 November 12, 2008
Dear Friend, As you read this week's WeGetIt.org Wednesday Bulletin, please be thinking of friends who would benefit from it, and then forward it to them. Thanks for your support! Seeing purple about "green" jobs
President-elect Barack Obama made his beliefs and priorities about the environment, energy, and climate change a significant part of his campaign for the presidency. Over the next few weeks, we will take a closer look at them. But there’s another reality we must face: opportunity cost. In a finite world, we can't do everything at once. To fund 80,000 “green” jobs, how many other jobs must be sacrificed? In other words, even assuming that the alternative energy programs Obama supports might create 80,000 new jobs in Nevada, or millions around the country, it doesn't follow that there will be 80,000 (or millions) more jobs afterward than before. There might be no net gain, or there might even be a net loss in jobs. If creating a million new "green jobs" costs more than sustaining a million other jobs, creating them will mean fewer jobs than before, not more. The reason it's so challenging is that when politicians talk about promoting this policy or that, they focus only on the new jobs the policies will create, which are easily seen, not on the jobs "somewhere else" that could have been created with the same investment, or that will be sacrificed before investment shifts. These jobs are not easily seen, but they are just as real and just as important. Birds, lilies, and people In teaching His disciples not to worry, Jesus said, "Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they?" (Matthew 6:26) People who love God's creation will immediately recognize Jesus' affirmation here that God cares for birds--and, by extension, His other creatures. A couple of verses later, when they read that He said, "Observe how the lilies of the field grow; . . . Solomon in all his glory [did not] clothe himself like one of these" (verses 28-29) they will recognize that God Himself values the beauty of His creation. But careful reading of Jesus' words will remind them of something else, too. Just as He said people were worth much more than birds, so also the plant God clothed with glory exceeding Solomon's "is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace" (verse 30). If God so clothed it, would He not "much more clothe" His people? Biblical stewardship honors the central role that people play in creation. While unbiblical environmentalism tends to assume that people and nature compete, in God's wise design people and nature flourish together. Now, please forward this message to your pastor, other Christian leaders, and friends and urge them to sign the WeGetIt.org Declaration, too! The more people sign, the stronger the message our leaders will hear that Biblical principles and factual evidence, not media hype about speculative fears like global warming, should guide our care for the environment and the poor.Gratefully,
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