In the most contentious veto of his tenure, President Barack Obama has rejected legislation that would have cleared the way for construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline. For now, at least, completion of the 1,200-mile conduit bearing crude from Alberta’s oil sands remains on hold. What continues, however, is the debate raging around jobs the project was expected to create.

Even before the bill reached his desk, Republicans were lining up to slam the president’s likely veto as a job killer. As The Hill reported on Feb. 9:

“Republicans are eagerly awaiting Obama’s stroke of the pen, believing every veto he makes will help them make the case that job-creating legislation is being blocked by a president of ‘no.’

“‘This is the first piece of legislation on his desk … and he will have to choose between hard-working Americans and taxpayers or environmental extremists,’ said Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., a staunch Keystone supporter.

“‘We will keep our word to the American people, and we are going to keep sending bills to his desk,’ he added.”

OK, let’s talk about jobs (we’ll table the climate change discussion for now).

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The Keystone XL reportedly would create roughly 42,000 jobs, most of them construction jobs lasting about 19 weeks. This sounds like a lot of jobs until you consider that our economy is adding hundreds of thousands of jobs every month, 257,000 added in January alone.

Still, 42,000 jobs, even if they’re temporary, are nothing to sneeze at. The reality, though, is that Keystone XL would not happen any time soon. So, if this Congress is “going to keep sending bills to his desk,” there is legislation the president likely would sign that would produce way more than 42,000 jobs.

In fact, one legislative proposal would add 2.1 million jobs to the economy over the next decade without the federal government spending a dime to create those jobs.

In addition to creating jobs, this proposal also would reduce greenhouse gas emissions to levels that could avert the most severe consequences of climate change.

The proposal I’m talking about is George Shultz’ carbon fee and dividend plan. Shultz, former secretary of state under Ronald Reagan, promotes this plan as the conservative answer to climate change, because it wouldn’t increase the size of government.

It would work like this:

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A steadily rising fee — starting at $15 per ton of carbon dioxide — is placed on fossil fuels at or near the first point of sale, increasing by $10 per ton of carbon dioxide each year. Revenue from the fee is divided up equally and returned to all households. Border adjustment tariffs are placed on imports from nations that do not have an equivalent carbon-pricing mechanism in order to maintain a level playing field for American businesses.

Regional Economic Models Inc., a firm that corporations, governments and academic institutions turn to for economic forecasting, conducted a study on the carbon fee and dividend proposal.

REMI predicted that, after 10 years, carbon dioxide emissions would be cut 33 percent and 2.1 million jobs would be added to the economy, primarily because of the economic stimulus of recycling tremendous amounts of revenue into the pockets of people who are likely to spend the money.

That’s right. We can cut carbon emissions while adding millions of jobs to our economy.

So, if this Congress is “going to keep sending bills” to the president’s desk in an effort to create jobs, make one of those bills carbon fee and dividend. I have a hunch Obama would sign it.

Mark Reynolds is executive director of Citizens’ Climate Lobby, a non-profit, non-partisan, grassroots advocacy organization focused on national policies to address climate change.


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