We hear it from the GOP all the time: "Green jobs are a hoax". "Regulations mandating conversion to renewable energy sources costs jobs".
Like many things we hear from the GOP, these claims appear to have only a marginal connection to reality.
And now we have some proof.
Today, the US Labor Department released a report which claims that 3.1 million Americans are employed in "green jobs".
"Green jobs", according to the definition used in this report, are of two types:
"output-based jobs" that produce goods and services benefiting the environment or conserving natural resources. That includes a company producing solar panels or a farmer growing organic tomatoes.
and:
"process-based jobs" where workers make a company more environmentally friendly or use fewer natural resources. That would include an employee at a manufacturingplant in charge of recycling, even if the plant itself is not green.
The 3.1 million figure uses only the first definition (a report scheduled to come out later this year will include the second definition. Frankly, I think that the first definition is the more relevant one.)
The data is a little old, but still valuable:
The report makes no assessment of when the jobs were created and says its figures are from 2010. It found 2.3 million green jobs in the private sector and 860,300 in the public sector.
There is no good news for anti-regulation forces in the report, and green groups were quick to laud the report's results:
Environmental groups cheered the report as an affirmation that green jobs are real factor in the nation's economic growth. Obama has set a goal of creating 5 million green jobs and his stimulus plan provided $80 billion to help boost this sector.
"Critics and politically driven naysayers have been trying to convince us that clean energy and green economy jobs are a hoax," said Bob Keefe, spokesman for the Natural Resources Defense Council. He said the sector would continue to grow "as long as we don't let entrenched interests stop it."
Take that, GOP!