been more urgent. According to NASA, the past nine years have been the warmest since modern record-keeping began in 1880. Shrinking glaciers, droughts, rising seas, heat waves—we have more than enough evidence to compel us to act personally and collectively. 

The 2023 Synthesis Report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change delivered a "final warning" on the climate crisis, as rising greenhouse gas emissions push the world to the brink of irrevocable damage that only swift and drastic action can avert. While the report identifies dire conditions globally, there is still time to act to avoid the worst outcomes. We need to keep the vast majority of remaining fossil fuels in the ground. 

The Divest-Invest climate movement is an increasingly powerful force to help achieve the goal of a global clean energy economy. Individuals and institutions—including foundations, states and cities, colleges and universities, pension funds, faith-based organizations, and civil society groups—have pledged to divest either in whole or in part from fossil fuels. 

As of April 2023, $40.4 trillion in assets, from 1,508 institutions in 71 countries, have been pledged to divest in whole or in part from fossil fuels. The urgency has never been greater for divesting from fossil fuels and reinvesting those funds in renewable energy, energy efficiency, and clean-energy-based community development. 

You can join this movement too! 

We spend an average of 33 percent of our time (eight hours per day) in our bedrooms. And, experts say the bedroom is often the room with the highest allergen content in the entire house.

If you or a family member have allergies or asthma, you might experience a noticeable difference in your symptoms after removing as many allergens as you can from this one room. Here are our best tips for creating an allergen-free bedroom.

What Lurks Under Your Bed

There are five main types of allergens that lurk in the bedroom:

• Dust mites: These ugly little microscopic creatures feed on sloughed-off skin cells and congregate mainly in bedding, pillows, stuffed animals, curtains, upholstery, carpets, and storage boxes. It’s actually dust mite waste that triggers our allergies, not the mites themselves.
• Mold: Anything damp—from pet bedding to carpets to walls and window moldings—can become a haven for mold.
• Animal dander: If you allow your cat or dog to sleep in your room, allergy-inducing proteins from your furry friend’s skin, saliva, and urine—also called animal dander—may be sticking to any available surface. Animal dander also remains airborne for several hours, so it can float into your bedroom from other areas of the house.
• Pollen: Pollen is often carried indoors on clothing or on pets. It can also float inside from windows or your central air system.
• Cockroaches: The cast-off skins and droppings of these pests are what trigger allergies. Now that you know what allergens could be making you sneeze, it’s time to focus on getting rid of them as much as possible. If you’d like to pinpoint exactly which allergens trigger your symptoms, consider asking your doctor for a referral to an allergist, who can figure out what you’re allergic to through a simple skin test.

Simplify Your Bedroom

Simplifying your life isn’t just good for your pocketbook—it can be good for your health, too. The more storage boxes, books, upholstered furniture, pillows and bedding, and other items in your bedroom, the more places allergens have to hide.

Keep your bedroom as simple as possible. Clear out clutter, and see if you can sell or donate it instead of letting it sit around and collect allergens. Put items you can’t part with in other rooms.

Remove drapes, feather pillows, upholstered furniture, non-washable comforters, and other non-washable soft items, if possible.

For children, minimize stuffed animals and other soft toys in the bedroom—they become havens for dust mites. Look for machine washable stuffed toys. Clean those that can’t be washed with a damp cloth, then put in the dryer on a high setting to kill dust mites.

Carpets: A Haven for Allergens in the Bedroom

The American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) recommends replacing carpets with hard flooring, since carpets are notorious for trapping allergens and exacerbating symptoms.

To find environmentally (and allergy-) friendly flooring options, consult our Real Money July 2003 article, “Eco-Flooring Options,” or check the “Flooring” category of our National Green Pages™ for sellers of cork, sustainable hardwood, and bamboo flooring.

If replacing carpeting isn’t an option, vacuum floors at least weekly with a machine that has a high efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter. (Standard or water-filtered vacuums just stir up allergens.) Vacuum furniture and curtains as well.

Several green companies offer nontoxic allergen-reducing sprays, detergents, and cleaners for
carpeting, upholstery, and more.

Steps to Reduce Allergens

These steps will help reduce all five allergens:

1. Filter your air: Though no studies have proven that indoor air filters help clear out allergens in the bedroom, many people with allergies attest to their effectiveness. The NIAID recommends talking to your allergist about the best type of air filter to use. Having your air ducts cleaned has not been proven effective against allergies, says the AAAAI.
2. Bring in plants: Indoor plants are great air filters, so unless you have mold or pollen allergies, putting plants in your home can reduce allergens.
3. Keep humidity levels low: All five allergens thrive in humidity, so keep humidity levels below 50 percent by repairing leaks and using a dehumidifier. If you live in a very humid climate, you may need to turn on your air conditioner to reduce humidity and, therefore, your symptoms.
4. Clean your house: In addition, keeping your home, especially your bedroom, as clean as possible will go a long way toward keeping allergens at bay. Use nontoxic cleaning products, which can be found at your local health food store or in the National Green Pages™, to avoid chemical irritants.
5. Avoid toxins: “Those with allergies and asthma should avoid airborne irritants, including tobacco smoke, aerosols, paint, perfumes, cleaning products, or other strong odors or fumes,” says the AAAAI.

Cut down where it counts

Use the following suggestions to specifically expunge each of the five main types of allergens from your bedroom:

1. To dispel dust mites:
   • Encase mattresses, box springs, comforters, and pillows in airtight, zippered plastic or special allergen-proof fabric covers. These are widely available at national and specialty stores, as well as from the socially and environmentally responsible businesses listed in the resource box on this page.
   • Avoid down pillows and comforters, if possible, as they attract dust mites. If you choose to use them, encase them in allergen-proof covers.
   • Wash sheets and pillow cases weekly in hot water to kill dust mites—the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) says temperatures lower than 130°F will not kill mites. (You can still save energy by rinsing in cold water, and by washing your other items in cold water.)
   • Vacuum weekly with a HEPA vacuum cleaner. Dust weekly with a damp or electro-static cloth to pick up dust, rather than dispel it. Wear a dust mask while cleaning to minimize symptoms.
2. To combat pet dander:
   • The best way to minimize allergens is to keep your pet outside in an environment that meets its health and social needs. If your pet isn’t the outdoor sort, at least keep it out of your bedroom, even when you're not in there.
   • Replace bedding and carpeting that has animal dander on it. “It can take weeks or months for fabrics to come clean of allergens, and animal allergens may persist for a year or more,” says the AAAAI.
   • Bathe your pet weekly—studies have shown that weekly baths can minimize dander.
   • Vacuuming does little to reduce pet dander, since vacuums don’t clean the very bottom levels of the carpet where dander collects. A HEPA vacuum may help somewhat. As with dust mites, the best solution is to install hard flooring, if possible.
   • If your pet allergies are significantly reducing your quality of life, the only way to truly get rid of dander is to find your pet another loving home with someone who is not allergic to it. The AAAAI says that even keeping your pet outdoors exclusively isn’t a complete solution, since homes with an outdoor pet have been found to have a higher concentration of pet dander inside than homes without a pet.
3. To minimize mold:
   • To keep mold out of your home, keep dampness out. Repair and seal any leaks, and keep humidity levels below 50 percent.
   • If you discover mold, clean it promptly with a solution of water and a non-ammonia soap or detergent. Remove any carpeting or wallpaper contaminated with mold.
   • If the soap or detergent doesn’t eliminate the mold, and you can’t remove the contaminated materials, some green companies, such as Sneeze.com, offer nontoxic mold removers. As a last resort, a solution of water and five percent chlorine bleach may kill stubborn mold. Keep in mind, however, that chlorine bleach may react with organic compounds in drinking water to produce carcinogens and other toxins, according to the Children’s Health Environmental Coalition.
   • Keep houseplants out of your bedroom.
   • If you don’t have pollen allergies, open doors and windows periodically and use fans to increase air movement. Open your bathroom window after a shower to release moisture.
4. To reduce pollen:
   • Bathe before going to bed to wash pollen off your skin and hair. Leave the clothes you wore all day in a hamper outside your bedroom.
   • Avoid line-drying your clothes outside, as they will collect pollen. Instead, invest in a folding drying rack and dry your clothes indoors to save energy.
5. To control cockroaches:
   • Block areas where roaches could enter the home, including cracks, windows, and outside doors and drains.
   • Keep your home meticulously clean, especially the kitchen. Store food in airtight containers, clean counters and sweep the floor after meals, and put away pet food after your pet eats. Vacuum frequently, and take out trash and recycling daily.
   • If you think you need to call an exterminator, first try employing the less-toxic roach control methods such as: "The Pesticator" (an ultrasonic device that is supposed repel mice and roaches), borax for carpets and cracks (use caution around pets and children), products from the "Pest Control" section of our National Green Pages™, and pest-control companies that use less-toxic methods.

Of course, none of the advice we’ve given is intended to replace evaluation of your symptoms by a physician. If you have concerns about your health, please consult your doctor. Hopefully, though, the tips offered here will help you reduce your daily sneezing and get you on your way to an allergen-free bedroom!

Amazon continues to grow in popularity for its low prices and fast delivery. But warehouse workers behind the scenes are paying for it all with bottom-level salaries and back-breaking work.

In cities across the country, people are waiting with bated breath to see where online retail giant Amazon will build its planned second headquarters, because they’re hungry for the 50,000 jobs the company says it will add as part of the expansion. 

Amazon has already busted out of its headquarter city of Seattle. It has 75 fulfillment centers across the US employing 125,000 full-time workers, according to company reports, with hundreds of other locations and hundreds of thousands more employees around the world. But what goes on behind the closed doors of those fulfillment centers—and thousands like them owned by other companies—is a dangerous business. 

Temporary Workers, Permanent Problem

After the labor movement of the 1940s and ’50s, warehouses jobs were stable, paid enough to support a family, and offered benefits. But in the following decades, costs fell as companies outsourced manufacturing, and box stores saw they could increase profit by paying US warehouse workers less, too. 

Temporary workers are now standard in the industry—an organizer in Southern California says up to 40 percent of warehouse jobs in the state’s Inland Valley region are temporary, and in Chicago, organizing group Warehouse Workers for Justice estimates more than 60 percent of the city’s 80,000 warehouse jobs are temporary. Chicago and L.A. are the biggest shipping hubs in the US.  

Temporary workers provide companies with a more flexible labor force requiring fewer benefits than full-time, salaried employees. They are also a more “vulnerable workforce with unclear lines of accountability for health and safety,” states a 2018 report from the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (COSH).

The way companies like Amazon and Walmart fulfill temp positions is through staffing agencies, which find, hire, and pay workers. This system prevents unionization—because not all jobs in one warehouse are for the same staffing company—and helps corporations save on health insurance and other costs. 

Sheheryar Kaoosji is executive co-director at the Warehouse Worker Resource Center in Ontario, CA, a nonprofit that aims to improve working conditions in the Inland Valley of California, home to a large warehousing industry. 

“There’s 80,000 jobs available [here], but because of the temp system, there might be 200,000 people flowing in and out of those jobs—they’re not fully employed,” explains Kaoosji. “It’s a key part of the ‘working poor’ economy in our region.”

He says workers who move to the Inland Valley, because of the lower cost of living and many job opportunities, end up scrambling to make ends meet. 

“The warehouse worker population is almost entirely people of color, and it’s lots of people who are new to the community,” Kaoosji says. “It’s a lot of people ... who are trying to hang on and make a life for themselves. This region was promised that these jobs would be the future of the economy, and it’s not turning out to be that way.”

Humans Treated Like Machines

Ten percent of the warehouse jobs in the Inland Valley are at Amazon warehouses. Kaoosji says people must pay attention to Amazon because it draws in workers with wages a few dollars higher than minimum wage, and as one of the country’s largest retailers, it impacts how other companies treat their workers. [Editor’s note: Green America has a campaign pressuring Amazon to clean up its coal-powered cloud operations.]

Recently, workers have spoken out anonymously to various news sources about the bad conditions in Amazon’s warehouses. As orders come in via the Amazon website, workers called “pickers” retrieve items for orders from stocked warehouse shelves, putting them onto giant shopping carts and delivering to a boxing station. Amazon holds pickers to a steep piece rate, reported to be from 85-300 items per hour.

Pickers can be and have been fired for not making rate, and these workers complain of back and joint pain from bending, reaching, and being on their feet all day. Some workers report walking more than ten miles per shift through huge fulfillment centers.
Roberto Jesus Clack is an organizer with Warehouse Workers for Justice (WWJ) in Chicago. He says that Amazon’s goal is to provide the same instant gratification as department stores. 

“Really, its goal is to be able to get people as many products as possible within the day, or even within a few hours of ordering,” Clack says. “There’s a ton of pressure on the workforce to always speed up, speed up. [WWJ is] really concerned about safety issues, and whether [workers are] being compensated appropriately for the value they add.” 

Other reports make Amazon’s warehouses seem like sweatshops. Security checks to prevent worker theft are included in break times, so half-hour lunch breaks and timed bathroom breaks end up being shorter than promised. Employees have reported being written up for not showing up for overtime hours, which should be voluntary by law. 

Since 2013, there have been seven fatalities among Amazon warehouse workers. In 2013, picker Jeff Lockhart Jr. died after collapsing during his overnight shift. A cardiologist who reviewed his autopsy said it was likely from overexertion. And last year, two workers were crushed by warehouse vehicles, calling into concern the safety procedures of both drivers and ground staff. 

The Associated Press reported in November that Amazon could face $28,000 in fines from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) for safety violations that led to last year’s deaths, including a $7,000 fine for failure to provide training. 

Earlier this year, Amazon made headlines when it was approved for a patent for a wristband that tracks workers’ movements. The wristband will buzz when a worker’s hand is close to the item they’re reaching for, to help reduce the time needed to locate the correct item on a crowded shelf. 

Kaoosji, says the wristband is just the latest push in the company’s efforts to improve its employees’ piece rates. 

“Amazon has a specific kind of problem that stems from its obsession with metrics, and because of technological advantages, their surveillance regime is about as good as it can get,” Kaoosji says. “They’re surveilling employees to watch exactly what they’re doing and how quickly they’re moving.”

That kind of constant pressure to meet ever higher fulfillment quotas has created a culture at Amazon warehouses where stressed-out employees forgo bathroom breaks or urinate in bottles, out of fear of being disciplined or losing their jobs, according to journalist James Bloodworth, who went undercover in a UK Amazon warehouse, the subject of his new book Hired: Six Months Undercover in Low Wage Britain (Atlantic Books, 2018). 

Dangers of the “Lower-archy”

Many warehouse workers are afraid of losing their jobs if they report a safety violation or complain about conditions. Marcy Goldstein-Gelb, co-executive director at National COSH, describes the people who feel least comfortable speaking out, and who are the lowest-paid workers as a “lower-archy.”

“The lower you are, the fewer job options you have, the more that you risk if you speak up about a labor violation—be it health and safety or not being paid—and the less likely you are to feel comfortable speaking up,” Goldstein-Gelb says. “There’s a few factors that make you vulnerable: if you don’t speak English, if you’re younger, if you lack a union, if you’re a temporary worker. If you’re in a day-to-day situation where you could be fired for speaking out, then your life is at risk.”

National COSH and its regional groups are trying to make workplaces safer by training employees on what to look for to assess workplace safety, how to speak up if their workplaces aren’t safe, how to work with unions, and how to talk to communities about the importance of having strong safety laws and standards.

Consumers can help by telling their Congressional representatives to press for adequate staffing at OSHA, Goldstein-Gelb says. This federal agency can make workplaces comply with regulations for worker safety by sending in investigators who cite employers for violations. However, nearly 50 investigator positions have opened up and not been rehired since the beginning of Trump’s presidency. Goldstein-Gelb notes it would take the current number of investigators 140 years to look into all complaints that are on file right now (with no new ones added).

“In the ideal world, employers would simply want to have safe workplaces and do it on their own without any need for enforcement, but too often, we find that employers are cutting corners and trying to make a quick buck at the expense of workers,” Goldstein-Gelb says. 

Support Warehouse Workers

Across the country, warehouse workers are organizing for better working conditions. Here’s how you can amplify their efforts: 

• Support unions. Shopping at stores where the workers are unionized supports fair wages and safer workplaces. Instead of buying groceries at Amazon or Walmart, try union stores like Kroger or Albertson’s. Find one at ufcw.org/grocery. Find union-made products at unionlabel.org.
• Shop green and local. Avoid big-box and online retail giants like Amazon when you can, and shop with local, green businesses instead. Find those near you at GreenPages.org. And read our “11 Greener Options Than Amazon.” 
• Support campaigns at warehouse worker organizations. Stay informed through Warehouse Workers for Justice, the Warehouse Workers Resource Center, and the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health.

Michael Rainville of Maple Landmark Woodcraft, a Vermont green toy manufacturer, has never seen business pick up as fast as it has in the last couple months. “We are phenomenally busy,” he says. “We’re scrambling to figure out how to meet demand.”

Rainville knows why there is renewed interest in the colorful wooden trains, buses, and cars he sells—the recalls of hundreds of thousands of Chinese-made toys containing lead paint last summer were a surprising wake-up call to many parents.

“There’s a lot of fright over the fact that there are issues parents weren’t aware of before with conventional toys,” says Rainville.

When parents ask persistent questions about whether Maple Landmark is truly manufacturing in the US, Rainville offers to hold up the phone “so they can hear the saws running and know we’re making the toys under one roof.” He then tells parents about the company’s other sustainable features: the toys are all made from sustainably harvested Vermont wood. Safe paints and finishes range from beeswax coatings to colorful lacquers. In addition, Maple Landmark packs its toys in secondhand boxes and shipping materials, and takes care to recycle whenever possible. It donates its scrap wood to farmers for sawdust bedding and to locals for kindling.

Once parents learn about everything the company does to ensure safety and sustainability, they’re reassured that Maple Landmark toys will be safe for their kids, says Rainville. If you’re wondering how to ensure that the children in your life only play with safe toys, we’re here to help. We’ve gathered some of the most important considerations in selecting safe toys.

Toxins in Toys, Legally

Toys sold in the US are regulated by the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), which enforces federal standards for children’s products. General laws regulating all products concern sharp points or edges, parts small enough for a child to swallow, and lead in paint, according to Consumer Reports. Unfortunately, this does not mean that the government tests toys for safety before they go on the market.

On the contrary, the CPSC is “entirely reactive,” says Ruth Ann Norton, the former executive director of the Coalition to End Childhood Lead Poisoning (CECLP, part of the Green & Healthy Homes Initiative). Once a toy is already on store shelves, toy manufacturers are required to report to the CPSC if it causes any injuries or deaths, and consumers may submit reports, as well. The government’s current recall mechanism is exclusively “complaint driven,” explains Norton: the CPSC collects reports and may issue a recall of a toy it deems unsafe.

Regardless of what is legally permissible in the US, Norton says, toys made in China or other developing countries carry a higher risk of containing chemicals that are illegal than toys made in the US, Canada, or the European Union (EU), because dangerous chemicals are less well-regulated in these countries.

Lead Paint

Though there is no comprehensive US ban on lead in toys, it is illegal for the paint to contain more than 0.06 percent concentration lead, and with good reason. When ingested, lead can cause nerve damage, learning and behavioral problems, reproductive damage, and irreversible brain damage. It can also increase the risk of cancer.

Legal limits notwithstanding, several high- profile toy recalls over the summer revealed that some toys made in China and sold to families in the US contained illegal and dangerous levels of lead. The levels of lead in some of the toys recalled by the Mattel Corporation were as high as 11 percent, 180 times the legal limit.

Some states have banned lead in children’s products entirely, and a stricter federal standard for both lead levels and testing of imported toys may be forthcoming from Congress, says Norton. Meanwhile, she suggests that parents follow the motto posted in her office: “When in doubt, throw it out.”

Unfortunately, the test kits for detecting lead in homes can’t be reliably used by parents to test toys, and laboratory tests of toys destroy the toys. If you do have concerns that your child may have been exposed to lead, have your health care provider conduct a blood test. If the test shows elevated levels of lead, the child can take medicine that brings down lead levels to prevent further damage.

How to steer clear of lead:

• Avoid painted toys made before 1978, because before lead paint was banned in toys, residential structures, and hospitals that year, it was used commonly in paints in the US.
• Imported painted toys carry a higher lead risk because lead is less well-regulated in many developing countries. Choose toys manufactured in the US, Canada, or the EU.
• Show caution around any imported toy with flaking paint, in particular.
• The CECLP advises parents to avoid fake painted pearls, including Mardi Gras beads, and cheap children’s jewelry of the type sold in vending machines or given away as party favors. A 2006 study by Ashland University researchers found that 70 percent of the 20 cheap toy jewelry samples they tested contained illegal levels of lead, only three of which have been subsequently recalled.

PVC & Phthalates

Polyvinyl chloride plastic, known as PVC or vinyl and identifiable by a #3 or “V” symbol, is so toxic for people and the planet at every point in its lifecycle that some activists call it by another name: the “poison plastic.”

Of particular concern for children’s health are vinyl toys such as teethers, “rubber duckies,” beach balls, and bath books. These are often made of a flexible vinyl that has been softened using “plasticizer” chemicals called phthalates. (Lead has also been found in some children’s vinyl products, such as bibs.)

Children’s polymer clays such as Fimo and Sculpey also have been found to contain trace amounts of phthalates. Phthalates can leach out of PVC products, especially when hot food is served in plastic containers and when children put PVC toys like teethers in their mouths. Studies have identified phthalates as a hormone disrupter. Phthalates may also cause liver and kidney lesions, a higher risk of certain cancers, and may exacerbate asthma and allergies in children.

PVC also creates dangerous chemicals throughout its lifecycle: making PVC releases carcinogens such as vinyl chloride and dioxins, and incinerating PVC generates carcinogenic dioxin. Because phthalates harm a person through total exposure from many sources, it’s hard to measure the harm likely to be caused by particular PVC toys. However, many experts, including those at the nonprofit Healthy Child Healthy World, say it pays to be cautious. The EU, 12 countries, and the state of California have banned or restricted the use of phthalates in children’s products, and some US toy manufacturers have enacted voluntary bans.

How to steer clear of PVCs and Phthalates:

• Avoid PVC plastic: Unfortunately, most plastic toys don’t carry clear information about the type of plastic they’re made of, though some PVC toys may carry a #3 or the word “vinyl.” A number of toy companies have pledged to begin phasing PVC out of their toys, but IKEA is the only major retailer that has already completely phased out PVC.

Mike Schade, the PVC Campaign Coordinator for the Center for Health, Environment, and Justice (CHEJ) recommends e-mailing toy companies directly to ask if a particular toy contains vinyl; he’s found that most respond within a day or so. Instead of toys that contain vinyl/PVC, choose toys made of alternative materials, including FSC-certified wood, natural fabric, or plastics #1, 2, 4, and 5.

Clear Plastics and Bisphenol A

Bisphenol-A (#7) is legally used to make transparent, hard, unbreakable plastic products, such as baby bottles and “sippy” cups, and CD jewel cases. Very small amounts of this chemical have been shown to cause serious reproductive damage in mice, especially when the exposure occurs in utero. Exposure may cause prostate cancer, breast cancer, female infertility, and obesity.

How to steer clear of bad plastics and BPA:

The Natural Resources Defense Council advises parents to avoid polycarbonate (#7) plastic. When in doubt about items you already own, call the manufacturer and ask. If you notice that a clear plastic bottle or cup has become worn, or that the clear plastic of a toy has become cloudy, that may be evidence of off-gassing bisphenol-A. Throw it out.

Instead, choose baby bottles and spill-proof cups made of glass or polyethylene (#1, #2, #4 recycling symbols) or polypropylene (#5). To find safe bottles and sippy cups by brand name, consult the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy’s “Smart Plastics Guide."

Keep Recalls in Mind

When a manufacturer issues a toy recall, they may contact customers who purchased the toy online, or prevent shoppers from purchasing the toys still on store shelves. But it’s up to parents to scan the recall lists and notice if a toy recall applies to something your children play with.

To review toy recalls, visit www.recalls.gov or call the CPSC hotline, 800/638-2772. You can also report unsafe products to the CPSC via the hotline.

When it’s time to buy a new toy, the greenest companies are most often the safest. See our box at right for resources that can help you find toys that are safe for people and the planet.

Ruth Ann Norton at the CECLP admits that she sometimes imagines Barbie, Dora the Explorer, and Thomas the Tank Engine commiserating together somewhere in the aftermath of the massive recalls. “They’ve had a rough year,” she says. “But these are toys that kids love, and they can be made safely. Someday, they will be.