By Kerry Trueman

We’ve been hemorrhaging blue collar jobs in the U.S. for decades now, and the loss of good-paying factory work has decimated our middle class. But a provision in the energy bill currently before Congress could help create a whole new generation of “green-collar” jobs that would revive our local economies while weaning us off fossil fuels.

The provision calls for “generating 15 percent of America’s electricity from alternative sources by 2020,” and it would create thousands of manufacturing jobs at good wages in the alternative-energy sector. The free market’s all well and good, but this just goes to show that sometimes, it takes a little legislative action to light a fire under capitalism’s ass. Here’s hoping the provision passes.

For a list of “green-collar” jobs check sustainablebusiness.com.