Green “Sequester” Is Already Costing U.S. Jobs
A new Economic Policy Institute paper finds that job loss from cuts in clean-technology investment are as large as losses from proposed defense sequester.
A new EPI paper finds that job loss from cuts in clean-technology investment are as large as losses from proposed defense sequester.
If federal investment in clean technology returned to its 2009 levels in 2013, the job gains would almost equal the job gains from canceling the $54 billion cut to defense spending scheduled for 2013 under the Budget Control Act, a new EPI paper finds.
In Green ‘sequester’ is already costing U.S. jobs: Job losses from ongoing clean-tech cuts will rival those from defense cuts, EPI Research and Policy Director Josh Bivens explains that federal support for clean technology has already been cut back steadily and is scheduled to fall from $47.3 billion in 2009 to $12.9 billion in inflation-adjusted dollars by 2013, a drop of almost $35 billion. Because each $1 of green investments supports 1.5 times as many jobs as each $1 in defense spending, the drop in clean technology investment in 2013 relative to peak levels would translate into about 436,000 fewer jobs, relative to the roughly 448,000 fewer jobs resulting from the proposed cut in defense spending.