NOTE: THE REPRODUCIBILITY REVIEW FOR THIS PACKAGE IS IN PROGRESS.
The concept of “green jobs” has received widespread attention in academic, policy, and public discourse, reflecting the growing emphasis on sustainability and the transition to a low-carbon economy. However, defining and measuring green jobs remains analytically challenging and highly sensitive to methodological choices. This paper demonstrates that depending on classification criteria and data aggregation approaches, the share of occupations identified as ‘green’ can range from just 4 percent to as high as 74 percent, raising concerns about the comparability and usefulness of green job estimates in practice. Moving beyond the traditional “green jobs” framing, the paper proposes a more pragmatic and flexible approach that focuses on identifying ‘jobs-in-demand’ and ‘jobs-at-risk’ under specific transition scenarios. This approach allows for application across different country contexts, different transition scenarios and can also incorporate other structural labor market shocks, such as technological change or demographic shifts. The paper also reviews methodologies for analyzing labor re-allocation in the context of a given labor market shock, highlighting the advantages and disadvantages of relying on historical job transition patterns compared to more forward-looking task and skill similarity measures. It discusses key challenges in integrating labor market dynamics into macroeconomic models and highlights emerging efforts in hybrid modeling that combine macroeconomic frameworks with micro-level labor market insights. The paper concludes by outlining priority areas for future research and methodological development.
| Repository name | URI |
|---|---|
| Reproducible Research Repository (World Bank) | https://reproducibility.worldbank.org |
Some data is restricted and has not been included in the reproducibility package. For more details, please refer to the README file. (Limited-access/Restricted Data)
| Author | Affiliation | |
|---|---|---|
| Penelope Mealy | World Bank | pmealy@worldbank.org |
| Camilla Knudsen | World Bank | cknudsen@worldbank.org |
| Joris Bucker | World Bank | bucker@worldbank.org |
| Fernanda Senra de Moura | World Bank | fmoura@worldbank.org |
2025-11-18
| Location | Code |
|---|---|
| World | WLD |
The materials in the reproducibility packages are distributed as they were prepared by the staff of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/The World Bank. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this event do not necessarily reflect the views of the World Bank, the Executive Directors of the World Bank, or the governments they represent. The World Bank does not guarantee the accuracy of the materials included in the reproducibility package.
| Name | URI |
|---|---|
| Modified BSD3 | https://opensource.org/license/bsd-3-clause/ |
| Name | Affiliation | |
|---|---|---|
| Penelope Mealy | World Bank | pmealy@worldbank.org |
| Reproducibility WBG | World Bank | reproducibility@worldbank.org |
| Name | Abbreviation | Affiliation | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reproducibility WBG | DECDI | World Bank - Development Impact Department | Verification and preparation of metadata |
2025-11-18
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