Green jobs, Hardly!

Hardly a week goes by without multiple stories appearing detailing the abject failure of the Obama administration’s green jobs efforts.  And a costly failure it has
been with hundreds of millions if not billions of taxpayer dollars squandered with but very few jobs to show for the money spent.

It’s gotten so bad, even the mainstream media has had to cover it.

First there was the long unfolding saga of Evergreen Solar – a company that received subsidies, grants and sweetheart tax deals from both the Obama administration and the state of Massachusetts.   In 2007, the company was granted a lease on 23 acres of a former military base for the princely sum of $1.00.  Then the state bestowed a $58 million grant to the company. The federal government also set money Evergreen’s way, all on a hope and a prayer that it would create jobs.  It did, just not in the U.S.  Evergreen moved its operations to China and is now seeking bankruptcy protection.

Then there was Solyndra Inc., a solar panel manufacturer touted by President Obama as a model of a green energy future that received $535 million in taxpayer loans to finance a new factory that would create 1,000 new jobs. Instead, it will close an existing factory and keep its workforce at present levels. Basically, taxpayers built Solyndra’s new factory and the workers at the old plants joined the unemployment line.  While its sales have grown in recent years, Solyndra has yet to make a profit. In July 2010 it withdrew plans for an initial public stock offering.

And the Associated Press has reported that Seattle’s green jobs program has also fallen far short of its goal.  With a $20 million dollar federal grant in hand the city seat out to retrofit 2,000 homes with energy efficient windows, insulation and the like while creating 2,000 “living wage” jobs. The result, only three homes have been retrofitted and 14 new jobs created.

Even the New York Times has begrudgingly taken notice, with a story “Number of Green Jobs Fails to Live Up to Promises.”

Despite the mounting evidence of failure, the Obama administration seems bent on throwing more money down the black hole that is the “Green jobs/green energy economy.”

This country has been subsidizing and mandating the use of various green energy technologies and fuels for decades –yet they still aren’t reliable, they still can’t compete without subsidies in the marketplace, and as study after study detail, they still raise energy costs and cause more job losses than the jobs they create.

Will the Washington central planning elites ever learn?

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