In his book, The Green Collar Economy, Van Jones writes that many of the green consumer stereotypes that exist are downright wrong:

The Green Collar Worker: “When you think of the emerging green economy, don’t think of George Jetson with a jet pack. Think of Joe Sixpack with a hard hat and lunch bucket, sleeves rolled up, going off to fix America. Think of Rosie the Riveter, manufacturing parts for hybrid buses or wind turbines. Those images will represent the true face of a green-collar America.”

The Green Shopper: “People imagine a few Hollywood celebrities eating tofu, doing yoga, and driving hybrid cars. They envision affluent white people who care about nothing but polar bears and can afford to shop at health-food stores and put solar panels on their second home …Many of these caricatures are grossly unfair.”

While people are debating the rise (or even the existence) of the new Green Collar demographic in America, Consumer Reports came down on the side of — not really sure.

“There is no official ‘green-collar’ worker definition just as there isn’t for other commonly cited terms, such as white collar and ‘blue collar,” says Bureau of Labor Statistics spokesman Gary Steinberg. “One sees green collar and green jobs increasingly used in public discourse, but because of the criteria limitations discussed above, we cannot at this time make any official assessments about the extent of such employment or its impacts on the overall economy.”

http://blogs.consumerreports.org/home/2008/08/green-collar.html