Under the present administration in Washington, any issues pertaining to climate change, environmental safeguards or mitigation of the impacts of a warming climate have been ignored. Yet, we are constantly reminded of the dangers – from bone-chilling cold snaps to the melting of ice in our polar regions.
Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Senator Ed Markey, D-Mass., think they have a start to a solution. The two lawmakers are introducing a framework defining what they call a “Green New Deal.” Basically, it is a policy package that seeks “to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions through a fair and just transition for all communities and workers,” according to the document
It may sound like the plan will be an impossible undertaking. However, Ocasio-Cortez told NPR’s Steve Inskeep in an interview that aired Thursday on Morning Edition, “Even the solutions that we have considered big and bold are nowhere near the scale of the actual problem that climate change presents to us.”
She added: “It could be part of a larger solution, but no one has actually scoped out what that larger solution would entail. And so that’s really what we’re trying to accomplish with the Green New Deal.”
Without a doubt, the Green New Deal resolution is going to become a cornerstone of debates as Democrats gear up for the 2020 election. A number of lawmakers are already favorably impressed with the legislation, including Senators Kamala Harris, D-Calif., Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., who are also co-sponsors of the resolution.
The resolution is nonbinding — meaning it would not be a law that can be enforced if passed. Instead, it is a set of principles and goals to help the U.S. in mitigating the impacts of climate change. The Green New Deal legislation does set goals for cutting carbon emissions across a broad swath of the economy, yet it aims to create jobs and boost the economy.
What is the Green New Deal?
The Green New Deal has been likened to the New Deal, a series of programs and projects instituted during the Great Depression by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. While the New Deal was meant to relieve Americans from the pressures of the depression, it was also seen as “vastly increasing the scope of the federal government’s activities” by creating a government regulated economy.
The most prominent goal of the resolution is “meeting 100 percent of the power demand in the United States through clean, renewable, and zero-emission energy sources.” The ultimate goal is to stop using fossil fuels entirely, as well as to transition away from nuclear energy.
The Green New Deal takes an economic approach with modern ideas such as renewable energy and resource efficiency. The resolution will hopefully create a massive new policy package that includes a 10-year infrastructure plan. But this in itself is something the country has been needing for quite some time.
Of course, there will be opponents that question how such a huge program would be paid for — however, Ocasio-Cortez promotes an economic theory that downplays the deficit concerns, saying offsetting the cost may be unnecessary.
“The question isn’t how will we pay for it, but what is the cost of inaction, and what will we do with our new shared prosperity created by the investments in the Green New Deal,” she wrote in a blog post earlier this week.
She writes: “We will finance the investments for the Green New Deal the same way we paid for the original New Deal, World War II, the bank bailouts, tax cuts for the rich, and decades of war – with public money appropriated by Congress.”
To that end, the Green New Deal aims to meet its goals while also focusing on groups like the poor, disabled and minority communities that might be disproportionately affected by massive economic transitions like those the Green New Deal calls for.
