The Green Collar Economy: How One Solution Can Fix Our Two Biggest Problems

In The Green Collar Economy, acclaimed activist and political advisor Van Jones delivers a real solution that both rescues our economy and saves the environment. The economy is built on and powered almost exclusively by oil, natural gas, and coal--all fast-diminishing nonrenewable resources. As supplies disappear, the price of energy climbs and nearly everything becomes more expensive. With costs and unemployment soaring, the economy stalls. Not only that, when we burn these fuels, the greenhouse gases they create overheat the atmosphere. As the headlines make clear, total climate chaos looms over us. The bottom line: we cannot continue with business as usual. We cannot drill and burn our way out of these dual dilemmas.

Instead, Van Jones illustrates how we can invent and invest our way out of the pollution-based grey economy and into the healthy new green economy. Built by a broad coalition deeply rooted in the lives and struggles of ordinary people, this path has the practical benefit of both cutting energy prices and generating enough work to pull the U.S. economy out of its present death spiral.

Rachel Carson's 1963 landmark book Silent Spring was the pivotal ecological examination of the last century. Now, rising above the impenetrable debate over the environment and the economy, Van Jones's The Green CollarEconomy delivers a timely and essential call to action for this new century.

“Steadily—by redefining green—Jones is making sure that our planet and our people will not just survive but also thrive in a clean-energy economy.”
—Leonardo DiCaprio

A New York Times bestseller, The Green Collar Economy by award-winning human rights activist and environmental leader Van Jones delivers a much-needed economic and environmental solution to todays two most critical problems. With a revised introduction and new afterword by the author—a man who counsels President Barack Obama on environmental policy—The Green Collar Economy and Jones have been highly praised by a multitude of leaders and legislators, including Al Gore, Senator Tom Daschle, and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Van Jones was named one of “The Worlds 100 Most Influential People of 2009” by Time magazine, and with The Green Collar Economy he offers a wise, necessary, and eminently achievable plan for saving the earth and rescuing working class Americans.