'Green jobs' will cost Britain 3% GDP/£250bn

[-:Undertaker:-]

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/ja...n-jobs-pt-242/

Green jobs? Wot green jobs? (pt 242)

The Global Warming Policy Foundation has published a report into the future of “Green Jobs” in Britain. It is damning indeed. Though it doesn’t actually say as much – the GWPF is too austere and restrained for such flippancies – this Government’s green policies are the equivalent of trying to pay off the national debt by breeding unicorns to sell to Chinese millionaires.

A glimpse inside David Cameron's head

Among the conclusions of The Myth of Green Jobs by Gordon Hughes, Professor of Economics at Edinburgh University, are:

1. “Green jobs” are a chimera. Though diverting taxpayers money into the renewable energy sector may indeed “create” jobs in the renewable energy sector, it will cost many more jobs in the broader economy.

2. Policies to promote renewable energy will add 0.6 to 0.7 per cent per annum to core inflation from now till 2020. This is equivalent to a rise in the same period of the Consumer Price Index by 6.5 per cent. if the Government sticks to its inflation targets and applies restrictions on speed of growth through higher interest rates, then the “sacrifice cost” – ie what the economy could have made, but was prevented from doing so by monetary policy – is £250 billion.

3. These same policies will, on top of that £250 billion cost, reduce GDP by 2 per cent to 3 per cent for at least ten years. This will cost Britain the equivalent of 60 per cent of the amount the government spends each year on primary and secondary education.

4. Renewable energy will cost £120 billion – making it 9 to 10 times more expensive than energy from conventional sources.

5. Claims about “innovation” and the development of “new industries” are a nonsense. “Almost every country in the world wants to claim the same benefit so the numbers do not add up….For the longer term, there is little doubt that the primary beneficiary will be China. That is already apparent from the way the market is developing.”

6. Not only is there no evidence to support lobbyists’ and government ministers’ claims that green “investment” will create green jobs, but also such a policy will result in lower real disposable incomes and higher prices. Little thought appears to have gone into considering the real consequences of this government policy. Indeed, all these claims about green jobs “seem intended to divert attention from the consequences of setting arbitary and poorly considered targets for renewable energy.”

Not, of course, that we didn’t know all this already. I’ve written before about those non-existent “green jobs” here, here (the one where we learned that for every “green job” created in Britain 3.7 jobs are lost in the real economy) and here (my evisceration of the beyond-dismal Climate Change minister Greg Barker). What’s more significant, though, surely, is that for all the overwhelming evidence out there of the environmental and economic damage being done by the Government’s green policies, the Government is making no effort whatsoever to change course.
The story is the same in Obama’s America, as described in this brilliant piece by Walter Russell Mead. HT Chris Horner. The examples he cites of Obama’s green jobs quest – what he calls “feeding the masses on unicorn ribs” – almost beggar belief.

150 green jobs created in Southern Michigan, at a cost per job of $2 million.
$700,000 city and state investment in Green Vehicles in Salinas, CA, which has failed to produce a single car

Ed Miliband, in his former role as Climate Change Minister committed Britain to spending £18.3bn a year until 2050 on the likes of 'Green jobs' under the Climate Change Act - something both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats continue to support

I remember around election time people were posting things along the lines of 'but Labour (or the other two heads of the monster) are going to create X amount of Green jobs, just what our economy needs' - as the figures show and as we've known (those who think) this is a fallacy. Government can't create jobs and whether its green jobs to fight the myth of global warming or simply having a large public sector, it is always a drain on the wealth creating sector; the private sector.

Of course I can't just comment on global warming/energy policy without mentioning the European Union which now makes most of our laws. Due to being members of the EU, we are being forced to introduce ridiculous energy policies which will mean the lights will go out in a few years. Did you know, not one coal or gas powered station has ever been closed down despite thousands of ridiculous wind turbines being built? and why? because wind isn't reliable. But still, if we don't meet these binding targets and have regular power cuts - we'll be fined by the EU.

The sums are mind blowing, but sadly not at all suprising.

Thoughts? have the loons finally taken over the asylum? economic suicide? do these people have a clue what they are doing?

[Recursion]

Reminds me of the 1000s of wind farms they're setting up off shore as "green" or renewable energy sources, fact of the matter is we still have to keep coal power stations running (it's not easy to start them up, it can take days) to back them up when there's... wait for it... NO WIND. Instead of wasting money on this green rubbish, it'd be more to the point if they put money into R&D for Nuclear energy and our various (lost) ideas for space and conventional military aircraft (we managed to scrap a whole bunch of those due to lack of government funding).

Our government really needs to rethink it's strategies and pull out of the EUs ridiculous agendas. Perhaps if we stopped paying countries like India too we'd be better off, after all they have a space program and we don't... :rolleyes:

Now to wait for someone to come in and blame it all on the Conservatives... fact of the matter is, they're all just as responsible as one another.