On the other hand, employment in construction has long been dominated by white males. The industry has a history of hiring discrimination against women and racial minorities, and even now, nearly 60 percent of construction jobs are held by white non-Hispanic males. Women who try to enter construction trades also face sexual harassment and work schedules that are not family-friendly. It is essential that the green investment agenda include strong measures to break down the employment barriers in these trades. It would be an important first step for Hilda Solis, Obama’s pick for labor secretary, a Hispanic with a strong record of supporting the rights of all working people, to revive the Labor Department’s long dormant Federal Contract Compliance programs. If enforced, these measures would go far toward providing women and minorities a fair share of the construction jobs generated by the green investment agenda.

Beyond this, the green investment program cannot be seen as sole driver of a social justice agenda, either as a short-term stimulus or a long-run program for equitable and sustainable economic growth. Two other obvious investment targets are healthcare and educational services (i.e., spending on teachers, administrators, scholarships, hot lunch programs and bus drivers, as opposed to constructing new school buildings). In terms of promoting productivity and public well-being, investments in health and education are at least as important as public transportation and the energy grid. In addition, the employment impact of investing in healthcare is roughly equal to the average for green investments, while educational services investments generate about 40 percent more jobs. Jobs in education and healthcare are also divided much more evenly by gender and race than those in construction (white non-Hispanic males make up only 15 percent of the overall workforce in healthcare and 22 percent in education).

That said, my gut is to be a little nervous that this is potential fodder for anti-greens posing as defenders of the oppressed. The same way they’ve tried to say that carbon regulation is an assault on the poor, perhaps now they’ll say green jobs are an assault on women.

I suppose the takeaway is that we need to keep the holistic progressive approach to this clean energy revolution alive and start working now to make green jobs, present and future, more accessible to people of different genders and for that matter all different backgrounds.

A “green economy” and a “green stimulus” are two different things. An economic stimulus (in this context) is meant to urgently kick start an economy headed towards recession/depression, so we focus on things that we are able to do most immediately that will spur significant and rapid economic benefits. The typical example is infrastructure (Keynesian economics), as this has both the effect of creating jobs and generating significant return on investment (efficiency saves $)–getting bang for your buck, on top of doing something society needed anyway [arguably, if it's something like roads, imho].

Add the “green” in front of economic stimulus, and you add a second mandatory criterion, that of environmental benefit, on top of immediate economic benefit. ie: investing in water and wastewater infrastructure to improve water & energy efficiency and stop unnecessary pollution.

A “green economy” is a longer term goal that doesn’t happen overnight–if anything, we need this green stimulus to get us there. We need to do what we can in the short term to save the economy and create as many jobs as we can, so we can fulfill the long term goal of having a prosperous and more inclusive (to other fields that wouldn’t be contained in an urgent stimulus package) sustainable economy.

Nancy Pelosi was looking to Green the Capitol; cool. Our present governments, on the other hand, are folding in green measures to their main goal: save the economy from collapsing any further. I think there’s no reason women can’t be a part of that, but there is general consensus that the way to move forward is infrastructure, retrofits, green technology and renewable energy, and if these fields aren’t heavily populated by women, oh well. (I say this as a progressive environmentalist feminist who subscribes to anti-oppression ideals!)

We need to do what we need to move forward. Unfortunately, this temporary set of policies doesn’t help all sectors (and by apparent extension, genders) equally, but you have to recognize that it’s triage, and only a first step to get us all back up on our feet!

In response to Celeste, I would say that yes, women should go into Alternative energy and engineering, etc. In fact, a number of my female friends did go down that route. However, it is not just a passive choice. Engineering, math, and to a lesser extent physics are academic disciplines that routinely discriminate or have negative environments for women. It isn’t determinism, it is that some glass ceilings haven’t been broken frequently enough.

While many aspects of the green economy will emerge from construction of new buildings and power plants, we also have to manage and educate our communities. A huge percentage of the experts being trained in how to actually develop sustainable communities are women, who have started in college through efforts like the campus climate challenge.

When Nancy Pelosi sought to Green the Capitol, she looked for the experts who had been working at Harvard…and found Allison Rogers, our fellow contributor, not an engineering firm.

However, much of the stimulus package has been based around new infrastructure. What they call shovels in the ground. Well, a green economy is going to need everyone – life sciences, tree planters, construction workers, teachers. Women control the majority of the household economic decisions in this country and if we want to restore consumer confidence and build a green economy maybe we should look there. (Take a gander at The Big Green Purse , if you want)

The women before us fought so hard to say “we can do anything men can do!” and now we’re chastising Obama and other green stimulus plans because “well, these aren’t fields most women work in”. This really seems to fortify the idea of gender roles and biological determism, and I don’t like it.

Call me a hard-nose, but the economy needs saving right now, and so does the planet. A green stimulus will create jobs, and if us women choose to work in fields that aren’t well-positioned to this broader goal, well that’s our own choice, isn’t it?

Maybe now is the time to branch out and learn new skills… The Canadian government apparently plans to invest in training programs. How about some hard hats and science, ladies? Any takers?

i don’t think a green economy will reward Mother Nature, from my observations and experiences, capitalism and dominant structures of power centered around making money have only provided disrespect and harm towards Mother Nature, and every living thing on the planet, except for the same 12 white guys who are making all the money, thinking things are just fine i guess.

how will women survive?
i’m not sure how i feel about that sentence, but i can tell you that i know plenty of women, including myself actively working to dismantle the oppressive economic system that will continue to do us nothing but harm, and we’re doing just fine. in fact, our qualities of life are better than a lot of women i’ve talked to who still think the system is working for them.

either way, thanks for posting this =), it’s definitely a huge issue that has to be brought to peoples’ attention