Vivien Leigh, who was born November 5, 1913, may not have lived to see her 54th birthday, but she is one of the rare performers whose fame has long outlasted her death. This is at least partly due, of course, to her Oscar-winning film performances as Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind (itself turning 75 this year), and as Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire. Leigh's distinctive blend of delicacy and power as an actress, coupled with her great beauty, have helped to enshrine her.

In her final years, VIvien Leigh also acted in two major films, The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone and Ship of Fools. When she succumbed to tuberculosis on July 7, 1967, she was rehearsing for the London production of A Delicate Balance.

Notable biographies of Vivien Leigh were written by Anne Edwards in 1977; Alexander Walker in 1987; and Hugo Vickers, in 1988. Other books of interest include Jesse L. Lasky's Love Scene: The Story of Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh and Sam Staggs' When Blanche Met Brando: The Scandalous Story of "A Streetcar Named Desire." Some archival material, including production materials and correspondence with the actress in several collections, can be found by searching NYPL's archival portal, which other items are listed under her name and various production titles in the Theatre Division card catalog. Other Vivien Leigh films on DVD in New York Public Library circulating collections include St. Martin's Lane and Anna Karenina (the 1948 version, in which she delivers a heart-rending portrait), and, of course, A Streetcar Named Desire and Gone with the Wind.

Speaking of GWTW, among the Theatre Division's archival holdings on the film are an early draft (from 1937) of the screenplay and a souvenir program from its initial run (call number MFL+ n.c. 461, from Theatre Division card catalog):

Notice the billing—Leigh is listed fourth in the cast, although she's granted special treatment ("and presenting Vivien Leigh as Scarlett O'Hara").  She was getting the build-up as a fresh new presence. Seventy-five years later, the bloom is still on the rose. 

Ruby's pa is a lumberjack who works in the forest. She has 10 brothers and sisters and a puppy to help take care of. She works in the house, and she goes to school when she has time. Ruby enjoys teaching her siblings and the lumberjacks to read. Amazingly enough, these lumberjacks who topple logs every day are a little bit afraid of literature. 

Ruby loves books so much that she barters raspberry pies for books. Some people gave her boots instead... not exactly what the girl bargained for. Blind neighbor, Mrs. Graham, shares Ruby's love of literature, and she gives her many beloved novels that she can no longer use. Ruby repays the favor by reading to her. The old woman has a lovely house and manner. 

Lumber Camp Library by Natalie Kinsey-Warnock, 2002

Natalie Kinsey-Warnock's web site

Defender Security Services, Inc. will present a recruitment for Security Guard (10 openings),  Dispatcher/ Field Supervisor (2 openings)  on Wednessday, November 12, 2014, 1:00 pm - 3:00 pm, at Brooklyn Workforce 1 Career Center, 250 Schermerhorn Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201.

PLS  will present a recruitment for Shift Supervisor (25 openings), Manager / Assistant Store  Manager (25 openings) on Thursday, November 13, 2014, 10 am - 2 pm, at the Bronx Workforce 1 Career Center, 400 E. Fordham Road, 7th Floor, Bronx, NY 10458.

New Partners Inc. will present a recruitment for Home Health Aide (Bilingual English / Spanish 10 openings) on Friday, November 14, 2014, 10 am, at the Bronx Workforce 1 Career Center, 400 E. Fordham Road, 7th Floor, Bronx, NY 10458.

St. Nicks Alliance Workforce Development  provides Free Job Training and Educational Programs in Environmental Response and Remediation Tech (ERRT), Commercial Driver's License , Pest Control Technician Training (PCT), Employment Search and Prep Training and Job Placement, Earn Benefits and Career Path Center.  For  information and assistance,  please visit St. Nicks Alliance Workforce Development, 790 Broadway, 2nd Fl., Brooklyn, NY 11206.   718-302-2057 ext. 202.

Brooklyn Workforce Innovations helps jobless and working poor New Yorkers establish careers in sectors that offer good wages and opportunities for advancement. Currently BWI offers free job training programs in four industries: commercial driving, telecommunications cable installation, TV and film production, and skilled woodworking.  BWI is at 621 Degraw Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217.  718-237-5366.

CMP (formerly Chinatown Manpower Project) in lower Manhattan is now recruiting for a free training in Quickbooks,  Basic Accounting, and Excel.   This training is open to anyone who is receiving food stamps but no cash assistance.  Class runs for 8 weeks, followed by one-on-one meetings with a job developer.  For more information : Email:info@cmpny.org , call 212-571-1690 or visit 70 Mulberry Street, 3rd Floor, NY, NY 10013.   CMP also provides tuition-based healthcare and business trainings for free to students who are entitled to ACCESS funding.  Please call CMP for information.

Please note this blog post will be revised when more recruitment events for the week of November 9 are available.

One of the best books I have read this year was The Fault in Our Stars by John Green.  For those who have not read or seen the movie yet, The Fault in Our Stars tells the story of Hazel Grace and Augustus Waters. Hazel meets Augustus at a support group for kids with cancer and her life is forever changed. The Fault in Our Stars has spent 83 weeks in the New York Times bestseller list. 

The Fault in Our Stars film was released June 6, 2014.  

Another wonderful novel by John Green that I read this year was Looking for Alaska. The novel is about a boy named Miles Halter, who meets a girl named Alaska at his boarding school. Alaska is different from anyone Miles has ever met. 

This year I also read the Throne of Glass series by Sarah J Maas.  The first book in Throne of Glass of series is Throne of Glass, followed by Crown of Midnight and Heir of Fire. Each book in the series is better than the next.  Throne of Glass  tells the story of Celaena Sardothien. Celaena is an eighteen year old assassin sent to do hard labor in the salt mines of Endovier for her crimes. Crown Prince Dorian offers her a pathway to freedom by making her fight as his champion in the royal tournament. In order to gain her freedom Celaena must win the tournament and work for the palace for a few years. 

The Assassin's Blade is an anthology of five novellas that prequel Throne of Glass. 

The Divergent series by Veronica Roth is also very good. Divergent tells the story of Beatrice "Tris" Prior a quiet girl from a faction called Abnegation. On her choosing day she finds out that she is Divergent, which means that she does not conform to just one faction, she can belong to many. She transfer to Dauntless where she believes she can be who she really wants to be.  

Divergent is followed by Insurgent and Concludes in Allegiant. 

Four: A Divergent Collection is an anthology of stories about Four before her met Tris. 

The Divergent Movie was released in March 2014. 

What was the best book or book series you read this year? 

This is the text on one of the current displays in the Mid-Manhattan Library Picture Collection. In the few weeks this exhibit has been posted, it has reminded us that a picture of an actor can evoke widely varying memories from different people. Groups of people look at the pictures and start talking about which of a performer's films or shows they've seen, often also recalling at what point in their own lives they saw them. Even the staff members who made the exhibit were not immune to this.

For example, on seeing the chosen picture of Robert Mitchum, one recalled him as the vengeful preacher with "love" and "hate" tattooed on his knuckles in the film Night of the Hunter, while the other thought of the naval officer who was the main character in the TV miniseries Winds of War and War and Remembrance. Few mass art forms are absorbed in such a personal way by viewers as is film, and it's very interesting to work at the desk in the Picture Collection and overhear what the public says about our exhibit's theme and its choice of images.

This post was co-created with Jay Vissers, Mid-Manhattan Library, Art and Picture Collections

The New York Public Library Podcast brings you the best of the Library's author talks, live events, and other bookish curiosities. In our most recent episode, Neil Gaiman discusses his new interpretation of Hansel and Gretel.  Gaiman, the beloved bestselling author of Coraline, American Gods, and The Graveyard Book, joined us for a special Halloween Live at NYPL event. He spoke about librarians, why he learned to read, and his first brush with "Hansel and Gretel."

Like many writers, Gaiman began reading at a young age. He explains that this was because it was too difficult to demand storytime of adults:

"Adults were not obedient. You could not rely on them. There was never an adult when you wanted one. And you'd say, 'Read to me,' and they would say no. And you'd go, 'Right. I have to fix this.' So I was an incredibly early reader, just because I wanted those stories. "

Even so, it took Gaiman some time to warm up to librarians. Here's how describes the evolution of his understanding of librarians:

"I was terrified of them initially because librarians for me, my first experience of librarians, was they were those people who wanted their books back. I eventually gave almost all of them back... And then I discovered the power of A) they would answer questions and B) they understood this strange and abstract concept of the interlibrary loan."

Gaiman's latest book is his version of Hansel and Gretel, and his first brush with the classic fairy tale is a story in and of itself:

"'Hansel and Gretel' I think is probably the only one of Grimm's stories - maybe the Juniper Tree, but maybe even that I'd want to go back and fill that story in - the only one of the Grimm's stories I could ever imagine just wanting to retell straight, and wanting to retell straight partly because I remember being four years old, sitting in the garden at my grandmother's house in Portsmouth in South Sea, listening to the radio, and they put on a 'Hansel and Gretel' for kids with music... And I'm sitting there listening to this story and I'm like, 'Okay, so parents can lose their children, in the woods, on purpose.' I didn't know that. And then you listen to more, and I'm going, 'Okay, nice old lady. House. Good. Good—oh shit.' And then that awful moment of suddenly going, 'She wants to eat him!' And I'm looking down at myself at age four, going, 'I'm meat.' I had not figured this out: 'I'm edible.'"

You can subscribe to the New York Public Library Podcast to hear more conversations with wonderful artists, writers, and intellectuals. Join the conversation today!

Danny does not fit in New York City with his long hair and Mohawk ways. The other kids tease him about being different, calling him "Chief." Danny misses his reservation, but economics necessitated the move. Richard Bigtree, his father, visits his class and tells the kids about Native culture. This does not make much progress with the bullying kids.  His father wants him to make peace with his enemies.

Danny's mother works at the American Indian Community House. His friend there, Will, has joined a gang, which Danny really does not agree with. He misses the green trees and the community of the Akwesasne ("the place where the partridge drums") reservation.

Eagle Song by Joseph Bruchac, 1997

I loved learning about Native people from this book, and the Indian words interspersed in the text.

On November 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall fell, effectively and symbolically ending the Cold War. Twenty-five years later, we're still making sense of the decades of fear and east-west divisions. One need only watch FX's The Americans to see that the Cold War is still alive and well in the American imagination. As we look back at The Fall, here are the books we'll be reading.

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The Karla Trilogy Digital Collection Featuring George Smiley by John Le Carré You might call British intelligence agent George Smiley the "Anti-Bond." Neither handsome nor slick, he compensates with strategic brilliance.Iron Curtain by Anne Applebaum Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Anne Applebaum investigates how communism transformed Eastern Europe following World War II.The Sword and the Shield by Christopher M. Andrew What if the FBI found a treasure trove of KGB documents? In fact, they did, and the agency refers to it as their "most complete and extensive intelligence ever received."The Charm School by Nelson Demille A young American tourist discovers the secret KGB plot aimed at the American heartland.Spy Handler by Victor Cherkasin In this thrilling memoir, a former KGB officer tells the story of how he recruited two of America's most dangerous traitors, Robert Hanssen and Aldrich Ames.Comrade J by Pete Earley Comrade J was the highest ranking official in the SVR, the agency that succeeded the KGB. He directed all Russian spies in New York City, oversaw covert operations against the U.S. and its allies, and secretly, turned double agent for the FBI.Iron Curtain: From Stage to Cold War by Patrick Wright The "iron curtain" didn't always evoke its current political meanings. In fact, it began as a theater term. This fascinating history reveals the term's rich life.The Cold War by John Lewis Gaddis Informed by newly opened Soviet, Eastern European, and Chinese archives, this history of the Cold War focuses on the strategic relationships that marked the era.Within the Context of No Context by George W.S. Trow A prescient look at American pop culture.Anthropology of an American Girl by Hilary Thayer Hamann A young artist in the 1970s and 1980s discovers her true passions and a longterm love for a professional boxer.

Today women make up nearly half of the labor force, and more families with children have both parents working outside of the home than ever before. Latifa Lyles, director of the Women's Bureau, in her blog post, The Elephant at the Roundtable, affirms that quality and affordable child care should be a basic need, rather than a luxury.  Working mothers don't have  to make a choice between caring for a child and providing for a child.

Editor’s note: This is the third blog post in “Working Families, a Reality Series” by Women’s Bureau Director Latifa Lyles exploring issues that affect women and families in the 21st-century workplace.

Earlier this year, I participated in a small roundtable at the YWCA of Rochester & Monroe County in Rochester, New York in the last of our lead-up events for the White House Summit on Working Families. The goal of the event was to bring a handful of working women together with community leaders to discuss the range of working family issues – wages, fair pay, paid leave, workplace flexibility – from the vantage point of folks in the community.

After a tour of the facility, which includes short- and long-term housing for families, I joined a group of women that included Julie, a social worker and single mom, struggling to support her son on entry level pay; Trelawney, a part-time student and full time worker who has had to change her childcare arrangements three times in the past year; Kimberly, a single mother concerned about the effects the non-traditional schedule (working 3-11pm) was having on her 16-year-old son; and Orlandys, a teenage mother worried about how she will be able to juggle college, work and daycare once she graduates high school.

I broached the subject of working families through the variety of issues and intersections to be raised at the Summit. But not far into the conversation, it emerged that as working moms, child care was their central challenge in maintaining economic stability. It became clear that, despite the various child care situations discussed (including my own), the stress and insecurity that looms throughout the questions of access, affordability and quality have a tremendous impact on our lives as working parents.

The Obama administration has presented a robust policy agenda to address working family issues, encouraging common sense solutions that address the challenges of balancing personal and professional lives. This effort includes calling for an expansion of high-quality early childhood education and advocating for family- and business-friendly policies such as paid leave, flexible work schedules and child care.

Policies that enable women to participate in the labor force can give a large boost to economic growth. Today, women make up nearly half of the labor force, and more families with children have both parents working outside of the home than ever before. Nevertheless, women’s labor force participation rates in the U.S. have stagnated over past several years – an area in which America used to lead. Studies have shown that women are more likely to work if they have quality and affordable child care options. This is especially true for single mothers, who are nearly 40 percent more likely to maintain employment over two years than those who do not have support paying for child care. Unfortunately, quality and affordability continues to be elusive: According to the White House, since 2000, the cost of child care has grown twice as fast as the median income of families with children with annual costs for child, topping $15,000 for infants and $11,000 for 4 year-olds.

Enabling more women to work through improved access to child care can also help mitigate the gender wage gap for lifetime earnings. Women with access to reliable child care options are less likely to suffer unanticipated work interruptions and are more likely to stay in the labor force, and therefore are more likely to earn opportunities for advancement. Child care benefits can also provide a number of benefits to employers: research has found that employee absenteeism as the result of child care breakdowns costs U.S. businesses $3 billion a year. Expanded access to quality, affordable child care should be a central component to any modern-day social compact so that working mothers don’t have to make a choice between caring for a child and providing for a child. It’s time to start thinking of child care as a basic need, rather than a luxury.

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El jueves 27 de Noviembre se festeja el Día de Acción de Gracias (Thanksgiving). La siguiente lista selectiva de lectura además  de ofrecer nuevos temas de salud, superación, y relación personal y laboral le dará un motivo más para dar las gracias y ¡celebrar!

(Esta lista también está disponible en formato PDF.)

Vampiros emocionales en el trabajo: ¡que no te chupen la energía!

Albert J. Bernstein 

Un guía para aprender a identificar los diferentes tipos de personalidades negativas que agotan tu paciencia y energía en tu espacio de trabajo.

Algunas de estas y otras obras también pueden estar disponibles en diferentes formatos. Para más información sírvase comunicarse con el bibliotecario de su biblioteca local. Esta lista también está disponible en formato PDF. Síganos por ¡Twitter! Para información sobre eventos favor de visitar: Eventos en Español. Más Blog en Español

This is the Department of Labor blog post, authored by Mary Beth Maxiwell, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy at the U.S. Department of Labor and a senior advisor to Secretary Perez.  During a roundtable discussion with Secretary Perez, Dr. Zeynep Ton discusses how paying a living wage and investing in training are two decisions that are building successful, high-profile businesses across America.  In this blog,  Mary Beth Maxwell explains how this principle echoes the Labor Department's mission to provide good jobs for more people.

We’ve begun a new series of policy forums at the Labor Department, hosting national experts on issues that impact and inform our work here. Speakers have included Cass Sunstein (author ofSimpler: The Future of Government), Cary Goglianese (Does Regulation Kill Jobs?), and Wage and Hour Administrator David Weil (The Fissured Workplace).

Most recently we hosted Dr. Zeynep Ton, who teaches operations management at the MIT Sloan School of Management and authored the book, The Good Jobs Strategy: How the Smartest Companies Invest in Employees to Lower Costs and Boost Profits. After studying retail operations for more than a decade, Professor Ton has found that some of the most successful businesses are choosing to make significant investments in their employees — and making a lot of money doing it.[[{"fid":"276423","view_mode":"default","fields":{"format":"default","field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]":"good jobs","field_file_image_title_text[und][0][value]":""},"type":"media","attributes":{"alt":"good jobs","style":"float:right","class":"media-element file-default"}}]]

Professor Ton launched her research by looking for ways to increase efficiency in operations and to improve businesses’ competitiveness. What she found flew in the face of what is sometimes considered conventional wisdom in today’s global marketplace: The days of good jobs are over, especially for low-cost retailers, who often seem to rely on low wages and just-in-time scheduling. Dr. Ton was surprised in discovering example after example of some of the most successful retailers making a very different choice.

Many of us may be familiar with the Costco story. They pay a living wage, they promote from within and benefit from incredible employee retention and loyalty, and their sales per employee are almost double those of their main competitors. But Professor Ton has found that this strategy is not unique to Costco and its segment of the retail industry.

As another example among several, QuikTrip — a chain of low-price convenience stores — has also made this model work. They pay higher wages and benefits, and they schedule more workers so they can commit to high-quality service. In fact, QuikTrip’s wages and benefits are good enough that they have been named one of Fortune’s “100 best companies to work for” every year since 2003. And this investment has clearly paid off: their sales per labor hour are 66 percent higher than those of an average convenience store.

Through her years of research, Professor Ton has documented the fact that low wages and unpredictable work schedules are a choice — they are not the only business strategy — and it is a choice that comes with costs. At our forum, Dr. Ton talked about the fact that some companies are stuck in a vicious cycle of low investment in employees, poor operations and bad service, decreasing sales and profits and decreasing labor budgets. But companies can instead create a virtuous cycle by combining investments in workers like cross-training and higher wages with a sustained focus on logistics and service, reaping the benefits in sales and profits.

“Offering good jobs is a choice that’s available to all retailers – small, large, regional, national, public private if you want to move our economy more towards a good jobs economy that works for all, we have to think about not just the wages and benefits, but look at the work itself, because as I examine different companies – from Costco to QuikTrip — what I found was they weren’t just paying their people more, they were designing the work differently. They were designing the work so their employees are more productive, so they are more engaged, so they contribute more, so their job is more meaningful — there is more dignity in their job. Good jobs — in my research and the research of others — good jobs equal good work.”

As Dr. Ton talked to us about the decisions that successful, high-profile businesses have made — paying a living wage, investing in training and others — I could not help but think about the millions of low-wage American workers who have been mobilizing to demand these same things. It’s no surprise that workers value higher wages, a say in scheduling, and a certain dignity at work. But Professor Ton’s research shows that these same values can play a crucial role in building a successful, profitable business.

Secretary Perez talks often about rejecting “false choices” and lifts up companies that “do well by doing good.” If you missed his recent speech at the National Press Club, it’s a pragmatic as well as optimistic call for a return to the core American values of shared responsibility and shared prosperity. He talked about the fact that investing in workers is a crucial part of building an economy that works for everyone, and he highlighted the leadership of business executives, who believe an investment in their workers is an investment in the strength of their companies. Among other success stories, Secretary Perez lifted up the remarkable action this past summer of Market Basket workers and managers who came together around shared values, partnership and a mission that works: low prices, great service AND great jobs.

As we meet with business leaders from across the country, we continue to see there are companies all around us illustrating that what’s good for American workers is good for American business, too. And Dr. Ton’s concrete data and analysis are a critical new contribution to making the business case for investing in employees.

Worker engagement isn’t just the right thing to do; it’s a winning strategy for competitive high-quality services and a high-profit bottom line.

Mary Beth Maxwell is the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Policy at the U.S. Department of Labor and a senior advisor to Secretary Perez.

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On a rainy November 6 SIBL hosted The 2nd annual NYC Small Business Technology Expo. This free event is part of a citywide initiative supported by the New York City Department of Small Business Services, Citi Community Development, and the The NYC Small Business Technology Coalition (a public-private partnership between the NYC Department of Small Business Services, Citi Community Development, and select community development organizations across New York City). The goal is to help NYC small businesses located in low-to-moderate income communities implement technology that will help them grow.

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Among the speakers were:

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The NYC Small Business Technology Expo presents a great opportunity for small business owners and entrepreneurs to network with innovative and cutting edge technology companies. This year's participants included:

Topics discussed during breakout sessions included:

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In celebration of Veterans Day 2014, Dr. Nancy A.  Glowacki, manager of the Women Veteran Program at the Department of Labor Veterans' Employment and Training Service, presents Celebrating  All Veterans - Breaking Down Gender Barriers. In her blog, Nancy states that all efforts to expand economic opportunites for veterans must include consideration of the additional strengths and challenges of working women.  This year's annual Department of Labor Salute to Veterans had a specific focus on women  veterans in STEM occupations.

Americans have honored veterans on November 11th since the formal end of major hostilities of World War I on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 1918, when the Armistice with Germany went into effect. In 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed a bill into law that expanded Armistice Day to celebrate all veterans who have served in the military, and officially changed the name to Veterans Day. 

Since then, the community of all veterans has continuously grown more diverse, particularly in regard to gender. When the U.S. military shifted to an all-volunteer force in 1973, women represented just 2 percent of service members. Today, women (who have always been volunteers) comprise 15 percent of the active duty component and 18 percent of National Guard and Reserve forces.

Women veterans are more likely than their male counterparts to be of working age. While women make up 10 percent of the overall veteran population, 13 percent of veterans in the civilian labor force are women. Of those veterans who served after 9/11, 20 percent are women.

There is a mantra I often use to simplify what must happen to increase economic opportunities for American women veterans:

As the proportion of women in the veteran population continues to grow, all efforts to expandeconomic opportunities for veterans must include consideration of the additional strengths and challenges of working women.

As more veterans leave the military and join the ranks of civilian working women, all efforts to expand economic opportunities for working women must include consideration of the additional strengths and challenges of veterans.

This year’s annual Department of Labor Salute to Veterans had a specific focus on women veterans in non-traditional occupations like science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Women (veterans and nonveterans alike) continue to be underrepresented in these fields, which are projected to grow at faster rates than other job sectors and present significant economic opportunities.

During the panel discussion, veterans of both genders discussed how some women veterans have broken down the barriers associated with non-traditional career fields both in the military and in the civilian sector from their own perspectives as employees and employers.

To all my fellow veterans, my sincere gratitude for your service and sacrifice to our great nation. I hope you have an honored and memorable Veterans’ Day.

To my sisters in military service, please join me in proclaiming our veteran status at every opportunity! Let’s show the country what the community of all veterans really looks like and let’s continue to break down gender barriers!

Dr. Nancy A. Glowacki is the women veteran program manager at the Labor Department’s Veterans’ Employment and Training Service.

In celebration of Veterans Day 2014, Tom Perez, secretary of Labor,  presents  Working for Our Veterans Every Day.  He delivers the good news that "We’ll need upwards of 100,000 more computer support specialists in the coming years. 30,000 more surgical techs. These are the jobs of today and tomorrow — they pay middle-class wages and they don’t require advanced degrees. And their military experience uniquely equips veterans to thrive in these jobs."  He also states that  "We recently completed a four-year, $2 billion investment in community colleges, to help them better serve veterans and other adult learners."

We spend a lot of time at the Labor Department talking to employers about the traits that veterans can bring to help a company succeed here in the U.S. I certainly don’t need convincing that veterans are indispensable members of any team. I see it every day here at the Department of Labor, where 33 percent of the new employees we hired last fiscal year are veterans.

The economic outlook in our country has improved in meaningful and measurable ways of late, and the news is encouraging for veterans and their families. October was the 56th straight month of private-sector job growth, to the tune of 10.6 million new jobs. For veterans, the unemployment rate is now at 4.5 percent, down from 6.9 percent a year ago. With the overall unemployment at 5.8 percent, that points to the idea that more employers are getting the message that hiring veterans is good for business.

Yesterday, at our annual event recognizing the contributions of veterans to our economy, we held a discussion on women veterans in science, technology, engineering and mathematics careers. One of the most important steps in the stairway to shared prosperity is empowering people with the skills they need to succeed in jobs that employers want to fill right now.

About a quarter of the companies on Fortune Magazine’s list of 100 fastest growing companies are in the energy sector. That means a treasure trove of energy-related jobs; the utilities are in the process of dramatically expanding and modernizing the grid, which will require workers who can earn at least $50,000 a year to start. We can’t expand broadband access without middle-class workers either.

We’ll need upwards of 100,000 more computer support specialists in the coming years. 30,000 more surgical techs. These are the jobs of today and tomorrow — they pay middle-class wages and they don’t require advanced degrees. And their military experience uniquely equips veterans to thrive in these jobs.

Also, our skills and training infrastructure is undergoing a dramatic transformation, with the rise of apprenticeships and other innovations. We are building a modernized, refurbished skills superhighway enabling workers to get good jobs and businesses to find good workers. We have to work with all due urgency to ensure that we are helping to connect veterans to the programs that will help them launch their own journeys down that superhighway. We recently completed a four-year, $2 billion investment in community colleges, to help them better serve veterans and other adult learners.

Adding women veterans into the mix, we encounter a number of other challenges and opportunities. Women – veterans and non-veterans alike – continue to be underrepresented in these critical areas of the economy. The majority of opportunities for STEM mentorship or awareness programs are for high-schoolers or younger girls, not for women veterans. Another tricky problem that we’ve encountered in the field is that women veterans don’t always identify themselves as such when taking advantage of services at American Job Centers.

That’s something we need to work hard to change, to make sure that these veterans are getting the message to “Stand Up, Speak Up, and Claim Their Veteran Status Proudly.”

Women in STEM fields make, on average, 33 percent more than women in non-STEM fields, and the gender pay gap is smaller in those occupations. That alone provides an imperative for us to help women veterans connect with the opportunities for training in these fields.

While 63 percent of the women veteran population is in the civilian labor force, compared to 58 percent of women non-veterans, there are still too many women on the bench. We need them in the game, as full participants in this economy – because America is strongest when it fields a full team.

Our debt to our veterans extends far beyond the tributes and celebrations of their heroism on one day every year. Every day, we must support their successful transition into the civilian workforce through effective, targeted policies and programs that serve them as dutifully as they have served us. I trust that our team here at the Labor Department feels that in their core, and I pledge today that we will remain relentless in the pursuit of opportunity for our veterans.

Follow Secretary Perez on Twitter, @LaborSec.

A fence separates the homes where white folks live and the homes where black folks live. Clover notices a little girl on the other side of the fence. She wants to play with her and her friends, but everyone's mothers told them not to go over the fence. Unfortunately, the white girl is all alone and she looks sad. However, she has fun playing in the rain, which Clover is not allowed to do.

Clover takes to sitting on the fence, and she talks to the white girl, whose name is Annie. They sit on the fence together, since there is no prohibition against sitting on the fence. Annie and Clover spend a lot of time on the fence talking to each other. Clover's friends become curious about Annie.

The Other Side by Jacqueline Woodson, 2001

I love the simplicity of the watercolor illustrations.

I don't know what it is about autumn but it puts me in the mood for history. 

Maybe it's just my subconscious connecting the season with Thanksgiving and early Colonial American history, but I crave stories about Colonial and Revolutionary America every fall.  So I thanked my lucky stars when I stumbled across this gem as I was browsing the Hamilton Grange YA shelves recently. 

Accused of a murder he did not commit, Vango has to try to uncover his past in order to prove his innocence. His journey takes him all over Europe, but with the world still reeling from the First World War, will he succeed in clearing his name?Vango: Between Sky and Earth by Timothée de Fombelle

What are some other favorite autumn reads?

A few months ago, the NYPL Milstein Division of United States History, Local History & Genealogy put our collective local history obsessive minds together to bring you a list of our favorite NYC non-fiction books. Now we reveal our favorite New York documentaries. These documentary films best depict New York, either in moments or over lengths of time, providing a capsule of a New York experience.

Battle For Brooklyn The story of a reluctant activist Daniel Goldstein as he struggles to save his home and community from being demolished to make way for a professional basketball arena and densest real estate development in U.S. history.

Milstein says: “Although fairly one-sided, it’s a prime example of big projects versus residents that is so common in NYC.”

Bill Cunningham New York Documentary on New York times fashion photographer Bill Cunningham. For decades, Cunningham "has been chronicling fashion trends and high society charity soirées for the Times Style section in his columns 'On the Street' and 'Evening Hours."

Milstein says: “Bill succeeds in his classic paradox New York lifestyle only after riding a bike around town for 60 years and spending every Sunday in church. He is paid to follow the nightlife of tastemakers but is mortified by elite treatment and wears a blue janitor’s smock from the hardware store. He lives in a rent control studio in Carnegie Hall two blocks from the highest retail rents in the world. “I don’t touch money,” says Bill. New York has a habit of using small parts of itself as a stunt double for the universe, and the city needs Bill Cunningham to take pictures of it.”

Blank City In the late 1970s to the middle 1980s, Manhattan was in ruins. But true art has never come from comfort, and it was precisely those dire circumstances that inspired artists like Jim Jarmusch, Lizzy Borden, and Amos Poe to produce some of their best works. Taking their cues from punk rock and new wave music, these young maverick filmmakers confronted viewers with a stark reality that stood in powerful contrast to the escapist product being churned out by Hollywood. Documents the history of "No wave cinema" and "cinema of transgression" movements.

Milstein says: “A vivid portrait and love letter to a time when artists could afford to work and play in Manhattan. Makes you nostalgic for a grittier version of the Lower East Side.”

Capturing the Friedmans The Friedman's seem to be a typical family from affluent Great Neck, Long Island. One Thanksgiving, as the family gathers for a quiet holiday dinner, a police battering ram splinters the front door and officers rush inside. The police charge Arnold and his son Jesse with hundreds of shocking crimes. As police investigate, and the community reacts, the fabric of the family begins to disintegrate, revealing questions about justice, family and finally the truth.

Milstein says: “Absolutely disturbing and yet absolutely fascinating. You will really question what is true and what is fabricated.”

Dark Days Documentary about a community of homeless people living in a train tunnel beneath Manhattan. Depicts a way of life that is unimaginable to most of those who walk the streets above: in the pitch black of the tunnel, rats swarm through piles of garbage as high-speed trains leaving Penn station tear through the darkness. For some of those who have gone underground, it has been home for as long as 25 years.

Milstein says: “This is like a peek into a secret and sad world that you would never have permission to enter. It will make you redefine the word ‘community’.”

Grey Gardens Portrait of the relationship between Edith Bouvier Beale and her grown daughter, Little Edie, once an aspiring actress in New York who left her career to care for her aging mother in their East Hampton home, and never left again. The aunt and cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis feed their cats and raccoons and rehash their pasts behind the walls of their decaying mansion, Grey Gardens.

Milstein says: “A dark study of an overly codependent relationship in hovel that should be a castle.”

Jamel Shabazz: Street Photographer Photographer Jamel Shabazz has documented urban life for more than 30 years and has covered the growth of hip-hop in New York City since the 1980s. The documentary "Jamel Shabazz Street Photographer," is a portrait of his life, career, and impact as a photographer, educator, and visual artist.

Milstein says: “Just as much as Shabazz’s iconic books of photographs, Back in the Days, A Time Before Crack, and The Last Sunday in June, this film transports you to his NYC, an under-represented beauty of black families, B-Boys, Black Muslims, and street bravado.”

Man on Wire On August 7th, 1974, a young Frenchman named Philippe Petit stepped out on a wire illegally rigged between the New York World Trade Center's Twin Towers. After dancing for nearly an hour on the wire, he was arrested, taken for psychological evaluation, and brought to jail, before finally being released.

Milstein says: “This feat and this story portrayed the WTC Twin Towers in a way I had never pictured them before. And a tightrope walker as your storyteller - I would not have envisioned that but I’m glad to see the vision manifested.”

Manhatta Photographer Paul Strand and painter Charles Sheehan filmed Manhatta in 1921. An 11-minute documentary, it explores photography using the medium of cinema, and is also a tribute to Manhattan. The film consists of 65 shots of various views of the city. The camera is static. Movement comes from within the picture frame, from people, cars and trucks, trains, tugboats, passenger liners, and from the steam and smoke they produce, nearly all at a distance, rendered somehow impersonal. Skyscrapers and bridges dominate. The film begins with a shot of the skyline, seen from the East River, then the Brooklyn Bridge, before moving to a shot of commuters streaming out of the Staten Island Ferry. For the most part we cannot see their faces. Next we see a shot of Trinity Church Cemetery, followed by a view of the large blank windows of an office building, dwarfing the people walking by. Next a shot of the Woolworth Building, the Cathedral of Commerce. We see some views at street level, of people on the sidewalk, on their way to work, and so on. But mostly the shots are from above, or at a distance. The camera shows construction workers in silhouette, part of the skyline. We see the rooftops and their chimneys and water towers, the windows of skyscrapers, and further on, the horizon, the sun setting over the Hudson.

Milstein says: “The film is modern, at times abstract, almost surreal. Interstitial titles quote Walt Whitman, lines which precede and underpin the shots that follow. The film is both modern and sublime, a large scale tribute to Manhattan. It does not concern itself overly with individual people, rather the monuments they build. Manhatta does not seem overtly political. It does not explore the down sides to industrialism, technology, capitalism, and modern living, tropes popular in modernist works. Yet one cannot help but think of the cinematic passages in Manhattan Transfer, a very political, and modern text. I feel sure that the book's author Jon Dos Passos must have seen Strand and Sheehan's film.”

Mulberry Street Born in the Bronx and raised in upstate New York, Abel Ferrara started his professional film career on Mulberry Street in 1975. For the past year he's been living on the block, and the feast of San Gennaro is the subject of his new film. While he has used this location for a few of his features, this time it's the star of the film.

Milstein says: “A week in the life of Little Italy's San Gennaro Festival, directed by the O. Henry of Fear City, Abel Ferrara (King of New York, Driller Killer). A sausage-and-peppers homage to New York street life and ethnic pride which still haven't gone the way of subway tokens, Howard Johnson's, and smoking in bars. Plus the brief appearance by a Frank Vincent bubble-head doll.”

New York: A Documentary Film - Ric Burns An eight-part, 17½ hour, American documentary film on the history of New York City.

Milstein says: “This series was a big deal for me when I immigrated and all I knew was Ramones, Seinfeld, Taxi, Madonna, Hip Hop and bagels. It's a great introduction to New York History.”

On the Bowery 1956 American docufiction film directed by Lionel Rogosin. It was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. The film chronicles three desperate days in a then impoverished lower Manhattan neighborhood, New York's skid row: the Bowery. It is the story of Ray (Ray Salyer), a railroad worker, who drifts on to the Bowery to have a drunken spree after a long bout of laying tracks and then falls in with a band of drunks.

Milstein says: “This is not strictly a documentary despite being nominated for ‘Best Documentary feature’. It is however amazing footage of the Bowery in the 1950s. It’s footage New Yorkers should see, especially if they’ve ever walked along today’s more upscale version of the iconic street.”

Page One: Inside the New York Times This documentary chronicles the transformation of The New York Times newsroom and the inner workings of the Media Desk, as the Internet redefines the media industry by surpassing print as the main source of news.

Milstein says: “As New Yorkers, the Grey Lady is ours. There is no better paper to observe in this changing era of news than this one.”

Paris Is Burning Behind-the-scenes story of the fashion-obsessed New Yorkers who created 'voguing' and drag balls, and turned these raucous celebrations into a powerful expression of fierce personal pride.

Milstein says: “An absolutely perfect time capsule of the late 1980s in the NYC drag scene. The director lets the subjects explain themselves instead of trying to superimpose definitions on an underrepresented group of fascinating frolickers.”

Public Speaking Wise, brilliant, and funny, Fran Lebowitz hit the New York literary scene in the early '70s when Andy Warhol hired the unknown scribe to write a column for Interview magazine. Today, she's an acclaimed author with legions of fans who adore her acerbic wit. Public speaking captures the author in conversation at New York's Waverly Inn, in an onstage discussion with longtime friend and celebrated writer Toni Morrison, and on the streets of New York City.

Milstein says: “The director of Goodfellas profiles NYC writer and personality Fran Lebowitz, whose machine-gun wit and opinions, like the wiseguys, blow people's heads off. Fran talks in fast punchlines and her New York story is inter-spliced by an abundance of footage recounting the post-war legacy of New York artists and intellectuals, including James Baldwin debating William F. Buckley and Serge Gainsbourg's 1964 video for "New York USA."

Style Wars Exploration of the subculture of New York's young graffiti writers and break dancers, showing their activities and aspirations and the social and aesthetic controversies surrounding New York graffiti. Dramatizes conflicts between graffiti artists and the city, as well as among the graffiti artists themselves.

Milstein says: “Another perfect time capsule. Mid ‘80s breakdancing and graffiti art all set in their natural backdrop of the NY transit system. Anyone interested in hip hop or street art should see this.”

Do you have a favorite NYC documentary? Let us know in the comments!

This is the Department of Labor blog post, authored by Dr. David Weil, administrator of the Department's Wage and Hour Division.  In his blog he states that  we need to create ripple effects that impact compliance far beyond the workplaces where we physically conduct investigations.  He also affirms that  creating ripple effects through strategic enforcement will help the Department of Labor reach their fundamental goal of making sure workers in the U.S. receive a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work. Achieving that goal also requires education and outreach. 

Editor’s note: This is the second in a series of several blog posts about a Wage and Hour Division for the 21st Century Workplace.

The goal of the Wage and Hour Division is to protect the earnings and welfare of workers, and ensure a fair and level playing field for employers. We have a lot of ground to cover to accomplish that mission. More than 7.3 million establishments and 135 million workers are covered by the laws we enforce. Yet, we have limited resources. To carry out our job, we must be prudent and strategic in our enforcement actions.

Over the last several years, we’ve been targeting investigations where evidence shows labor law violations are greatest—that is, in industries where workers are most likely to be mistakenly or deliberately cheated out of their wages, and where they are least likely to speak up and report such violations. And now, we are taking strategic enforcement to the next level.

We need to create ripple effects that impact compliance far beyond the workplaces where we physically conduct investigations, or the organizations to which we provide outreach directly. We need to continue to find ways to make our investigation of one employer resonate throughout that particular sector and influence the behaviors of employers across that entire industry, to promote compliance across networks of business organizations.

Creating ripple effects requires doing several things:

Here’s a recent case example. A drywall contractor in Arizona was found liable for $600,000 in back wages and penalties after its labor provider misclassified the workers it supplied as independent contractors rather than employees. The contractor also was required to ensure that any subcontractors it hires in the future are properly licensed and insured, and that they comply with federal labor laws. Additionally, the contractor must educate its peers about the importance of compliance, including making presentations to home builders. The ripple effect created by this one investigation will spread across the entire Arizona residential construction industry. It will be good for workers, and good for those businesses that play by the rules.

The success of our enforcement efforts won’t be statistics showing the amount of back wages we have collected for workers. It will be improving compliance levels, so that when we enter workplaces in the future, we find fewer and fewer violations. Creating ripple effects through strategic enforcement will help us reach our fundamental goal of making sure workers in the U.S. receive a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work. Achieving that goal also requires education and outreach – which I will address in my next blog post.

Dr. David Weil is administrator of the department’s Wage and Hour Division.

The New York Public Library Podcast brings you the best of the Library's author talks, live events, and other bookish curiosities. In our most recent episode, we were lucky to be visited by George Clinton, a.k.a. Dr. Funkenstein himself. A pioneer of '70s funk, the creative mastermind has worked as a producer, writer, and performer. He spoke with us about rejected album cover concepts, Smokey Robinson, and inspiring Snoop Dogg. Most importantly, he urged, "Get off your ass and jam."

Clinton in many ways revolutionized music with his contributions to funk, but he also acknowledges those who inspired him. Of his hero Smokey Robinson, Clinton said:

"Smokey, when he wrote songs like 'My Girl,' 'It's Growing,' and all of that, it turned the whole industry around. Everybody had been writing bubble gum, you know, love songs. But he had lyrics and puns that you were like, 'How can anyone think of all of that?' And he would do it over and over... He was an artist artist."

As he reflected on several of his album covers, Clinton recalled the original idea for the Maggot Brain cover which was eventually rejected by the record company:

"Now if I told you what the original cover was going to look like, it was kind of nasty. But I can tell you. It was gonna be a pimp vampire, black vampire. You know, cape back, clean, fang with a diamond in it, a sparkling diamond. A glass of blood. Not biting nobody's neck. He was too cool to bite somebody's neck. He'd have a glass of blood with the fang, but when you look close to it, you saw a whole bunch of squeezed out tampons laying around."

Clinton's influence can be seen in the work of many artists, including Snoop Dogg. When asked how he felt hearing Snoop's "Who Am I," which features samples of Clinton's "Atomic Dog," Clinton was unequivocally pleased:

"I'm very proud hearing that. You know, I was actually on that record besides the samples. I actually did a live part on Snoop's record. I worked with Dre right from the very beginning on Tupac's 'You Can't See Me,' that record, and on quite a few of Dre's and Snoop's records. They were part of the P-Funk Mothership thing on the west coast. Dre had a company called Uncle Jam's Army, taken from one of our records, so we knew them before there was NWA. So by the time they got to do that, we was ready, you know, to be one nation under groove."

You can subscribe to the New York Public Library Podcast to hear more conversations with wonderful artists, writers, and intellectuals. Join the conversation today!