A lot of congratulations were passed around by lawmakers a few weeks ago when the federal hourly minimum wage was increased to $5.85, a 70 cent uptick. But wages are just part of the problem for workers in bottom-rung jobs. Health hazards, lack of insurance and labor law violations are among the on-the-job inequities faced by these workers, according to industry experts interviewed by TIME, as well as a new report from the Brennan Center for Justice at New ...

As the U.S. jumps on board the cash-for-clunkers bandwagon, the Obama Administration would do well to pay attention to what is happening in Hamburg's sprawling harbor. The seaport city is one of the busiest ports in the world: nearly every car — new or used — passes through its docks on the way out of Germany. And this week, the police charged with patrolling the harbor released evidence showing that Germany's hugely popular cash-for-clunkers program may have some unintended ...

Fossil fuel emissions are not just bad for the planet and bad for your lungs, they may also harm your baby's developing brain. A new study published in the journal Pediatrics links mothers' exposure to high levels of environmental pollutants during pregnancy to a four-point drop in children's IQ scores by age 5. "A difference in four points could be educationally meaningful in terms of school success," says Frederica Perera, director of the Columbia Center for Children's Environmental Health ...

Twenty milligrams; that's the average amount of carbon emissions generated from the time it took you to read the first two words of this article. Now, depending on how quickly you read, around 80, perhaps even 100 milligrams of C02 have been released. And in the several minutes it will take you to get to the end of this story, the number of milligrams of greenhouse gas emitted could be several thousand, if not more. This may not ...

A four-story residential building collapsed Sunday in the Fort Greene neighborhood of Brooklyn, and at least four people suffered minor injuries, according to the New York City Fire Department. The cause of the midday collapse of the building on Myrtle Avenue between Ryerson and Hall streets was not immediately known. All residents of the building were accounted for, authorities said. Three people were given medical attention at the scene and a fourth person was taken to a Brooklyn ...

A $15.5 million payout made by oil giant Shell to settle a lawsuit brought against it by relations of executed Nigerian writer Ken Saro-Wiwa and other activists will allow the families of the victims to move on with their lives, Saro-Wiwa's son has told CNN. The New York lawsuit -- brought to court by the Center for Constitutional Rights on behalf of Saro-Wiwa's family and others in 1996 -- accused Shell's Nigerian subsidiary of complicity in the writer's 1995 hanging ...

Oil company Royal Dutch Shell will pay $15.5 million to settle a lawsuit against its Nigerian subsidiary by the family of executed Nigerian environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and other dissidents, the plaintiffs announced Monday. The lawsuit accuses Shell of complicity in the 1995 hanging of Saro-Wiwa and the killings or persecution of other environmental activists by the military government that ruled the country at the time. Roughly half of the settlement will go into a trust fund to help the ...

(CNN) -- Here is a look at the resume and record of federal Judge Sonia Sotomayor, whom President Barack Obama has chosen as his nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court. • Age 54 (Born June 25, 1954, New York City) Judicial Career • U.S. Appeals Court judge, 2nd Circuit, 1998-present • U.S. District Court judge, 1992-1998 • Nominated to federal bench by Bush in 1991, Clinton in 1997 Government/Legal Career • Former N.Y. County Assistant District Attorney, ...

Environmentalists savored a long-awaited victory on Thursday when the carbon cap-and-trade bill fashioned by Democratic Representatives Henry Waxman and Edward Markey passed out of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, putting it on the road to becoming a law. Supporters had to withstand over 400 amendments filed by Republicans during the markup of the bill this week, but it's now possible the U.S. could see climate legislation go into effect by the end of the year. "The bill represents ...

In a landmark decision on climate change and energy, President Barack Obama will announce tough new vehicle gas-mileage standards on Tuesday, the first ever national limits on greenhouse-gas emissions. The new policy, which was worked out between Washington, state governments and the auto industry, will require automakers to meet a minimum fuel-efficiency standard of 35.5 miles a gallon by model year 2016 — four years earlier than Congress currently requires. Not only could the move potentially kick-start the ...