Lost in the green transition? Measurement and stylized facts
Greening the economy entails jobs contracting in “high-polluting” economic activities
and expanding in environment-friendly activities. Minimizing the corresponding transition
costs is crucial to accelerate decarbonisation and reduce displacement costs for affected
workers. Using individual-level labour force data for a large sample of European countries,
this paper finds that the shares of green and high-polluting jobs remained approximately
stable between 2009 and 2019, hinting at a slow or yet-to-come green transition in
labour markets. Green and high-polluting jobs are unequally distributed across socioeconomic
groups: women are under-represented in both green and high-polluting jobs, while green
jobs are associated with higher educational attainment, and high-polluting jobs with
lower educational attainment. Equally important from a policy perspective, the results
show that high-polluting jobs are concentrated in rural areas. These results are confirmed
by analyzing labour market transitions: for instance, while women are more likely
to transition from study to job, they are significantly less likely to get a green
job. Overall, the results suggest that well designed and targeted policies are needed
to support efficient and inclusive labour market transitions in the greening economy:
to minimize scarring effects for displaced workers, help individuals’ upskilling and
reskilling, and support the matching between workers and jobs in higher demand.
Published on April 24, 2024
In series:OECD Economics Department Working Papersview more titles