"Will Clean Energy Spending Create Recession Ending Jobs?"

President Barack Obama said Thursday that he remains confident the economy will turn around in the short term and the nation will prosper in the long term despite another dose of bad unemployment news.

"And I'm absolutely confident that we can, at this period of difficulty, prove, once again, what this nation can achieve when challenged," Obama said in the Rose Garden after a meeting with executives from energy companies.

Earlier, the government reported that employers cut a larger-than-expected 467,000 jobs in June. The unemployment rate climbed to a 26-year high of 9.5 percent.

Obama called that report sobering news but better than the last economic quarter and a sign that the recession is slowing.

"Obviously, this is little comfort to all those Americans who have lost their jobs," he said.

Obama and his team have pointed to energy companies in citing ways to steady the economy and put people back to work. The White House is working to keep energy in the spotlight even as Congress takes a break this week for the July 4 holiday.

The House last week narrowly approved the first energy legislation designed to curb global warming following furious lobbying by White House advisers and personal pressure by the president himself.

"So these companies are vivid examples of the kind of future we can create," the president said Thursday in the Rose Garden, flanked by energy industry leaders. "But it's now up to the Senate to continue the work that was begun in the House to forge this more prosperous future. We're going to need to set aside the posturing and the politics, and when we put aside the old ideological debates, then our choice is clear."

He added: "It's a choice between slow decline and renewed prosperity. It's a choice between the past and the future." (The Article Source)

The number of jobs in America’s emerging clean energy economy grew nearly two and a half times faster than overall jobs between 1998 and 2007, according to a report  released today by The Pew Charitable Trusts.  Pew developed a clear, data-driven definition of the clean energy economy and conducted the first-ever hard count across all 50 states of the actual jobs, companies and venture capital investments that supply the growing market demand for environmentally friendly products and services.

Pew found that jobs in the clean energy economy grew at a national rate of 9.1 percent, while traditional jobs grew by only 3.7 percent between 1998 and 2007.  There was a similar pattern at the state level, where job growth in the clean energy economy outperformed overall job growth in 38 states and the District of Columbia during the same period.  The report also found that this promising sector is poised to expand significantly, driven by increasing consumer demand, venture capital infusions, and federal and state policy reforms.

America’s clean energy economy has grown despite a lack of sustained government support in the past decade. By 2007, more than 68,200 businesses across all 50 states and the District of Columbia accounted for about 770,000 jobs.

By comparison, the well-established fossil-fuel sector—including utilities, coal mining and oil and gas extraction, industries that have received significant government investment—comprised about 1.27 million workers in 2007.

“The clean energy economy is poised for explosive growth,” said Lori Grange, interim deputy director of the Pew Center on the States.  “These jobs are driving economic growth and environmental sustainability at a time when America needs both.  There is a potential competitive advantage for federal and state policy leaders who act now to spur jobs, businesses and investments in the clean energy sector.”  (Read Full Article)

The Spanish professor is puzzled. Why, Gabriel Calzada wonders, is the U.S. president recommending that America emulate the Spanish model for creating "green jobs" in "alternative energy" even though Spain's unemployment rate is 18.1 percent -- more than double the European Union average -- partly because of spending on such jobs?

Calzada, 36, an economics professor at Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, has produced a report that, if true, is inconvenient for the Obama administration's green agenda, and for some budget assumptions that are dependent upon it.

Calzada says Spain's torrential spending -- no other nation has so aggressively supported production of electricity from renewable sources -- on wind farms and other forms of alternative energy has indeed created jobs. But Calzada's report concludes that they often are temporary and have received $752,000 to $800,000 each in subsidies -- wind industry jobs cost even more, $1.4 million each. And each new job entails the loss of 2.2 other jobs that are either lost or not created in other industries because of the political allocation -- sub-optimum in terms of economic efficiency -- of capital. (European media regularly report "eco-corruption" leaving a "footprint of sleaze" -- gaming the subsidy systems, profiteering from land sales for wind farms, etc.) Calzada says the creation of jobs in alternative energy has subtracted about 110,000 jobs elsewhere in Spain's economy. (Read Full Article)

    The Obama Administration has an agenda to spend billions of dollars on clean energy, justifying such spending will "save the planet" and create new recession ending jobs. Spain has already spent billions on clean energy but has a 18.1 joblessness rate. A new job created doesn't mean much when two jobs are lost in the process. I am all for governments doing what they can to "save the planet" but the government subsidized corn ethanol industry didn't get better gas mileage and caused food inflation notwithstanding a few corn farmers made a killing. Spending billions on clean energy will not get America out of recession, as I see it, despite what President Obama says.

tags: clean energy jobs  clean energy  obama  spain  politics  the economy  takebackamerica