Start a "Green Collar Jobs" program
Connect the work that most needs doing (retrofitting our buildings with solar panels, insulation, etc.) with the people who most need work. Let's have the green energy revolution lift all boats--not create an energy apartheid! See http://www.vanjones.net/ for more.
Matt_Lerner
shared this idea
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bonedog84
commented
Not really a job for the CTO... Isn't there a department of energy already? Department of Labor?
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jps
commented
jmkowalski: No drama = shared turf. The Labor department has been gutted into a former shell of itself which doesn't even release a fifth of the statistical data it did in 2000. If you want to hire an army of wind turbine erectors, you will need decisive executive action at the highest levels, not an ancient gutted bureaucracy.
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Norseman
commented
Also, The auto industry could have used a CTO IMO! Look at it now.
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Norseman
commented
@stocad: If this shift is going to take place, it must include tech prioritization, assessment of viability, and the management of skills and appropriate infrastructures. In my opinion from the high tech world, these tasks are part of the function of the CTO. True, labor aspect may belong with another dept. but from a pure tech perspective, the CTO should be central.
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jmkowalski
commented
Belongs to the Department of Labor..
NOT THE CTO
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DoctorMemory
commented
@ StocadL: agreed. Still, the CTO can be an important force in pushing for the development and adoption of green tech. If the CTO is going to kick of research projects or structure new legislation around communications, Internet, transportation (grasping at straws here: what's the "tech" that the CTO is going to preside over?), then he or she can explicitly include support for green collar jobs.
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stocad
commented
Interesting idea. This doesn't really seem like a CTO's area of responsibility.