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The Jobs Case for Conservation

Creating Opportunity Through Stewardship of America’s Public Lands

This report from the Center for American Progress looks at recent research on the direct, indirect, and induced jobs created by the conservation economy—recreation, renewable energy, restoration, and sustainable land management.

This report identifies 15 policies that have created or will create jobs by supporting conservation and restoration. No national studies on employment stimulated by restoration and sustainable forest management activities have been undertaken. Thus, one key recommendation in this report is that the government and independent analysts undertake a federal agency-wide study on the jobs that have been and could be created from the restoration and sustainable management of forests and watersheds.

It is important to note that this paper does not compare the relative benefits of developing versus conserving public lands. Rather, it seeks to highlight and draw attention to the often-overlooked conservation economy, made up of professions in the recreation, renewable energy, restoration, and sustainable land management industries. Also, the conservation of lands provides social and economic benefits that are additive to job creation. Clean air, clean water, crop pollination, and services provided by intact landscapes are valuable public health and social welfare advantages that should be considered when valuing conservation and land protection.

Attached document published September 2011