The Green Economy

When the United Nation’s Environmental Programme inspired the question of “[The] Green Economy: Does it Include You?”  my knee-jerk reaction was to shout out a self congratulatory ‘heck, yes!’  I had a ready-made list in my head to brag about: my green job, my hybrid vehicle, my life-long habit of recycling, my walk-able neighborhood, the compost pile which occupies some space along one side of my house. 

There are pockets of every community willing to take up environmental issues. The ethical premise of sustainable living resonates with that group on a very deep level. It’s a group that routinely measures the carbon footprint of vacations and major purchases. A group that makes the purposeful effort to support the Green Economy.  Understand that I count myself a member of this group. My eyes don’t roll at all when I mention our instinct to read tree-hugger blogs, find ways to make more with less, and occasionally attempt to out-green each other with biodegradable this, or energy-efficient that. 

But the more I thought about the topic the more certainly I concluded being part of a Green Economy isn’t something a person opts into or out of.  How active a business or an individual is in that economy varies but membership doesn’t. Membership comes with breathing. Like it or not a person breathes the air that is in front of his or her face. Whether you drive a hybrid or a hummer, it’s the same air. Businesses benefit from efforts to protect biodiversity. Job markets respond to growth sectors no matter their color.

Some people shy away from the term Green Economy. The term conjures images that are both expensive and irrelevant to their everyday lives.
At this point I don’t think the Green Economy wins out over apathy based on the moral argument. The people who were going to take up sustainability issues based on the ethical rewards have already done so. That’s your tree-hugging blog reader, your life long recycler. 

What I like is that the Green Economy now has the metrics and the data to make a business case, and a long-term investment or employment case. The metrics speak for themselves, they engage a broader audience. Boiled down to its essence the Green Economy inspires a series of questions about stuff: how much of it we’re consuming? Are there ways to be more efficient with the stuff we already have?

The main distinction between a Green Economy and more traditional economics is how the traditional model is fuelled by a frenzied instinct to consume, throw away, and consume more.  An economic base that encourages gluttonous pace of consumption burns itself out in the long run. Ultimately the traditional economic basis runs out of money, jobs, resources, and all the stuff the economy makes itself out of. 

I’m rather optimistic that people will eventually engage with the Green Economy it presents a better, smarter model. It offers a paradigm with less pollution, less waste and more profit. It’s the better offering for an individual as well. It’s cheaper. It’s cleaner, it’s healthier. It offers a more stable source of employment.

Does the Green Economy include me? Without a doubt. The Green Economy isn’t particularly interested in who or why a person becomes engaged. Whether sustainability practices are fuelled by regulation, the compelling business model, or by an environmentalist’s moral leanings the outcomes are the same. And the outcomes, the externalities, of a Green Economy are like the air we breathe it pulls everyone in with or without their explicit consent.