Gonna Finish That Green Job? Or Can We Have It?

It might be a stretch to call serving drinks at an Irish bar a "green job," but we were really taken with this photo called "Smiley consoles his alien friend," by Seattlest Flickr pool member Sedanman.

We've heard a lot about green collar jobs; that they're sexist, that they won't end unemployment in the short term, that it's all hype. The haters probably already have jobs--shiny pink and purple ones.

Gregoire's Washington Jobs Now initiative pledged $21.7 million for green clean-up projects, but the resulting jobs have yet to hit the state employment's web site, where a recent search for green positions turned up landscaping work. On one local green jobs web site the most recent listing was from October. Much ballyhooed green builder McKinstry has promised 500 local jobs; last time we checked only five were listed. Sustainable Business has a job search site devoid of any entry-level listings. Where are all the green jobs the NW is supposedly getting and will any of the state's more than 300,000 job seekers be eligible for them?

Xconomy is pumping cleantech as the next thing for the NW and they're holding a forum about it March 26 for entrepreneurs, VCs, angel investors, basically anyone with enough cash flow make that kind of shit go down. Best case scenario: they develop a green business that calls for the same skills used in the newspaper industry. Um...do they still use the term win-win?

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