Olivia Coletti '24

by Olivia Coletti '24 on November 12, 2023
News Staff

President Biden and his administration launched the American Climate Corps this week amidst a dramatic push from younger generations and organizations worldwide for governments to take control of the ongoing climate crisis.

Per the White House announcement, the American Climate Corps will, “mobilize a new, diverse generation of more than 20,000 Americans – putting them to work conserving and restoring our lands and waters, bolstering community resilience, deploying clean energy, implementing energy efficient technologies, and advancing environmental justice, all while creating pathways to high-quality, good-paying clean energy and climate resilience jobs in the public and private sectors after they complete their paid training program.”

The jobs referenced in the announcement include community emission strategizing and working with citywide entrepreneurs to help companies become environmentally conscious. These plans

will be mutually beneficial because they will help the government mitigate climate change while

enabling environmental tax benefits for companies.

Interestingly enough, NPR made a correlation between this policy and the environmental focuses within Roosevelt’s New Deal policies after the Great Depression which helped to bolster the economy through employment and financial safeguarding. Although these are

drastically different times, it is clear the American Climate Corps will help to resolve climate disasters while also providing more jobs in a growing industry. Clean energy is growing and considering how passionate younger generations are about the environment, more and more people will want these jobs.

CNBC interviewed Theo Daniels as a representative of the 49 percent of Gen Z whose personal ethics play a role in career choice, as per data recorded in a Deloitte survey. The CNBC article is titled, “The environment is Gen Z’s No. 1 concern – and some companies are taking advantage of that.” In the article, Daniels discusses his decision to switch from computer science to biology and political science because of his passion for the environment. He says, “I want to actually do something impactful and helpful. I’m not saying you can’t do that in computer science. I felt like for me, however, that would be something environmentally related.”

This reflects a tangible example of younger generations putting the environment higher up in their values relative to previous generations. The American Climate Corps is the first of many policy changes that could be ahead with growth in green industries.