Last December, the White House hosted a much touted "jobs summit".  One of the emphasized options from the summit were so-called "green" jobs.

Exhibit A: the Administration's ongoing push to create "Green Jobs." The Administration touts environmental initiatives not only as a way to improve quality of life and discourage climate change, but also as a way to employ more Americans. Accordingly, last week's summit included a breakout session called "The Innovation Agenda and Green Jobs of the Future."

The Green Jobs conceit goes like this: the government should offer tax credits and impose regulations that lead businesses to implement environmentally-friendly practices. This will create jobs doing what's needed to qualify for the credits or comply with the regulations. Most importantly, carbon regulation (most likely in the form of Cap and Trade) will lead to investments in technology that reduces carbon emissions.

President Obama highly touted Spain's success generating green jobs.  The problem is the TRUTH does not match the President's hype - again...

Every “green job” created with government money in Spain over the last eight years came at the cost of 2.2 regular jobs, and only one in 10 of the newly created green jobs became a permanent job, says a new study released this month. The study draws parallels with the green jobs programs of the Obama administration.   

President Obama, in fact, has used Spain’s green initiative as a blueprint for how the United States should use federal funds to stimulate the economy. Obama's economic stimulus package,which Congress passed in February, allocates billions of dollars to the green jobs industry. 

But the author of the study, Dr. Gabriel Calzada, an economics professor at Juan Carlos University in Madrid, said the United States should expect results similar to those in Spain: 

"Spain’s experience (cited by President Obama as a model) reveals with high confidence, by two different methods, that the U.S. should expect a loss of at least 2.2 jobs on average, or about 9 jobs lost for every 4 created, to which we have to add those jobs that non-subsidized investments with the same resources would have created,” wrote Calzada in his report: Study of the Effects on Employment of Public Aid to Renewable Energy Sources.

Emphasis mine. 

The best way to create jobs (green and otherwise) is to set the market loose - let the creaters create and let the market decide which creation is going to work best for THEM.  The government is not there to create "winners and losers" it is supposed to be there to create a level playing field for ALL.  If corn based ethanol is "all that" then take away the subsidies and let it play on an even field with the other options.  If wind power works for one area  - GREAT....solar works best in another - SPLENDID.  Let each "market" decide which alternative energy form it is going to form and use.  That is the best way to get the most alternates available to us all.

It's an all around winner.