8 million jobs, 9 trillion dollars, Inslee's radical plan on tackling climate change

[pnwmom]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/may/16/2020-jay-inslee-climate-change-plan

Jay Inslee, the governor of Washington state, is introducing a second portion of his climate change plan as most Democratic contenders for president have yet to officially roll out their own big-picture proposals.

Inslee’s 38-page document is focused on creating jobs. It outlines a $9tn investment over 10 years and seeks to create 8m jobs aimed at decarbonizing the economy. In an earlier plan, he vowed to make the US carbon neutral by 2045.

Inslee wants to upgrade buildings, replace water and transit infrastructure, clean up manufacturing and quintuple spending on clean energy and climate research. Many of those efforts would require congressional legislation.

The blueprint echoes progressives’ Green New Deal, but with far more details and fewer commitments to social programs.

Inslee told the Guardian: “You think of the Green New Deal as saying, ‘We should go to the moon’ – but in my plan is how to build the rocket ship. They both have their value.” He suggested other candidates might not have the “spine” to take the bold action needed.

SNIP

[jmbar2]

1. Great ideas, but very skeptical about jobs numbers

I used to do labor market analysis for colleges to identify future education needs. There are always lots of grants available to create curriculum and college programs for new occupations. However, it's mostly a scam, based on the "big bucket-o-jobs" fallacy.

-A lot of the jobs are temporary, during the initial buildout, then they go away. They are also pretty hard labor jobs, not lifelong careers.

- New occupations are filled by existing workers in related fields. For example installing solar panels will likely be done by existing roofing and HVAC workers. In many cases, these jobs are also performed by undocumented immigrants, who then go into business for themselves. (I don't have any problem with that).

- The government will hand out money to create training, and colleges will go into a feeding frenzy creating programs that oversell the occupation and produce too many graduates for low-paying, temporary jobs.

- Students will take out loans, and two years later graduate to find the jobs already taken, or in decline. The debt never goes away.

- Many of the jobs will not pay enough, or won't be stable long-term careers to repay the investment.



I really wish our candidates would stop perpetuating the "big bucket-o-jobs" stories.

[ancianita]

2. Excellent plan, and with experience in data use. I trust his up front spending plan. It will save

TRILLIONS more to global economies than it would cost them at the back end of climate disasters.

[BlueWI]

3. Excellent starting point.

Ideas win in the end - I hope that these ideas get traction.