Ben Lieberman: ‘Green Job’ subsidies in global warming bill destroy far more U.S. jobs than they create

"Real world experience bears this out. Governments that subsidize or mandate green jobs reap fewer overall jobs and a weaker economy.

"Green job advocates once touted Spain’s aggressive alternative energy policy as a model for America. But, today, Spain’s green-jobs bubble has burst.

"Unemployment there stands at 18 percent, nearly twice that of the U.S. Gabriel Calzada, economics professor at Madrid’s King Juan Carlos University, estimates that each green job Spain creates prevents 2.2 other jobs from being created.

"The Danish think-tank CEPOS recently studied wind energy in Denmark, another oft-cited model for America. CEPOS found than each wind energy job there costs the government $90,000 to $140,000 annually — much more than the jobs pay. Nor are these jobs sustainable. Once the government handouts end, so do the jobs.

"The same lesson can be seen in the U.S. California has led the states in pursuing a green jobs agenda. Environmentalists often cite it as a model for the rest of the nation. But California also stands out as having higher unemployment and energy costs and a weaker economy than nearly every other state.

"Waxman-Markey would take the nation down the same job-killing path. Some jobs would be destroyed entirely. Others would be outsourced to nations that don’t drink the cap-and-trade Kool-Aid.

"China, India, and other developing nations have wisely stated that they won’t accept similar global warming restrictions on their own economies, and for good reason. They know full well that the policies giving rise to green jobs kill many more jobs in the process."