Where Are The Jobs? In Clean Energy
In late June, all but eight House Republicans voted against the American Clean Energy and Security Act. A few weeks later, 134 of them took to the House floor to bash Democrats and snidely ask, "where are the jobs?" over and over again.
However, if conservatives were earnestly interested in pursuing policies to create jobs and improve the American economy, they would stop spreading lies and get behind clean energy legislation.
As we've noted before, legislation investing in clean energy technology would create up to 1.9 million jobs, boost GDP by up to $111 billion and increase families' incomes by nearly $1,200 per year.
Luckily, Republican falsehoods haven't deterred the Obama administration from doing what's best for the nation. Earlier this week, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis announced an additional $100 million for green jobs training "to prepare workers for careers in the energy efficiency and renewable energy industries."
Today, the president himself announced a significant new investment in clean energy. The League of Conservation Voters remarked, "[t]he announcement is the latest - and most significant - in a series of commitments the administration has made to boosting clean energy job creation, including through the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act."
Watch:
Through this initiative, we're awarding $2.3 billion in tax credits for American manufacturers of clean energy technologies, companies that build wind turbines and produce solar panels and assemble cutting edge batteries. The initiative we're outlining today will likely generate 17,000 jobs and the roughly $5 billion more that we'll leverage in private sector investments could help create tens of thousands of additional jobs.
At the same time, this initiative will give a much needed boost to our manufacturing sector by building new plants or upgrading old ones, and will take an important step toward meeting the goal I've set of doubling the amount of renewable power we use in the next three years with wind turbines and solar panels built right here in the U S of A.
