Workers and the Green-Energy Transition: Evidence from 300 Million Job Transitions

Using microdata representing more than 130 million online work profiles, we explore transitions into and out of jobs most likely to be affected by a transition away from carbon-intensive production technologies. Exploiting detailed textual data on job title, firm name, occupation, and industry to focus on workers employed in carbon-intensive (“dirty”) and non–carbon-intensive (“green”) jobs, we find that the rate of transition from dirty to green jobs is rising rapidly, increasing 10-fold over the period 2005–21, including a significant uptick in electric vehicle–related jobs in recent years. Overall, however, less than 1% of all workers who leave a dirty job appear to make the transition to a green job. We find that the persistence of employment within dirty industries varies enormously across local labor markets; in some states, more than half of all transitions out of dirty jobs are into other dirty jobs. Older workers and those without a college education appear less likely to make transitions to green jobs and more likely to other dirty jobs, other jobs, or nonemployment. When accounting for the fact that green jobs tend to have later start dates, it appears that green and dirty jobs have roughly comparable job durations.