Rejoining The Paris Climate Accord Can Create U.S. Jobs – Says A Woman Who Helped Developed It

Tracy Raczek “conceptualized and developed” then-United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s climate change strategy, which ultimately became known as the Paris Climate Accord and was signed by 197 countries on December 12, 2015.  She also developed the UN’s first policies and programmes to address the disproportionate impact climate change has on women.  

As she told me on my podcast, Raczek focused on strategies that are a win-win-win-win: (a) mitigate against climate change; (b) drive economic development; (c) support populations equitably, and (d) can be adapted to regional nuances.

Now that President Joe Biden has rejoined the Paris Agreement, after his predecessor pulled out, Raczek says Biden can also leverage rejoining it to boost economic growth in the U.S., as well as address climate change.  

Here are six ways Raczek says Biden can create jobs via the Paris Climate Accord, based on my interview with her:

1. Invest in the U.S. infrastructure: Raczek stressed that rebuilding the U.S. infrastructure is critical to rebuilding both the U.S. economy and its global reputation, because the domestic and international economies are intricately linked. “No action is isolated because of our global economy,” she told me. The variety of policies, incentives, and tax credits, such as for electric vehicles and retrofitting homes, Raczek explained, support markets that “are linked to global businesses… So, we’re all in this together.” She pointed out that, for example, many of the parts for electric vehicles assembled in the U.S. are manufactured in other countries.  

2. Grow jobs by greening the infrastructure:  Raczek thinks that, “The fact that the Biden-Harris plan plans to sink no less than $2 trillion dollars into infrastructure and energy, that’s a fair jobs plan.”  She explained that, “when you look at greening infrastructure, greening cement, greening houses, retrofitting houses, truly transitioning our entire economy, you have an incredible job opportunity…and this is a middle income job boom possibility. This is why I think the Biden-Harris climate plan is a really a jobs plan.”   

Referencing Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reports that reflect current talent shortages, Raczek described jobs that will grow with a green infrastructure rebuilding strategy. For example, “employment of electricians is projected to grow 8 percent from 2019 to 2029, much faster than the average for all occupations,” according to the BLS, which also projects construction jobs to increase 4%, and jobs in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) to grow by 8% as well.

 3. Adopt efficiency standards:  Raczek insists that adopting federal efficiency standards (including reinstating those reversed by Trump) will incentivize the market and create jobs. From vehicle fuel efficiency standards to appliance efficiency ones to construction codes, standardizing them, Raczek insists, will create jobs because the certainty will incentivize markets to release investments that create jobs.   

4. Fulfill the U.S. pledge to fund climate support for developing countries: The Green Climate Fund, set up by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and other related funds, were established to support climate change mitigation strategies in developing countries. For example, she said, “the Obama administration committed… 10 billion dollars to that fund that would distribute capacity-building technologies…to developing states to help them deal with the impact of climate change.” Those payments were halted by Trump, and resuming them Raczek believes would create more jobs opportunities in the U.S. and help rebuild the U.S.’s international reputation.

5. Reduce the U.S.’s emissions:  “The U.S. has a reputation… for having emitted more green gases greenhouse gases historically, so they have a greater responsibility in the future to be reducing more,” Raczek told me.  The process of doing so, monitoring and reporting on it, she explained, will create U.S. jobs.  That includes federally incentivizing reporting of them by private companies, such as using the Task Force on Climate-Related Disclosures (TFCD) recommendations for climate-related financial information (chaired by Michael Bloomberg).

6. Rebuild trust: “On the global stage, (Biden) has a lot of trust-building to do. The retraction of the U.S. government in the past four years has done a lot of damage to the U.S. reputation internationally,” Raczek insisted, adding that Biden’s choice of former Secretary of State John Kerry as his climate envoy is a step in that direction. “(Kerry) is a very trusted entity and a very smart, measured voice on this issue.”

Raczek believes these strategies, among others, will help Biden leverage rejoining the Paris Climate Accord to be a win for the U.S. economy and create the jobs so desperately needed to rebuild from the pandemic-economic recession.  

She also believes making sure women have several seats at the leadership tables – at the UNFCCC, COP26 and domestically – will be critical to success of the Paris Climate Accord, to every economy, and to creating U.S. jobs.

Listen to my full interview with Tracy Raczek on my podcast, Green Connections Radio, on our website, or wherever you like to listen to podcasts.