Investing in Green Economy Could Create 2 Million Jobs

by James Parks, Sep 9, 2008

The United States could create 2 million new jobs and lower the unemployment rate to 4.4 percent in just two years by investing $100 billion into developing a green economy, according to a new report released today.

The struggling construction and manufacturing sectors would be boosted by nearly 800,000 of those jobs, the report’s authors say. Overall, such an investment would roughly triple the number of well-paying jobs—paying at least $16 dollars an hour—compared with spending the same amount of money within the oil industry. The Political Economy Research Institute at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and the Center for American Progress (CAP) prepared the report, Green Recovery—A Program to Create Good Jobs and Start Building a Low-Carbon Economy.

The report also marks the launch of a weeklong speaking tour for the Green Jobs for America campaign to educate the public about the need for investments in family-supporting green jobs. The campaign is a partnership of CAP, Sierra Club, United Steelworkers (USW), Blue Green Alliance, Natural Resources Defense Council, Green For All, the New Jersey Work Environment Council and Working America.

The key to a green economy is investment in renewable energy and energy efficiency through a program of direct public-fund expenditures, tax credits and loan guarantees to spur private-sector investment, says Robert Pollin, the report’s author.

USW President Leo Gerard says by investing in the green economy, we are pursuing an economic policy that creates more and better jobs and moves our country toward a low-carbon economy that will benefit this and future generations:

The outlook for American workers remains cloudy. A weakened economy and high energy prices are making it harder for middle class men, women and families to make ends meet. Americans deserve an affordable and stable economic future, and we can get there by pursuing a comprehensive and long-term approach that creates good jobs here in the United States, increases our energy security, and reduces our reliance on harmful fossil fuels.

The green recovery program would boost private and public investment through the following energy efficiency and renewable energy strategies:

• Retrofitting buildings to improve energy efficiency.
• Expanding mass transit and freight rail.
• Constructing “smart” electrical grid transmission systems.
• Increasing usage of wind power, solar power and next generation biofuels.

Click here to read the full report.

Says Blue Green Alliance Executive Director David Foster:

Green jobs are not only those that produce a green product designed for a specific environmental purpose but also include existing jobs that involve a green process or a green purpose. Steelworkers building components for wind turbines are performing green jobs, as are chemical workers making products that are not harmful to humans or the environment. The green revolution isn’t just creating new and different jobs. It’s revitalizing and creating new investment in a lot of the jobs we already have.

Blue Green Alliance, a strategic partnership between the USW and the Sierra Club, has joined with the Alliance for Climate Protection, the nonprofit organization founded by former Vice President and Nobel Prize winner Al Gore, to take action to solve the climate crisis. In a first-of-its-kind program, the Blue Green Alliance and USW will work jointly with the Alliance for Climate Protection to educate members about global warming and mobilize them to support solutions that promote economic prosperity for everyone.

In March, the AFL-CIO Executive Council outlined a strategic approach to combat global warming domestically and around the world—and at the same time create a “green economy” with good jobs. In the statement “Greening the Economy,” the council says:

The AFL-CIO believes we can have both a healthy economy and a cleaner planet….The greening of the economy means that every job that contributes to a low-carbon future is a green job.

The council’s blueprint follows December’s U.N. meeting on climate change in Bali, where the global union movement called for decisive action, especially global warming

Some of the steps the council calls for in this country include:

• Diversity in the electric utility industry and the retention of all current generating options, including fossil fuels, nuclear, hydro and renewable energy.
• New investment in a sustainable energy infrastructure must be structured to create good jobs and ensure stable energy prices.
• An economy-wide cap-and-trade program that is transparent and requires all sectors to come to the table to reduce their carbon emissions.
• Energy incentives and investments by the federal government must be based on a set of economic development principles that clean the environment and create jobs but will not encourage offshoring of manufacturing jobs.

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