Green Trade Deficit

The following article appeared on TradeRefrorm.org.

Green investment is a major pillar of the president's economic recovery plan. Yet, America's dependence on foreign countries to produce green technologies may undermine this recovery strategy. Using a list of green goods derived from the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), we have determined that the United States ran an overall green trade deficit of -$8.9 billion in 2008, including a deficit of -$6.4 billion in the critical category of renewable energy, one of the main targets of the Obama administration's green agenda.

If current trends continue, the green trade deficit can be expected to widen further as the administration's agenda increases domestic demand but without sufficient measures to increase domestic production. If the deficit continues to grow, the United States will forego the creation of millions of high-wage, high-skill green manufacturing jobs and lose its potential to be a global producer as well as a consumer of green technologies.

You can find the full report here.

The following was written by Samuel Sherraden with help from Jason Peuquet, both of the New America Foundation, a nonprofit, nonpartisan public policy institute that invests in new thinkers and new ideas to address the next generation of challenges facing the United States.