Green Jobs Myths

• Myth: Everyone understands what a green job is.
• Reality: No standard definition of a green job exists.
• Myth: Creating green jobs will boost productive employment.
• Reality: Green jobs estimates include huge numbers of clerical, bureaucratic, and administrative positions that do not produce goods and services for consumption.
• Myth: Green jobs forecasts are reliable.
• Reality: The green jobs studies made estimates using poor economic models based on dubious assumptions.
• Myth: Green jobs promote employment growth.
• Reality: By promoting more jobs instead of more productivity, the green jobs described in the literature encourage low-paying jobs in less desirable conditions. Economic growth cannot be ordered by Congress or by the United Nations. Government interference - such as restricting successful technologies in favor of speculative technologies favored by special interests - will generate stagnation.
• Myth: The world economy can be remade by reducing trade and relying on local production and reduced consumption without dramatically decreasing our standard of living.
• Reality: History shows that nations cannot produce everything their citizens need or desire. People and firms have talents that allow specialization that make goods and services ever more efficient and lower-cost, thereby enriching society.
• Myth: Government mandates are a substitute for free markets.
• Reality: Companies react more swiftly and efficiently to the demands of their customers and markets, than to cumbersome government mandates.
• Myth: Imposing technological progress by regulation is desirable.
• Reality: Some technologies preferred by the green jobs studies are not capable of efficiently reaching the scale necessary to meet today's demands and could be counterproductive to environmental quality.