Employ America: Grantee Spotlight (2026)

Grantee Spotlight: Employ America

The Giving Green Fund plans to award a grant to Employ America for its work on clean firm energy financing tools. Employ America is a U.S.-based economic nonprofit that aims to build sustained prosperity, improve working conditions, and unleash the full potential of the U.S. economy.

Employ America's work falls within our philanthropic strategy of unleashing clean energy in the U.S. Please see Giving Green’s strategy report for more information, including recommended sub-strategies, theory of change, and key uncertainties.

Last updated: November 2025

What Is Employ America?

Employ America was founded in 2019 to confront policy failures that followed the Global Financial Crisis and led to a weak labor recovery: an insufficient fiscal response and a premature tightening of monetary policy. Its team brings together experts in economics, finance, law, and policy advocacy united by a commitment to full employment as the cornerstone of a strong economy. Its work focuses on addressing weakening labor markets, shifting global energy demand, and rising geopolitical and trade tensions that require policy solutions.

What Are We Funding, and How Could It Help Address Climate Change?

We are funding Employ America’s work to derisk financing clean firm energy projects, such as geothermal and nuclear power plants, by further standardizing the financing process. Since there currently is not a standard process to financing these large scale energy projects a developer must create new financing models for every project, making the process challenging and inefficient. If well designed standard models and practices existed (such as underwriting standard models and financial model structures that blend different types of financing), it would lower barriers to developing projects with complicated financial structures. Standardization would also help the private capital community feel more comfortable and confident with financing clean firm energy projects. To further this work, Employ America will rely on its staff’s economic and policy expertise, as well as a hired consultant from the financial sector, to:

• Design model structures that blend federal senior debt, state or municipal mezzanine finance, and private equity.

• Define model underwriting standards so that federal agencies, like the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Loan Programs Office, shift from direct lending to guaranteeing loans under clear, scalable criteria.

• Develop project delivery practices that enforce discipline, transparency, and cost control while protecting public investment.

In our strategy report on unleashing clean energy in the U.S., we identified deploying and commercializing clean firm power as a promising approach to decarbonizing the U.S. grid. One of the challenges, however, with deploying clean firm energy is access to financing, and as a result, we have prioritized unlocking new sources of financing as a sub-strategy. We believe that the Employ America’s standardization work fits well under this sub-strategy and will support greater financing for clean firm projects.

Why Do We Think Employ America Will Use This Funding Well?

Employ America staffs a group of highly skilled individuals steeped in policy and energy deployment challenges, and holds strong working relationships with the financing community. In the past, its team has worked with both sides of the aisle to progress energy financing policy and has already led work to derisk financing projects under DOE’s Loan Program Office. With the addition of an investment consultant to its team, we have confidence that Employ America will be able to develop solutions fit for the U.S. federal government and financing community.   

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Giving Green believes that additional climate donations are likely to be most impactful when directed to our top nonprofits. For several reasons, we may choose to recommend grants to other organizations for work that we believe is at least as impactful as grants to our top recommendations. We are highlighting this grant to offer transparency to donors to the Giving Green Fund, as well as to provide a resource for donors who are particularly interested in this impact strategy. This is a nonpartisan analysis (study or research) and is provided for educational purposes.

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