Article from For Liberty by Norm Leahy.

The so-called “Green New Deal” is many things to many people. Whether it will save the planet or destroy capitalism as we know it, there’s one thing most sides can agree on: making it a reality will cost money. Lots of money.

How much? The Competitive Enterprise Institute has co-authored a study of how much the Green New Deal would cost individual households in 11 states. The results:

…the average household in eleven model states will be on the hook for more than $70,000 in increased costs for electricity, upgrading vehicles and housing, and shipping in just the first year under the Green New Deal. Those initial costs would be slightly lower in subsequent years, but households in those states could expect tens of thousands of dollars in higher annual costs going forward.

That ain’t beanbag. Though to be fair, investing, say, in a home solar system could (eventually, and with a fair amount of subsidy) reduce electric bills, and do a few nice things for the environment.

But mandating such systems – much like mandates for health insurance, for example – only lead to greater costs, fewer alternatives, and even more government intervention. 

And let’s not forget the knock-on effects of ditching oil and gas entirely:

“The Green New Deal would effectively destroy America’s energy industry, and with it, our entire economy,” said Daniel Turner, Executive Director of Power the Future. “Right now, our booming national economy and record low unemployment rate is driven by abundant, domestic, reliable, and inexpensive energy produced by millions of men and women across the country. Any policy that proposes to reverse this success is a threat to jobs, to rural communities, to national security, and to the very prosperity that Americans are experiencing.”

We can quibble with the drivers of the American economy (not to mention government measures of unemployment and inflation), there’s no doubt the domestic energy industry is vital to our nation’s bottom line, and security.

Tossing those aside isn’t good politics. It’s even worse economics.

Image Credit: nrkbeta [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)]