Will Alternative Energy Really Create More Jobs?

It seems that many people who believe in global warming and that the cure is taxing carbon emissions and investing in alternative energies often make the claim “It will create jobs!” Yes, but it’s one thing for one company to create jobs and another thing for there to be net job growth, or more jobs created than jobs lost. Another claim made regularly by the global warming crowd is that clean energy will be cheaper than gas. But you might not be able to have it both ways.

Let’s say we could do what Al Gore wants and get completely off of oil within 10 years. Certainly jobs would be created as companies that make windmills, solar panels, etc. employ more and more workers. But at the same time the oil companies would be laying people off, right? If the number of workers hired by “green” companies exceeds the number of workers laid off by oil companies, then that means the energy we’re getting is probably more expensive than oil, especially if you compare it to what the price of oil would be if we had more domestic drilling (which would also create more jobs without destroying any others, by the way). If the number of workers is less, then that means we’re losing jobs when you look at the big picture.

Personally, I’d like to see us produce more energy and have a net loss in jobs. Loss of jobs in an industry while that industry maintains stable output means that industry is getting more productivity per worker, and that generally means lower costs of production, and that generally means lower prices for consumers. I don’t really care whether clean energy creates new jobs–I care about whether our country has access to cheap energy, because cheap energy is a big part of what supports our lifestyle in this country, which I happen to like. Jobs are great, but it’s a distraction from the real issue when talking about alternative energy.