Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Two separate studies have appeared recently claiming that climate will increase income inequality. In my opinion, both studies contradict readily observable evidence.
The first press release;
Study: Climate change damages US economy, increases inequality
Unmitigated climate change will make the United States poorer and more unequal, according to a new study published in the journal Science. The poorest third of counties could sustain economic damages costing as much as 20 percent of their income if warming proceeds unabated.
States in the South and lower Midwest, which tend to be poor and hot already, will lose the most, with economic opportunity traveling northward and westward. Colder and richer counties along the northern border and in the Rockies could benefit the most as health, agriculture and energy costs are projected to improve.
Overall, the study—led by Solomon Hsiang of the University of California, Berkeley, Robert Kopp of Rutgers University-New Brunswick, Amir Jina of the University of Chicago, and James Rising, also of UC Berkeley—projects losses, economic restructuring and widening inequality.
“Unmitigated climate change will be very expensive for huge regions of the United States,” said Hsiang, Chancellor’s Associate Professor of Public Policy at UC Berkeley. “If we continue on the current path, our analysis indicates it may result in the largest transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich in the country’s history.”
…
Read more: https://phys.org/news/2017-06-climate-economy-inequality.html
The second press release;
As the rich move away from disaster zones, the poor are left behind
By Leah Platt Boustan, Maria Lucia Yanguas, Matthew Kahn, and Paul W. Rhode
on Jul 1, 2017 6:00 am
Cross-posted from the Conversation
Every year, major earthquakes, floods, and hurricanes occur. These natural disasters disrupt daily life and, in the worst cases, cause devastation. Events such as Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy killed thousands of people and generated billions of dollars in losses.
There is also concern that global climate change will increase the frequency and intensity of weather–related disasters.
Our research team wanted to know how disasters affect people’s decisions to move in or out of particular areas. We created a new database that covers disasters in the United States from 1920 to 2010 at the county level, combining data from the American Red Cross as well as the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and its predecessors.
Our work shows that people move away from areas hit by the largest natural disasters, but smaller disasters have little effect on migration. The data also showed that these trends may worsen inequality in the U.S., as the rich move away from disaster-prone areas, while the poor are left behind.
…
Read more: http://grist.org/article/as-the-rich-move-away-from-disaster-zones-the-poor-are-left-behind/
The abstract of the first study;
Estimating economic damage from climate change in the United States
Solomon Hsiang, Robert Kopp, Amir Jina, James Rising, Michael Delgado, Shashank Mohan, D. J. Rasmussen, Robert Muir-Wood, Paul Wilson, Michael Oppenheimer, Kate Larsen, Trevor Houser
Estimates of climate change damage are central to the design of climate policies. Here, we develop a flexible architecture for computing damages that integrates climate science, econometric analyses, and process models. We use this approach to construct spatially explicit, probabilistic, and empirically derived estimates of economic damage in the United States from climate change. The combined value of market and nonmarket damage across analyzed sectors—agriculture, crime, coastal storms, energy, human mortality, and labor—increases quadratically in global mean temperature, costing roughly 1.2% of gross domestic product per +1°C on average. Importantly, risk is distributed unequally across locations, generating a large transfer of value northward and westward that increases economic inequality. By the late 21st century, the poorest third of counties are projected to experience damages between 2 and 20% of county income (90% chance) under business-as-usual emissions (Representative Concentration Pathway 8.5).
Read more: http://science.sciencemag.org/content/356/6345/1362
The abstract of the second study;
The Effect of Natural Disasters on Economic Activity in US Counties: A Century of Data
Leah Platt Boustan, Matthew E. Kahn, Paul W. Rhode, Maria Lucia Yanguas
NBER Working Paper No. 23410
Issued in May 2017
NBER Program(s): DAE EEE
Major natural disasters such as Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy cause numerous fatalities, and destroy property and infrastructure. In any year, the U.S experiences dozens of smaller natural disasters as well. We construct a 90 year panel data set that includes the universe of natural disasters in the United States from 1920 to 2010. By exploiting spatial and temporal variation, we study how these shocks affected migration rates, home prices and local poverty rates. The most severe disasters increase out migration rates and lower housing prices, especially in areas at particular risk of disaster activity, but milder disasters have little effect.
Read more (paywalled): http://www.nber.org/papers/w23410
What do I mean when I suggest both studies contradict observable evidence?
Ask one question – how do cities cope with hot weather, sudden deluges and extreme storms, in places where such phenomena are already a regular part of life? Places like the tropical coastal cities of my native Queensland?
The answer of course is the civic infrastructure of tropical cities is built to cope with the scale of events which are expected. The storm drains are built with much larger pipes, to easily cope with deluges on a scale which would severely flood most US cities. This is simply a matter of digging up the old pipes, and replacing them with larger pipes, next time the drains are repaired. The frames, walls and roofs of houses are built to resist cyclones, hail and extreme downpours – most of the roofs of working class houses in my area, including my house, are made of inexpensive heavy duty sheet steel. Such protection can be inexpensively retrofitted to houses at risk from storm damage – steel bracing to strengthen inadequate house frames, cheap steel roofs to increase protection from storm damage. Rich people sometimes choose tile roofs for aesthetic reasons – but they have more money to pay for roof repairs.
In severe cases, people in low lying areas are evacuated if a cyclone or other extreme event threatens, with well rehearsed evacuation plans. The government steps in to help repair usually very localised extreme storm damage. Even a near miss turns a tropical cyclone into an inconvenience rather than a disaster, if your local infrastructure is built to cope with extreme weather.
I am not suggesting that tropical cities get it right every time. 35 people died in the 2011 Queensland floods, a weather event so extreme it is believed to have caused global sea level to temporarily drop by 7mm. But this is far fewer deaths than the 1245 people who died due to Hurricane Katrina – a disaster which was reportedly exacerbated by poor planning and incompetence.
Incompetence which costs lives only prevails while it remains hidden. Queensland authorities are not inherently more competent than Louisiana authorities. We have our share of public scandals and crooked land planning decisions. But severe weather in Queensland is a regular occurrence. If severe deluges or other weather events were to become more common in the USA, the people would demand solutions – and those solutions are not difficult to implement. If all else failed, the USA would simply hire top civic engineers from tropical cities to help upgrade US infrastructure, to provide US citizens with the same kind of storm resilience as people who live in tropical cities already enjoy today.
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This is very obviously wrong; poor people don’t spend money on vacations to Florida and Cancún. In general, they’ll benefit from a warming climate.
We’ll just leave increased food production and lower prices as an exercise for the student.
Honestly, I didn’t bother to read the abstracts or the press releases, because climate change is such a non-issue that I didn’t want to waste my time. Severe weather will continue to happen and the poor will continue to be the most vulnerable. A little bit of warming won’t have much of an impact. A little bit of cooling would be far more of a problem.
A much bigger threat to the poor would be to raise the price of energy for the illusion of doing something about the climate. Higher energy costs make everything cost more and this would put a large and very negative burden on the poor, especially in winter, when many will no longer be able afford the energy to stay warm.
This is a no brainer. ‘Doing something’ about preventing climate change is far worse for ‘the poor’ than any possible change in the weather. In fact, this is true for everyone, but the poor will suffer the most from carbon mitigation schemes.
“‘Doing something’ about preventing climate change is far worse for ‘the poor’ than any possible change in the weather. In fact, this is true for everyone, but the poor will suffer the most from carbon mitigation schemes.”
Bravo. + 1000. Why this obvious point is lost on progressive globalists continues to escape me.
“…Why this obvious point is lost on progressive globalists continues to escape me…..” It’s because their goal has nothing to do with climate and everything to do with reducing humanity to the lowest common denominator.
A good point. My answer is, it’s not lost, it’s merely step one in a dance I call “The Progressive two-step.” The proof that it’s not lost? When properly challenged (the dance partner, the prog. press never bothers to challenge an eco press release) they will admit this but skip to, “the extra revenue (from, say, carbon tax) will be rebated to the poor.” Somehow. Wonder why the poor aren’t clamoring for higher energy costs, don’t they trust the progs to pass the quan down? Then these same progs will explain how the poor don’t seem to vote “their” economic interests (iow, the interests progs have planned tor them).
RCP 8.5 is the baseline. No wonder the alarmists are losing credibility. I guess examining actual data is no longer required. Why are people moving to the warm south if the cold north is going to become much more livable. I guess I should keep my summer home in Northern Michigan.
I’m devastated by the fact IPCC only has business-as-usual. They should create a worst case scenario as well!
By the way, this summer has been cold here. What did a friend of mine say about it? Well, she told it is because of climate change. Oh dear, I guess they will reuse their climate change scare if cooling really happened.
Mr Limbow is once again, still, proven correct. (Snipped) MOD
Well this explains why the poor people are now living with water views in Manhattan, Florida, Sydney, Hong Kong etc and the rich people are now living in the Bronx, the bayou, Redfern and the western slums on Hong Kong Island.
Low cost, reliable, and abundant electrical energy provides the greatest benefits to the poor. It means clean potable water, sanitation, healthier households, and improved hygiene. It provides the greatest economic, health, and personal leverage to the impoverished.
In contrast to low cost, reliable, and abundant electrical energy, no other societal benefit yields as high a return, in both human and economic terms. With low cost energy, adaptation to variable weather can be accommodated, as the histories of England, the USA, Australia, and Canada have demonstrated.
Let’s see if we can fix this
Study: Climate change regulations damage US economy, increases inequality
Draconian climate change regulations will make the United States poorer and more unequal, according to a new study published in the journal Political Science. The poorest third of counties could realize electric utility rates
sustain economic damagescosting as much as 30 percent of their income if warming regulations continue unchecked.States in the South and lower Midwest, which tend to be poor and hot already, will pay the most, with economic opportunity traveling overseas and to developing countries.Developing countries could benefit the most as health, agriculture and energy costs are projected to be lower without Paris commitments.
Overall, the study—led by Solomon Hsiang of the University of California, Berkeley, Robert Kopp of Rutgers University-New Brunswick, Amir Jina of the University of Chicago, and James Rising, also of UC Berkeley—projects economic losses, constant restructuring, increasing taxation, massive increases in energy expenditures and widening inequality in Developed Countries.
“Unmitigated climate change regulations will be very expensive for huge regions of the United States,” said Hsiang, Chancellor’s Associate Professor of Public Policy at UC Berkeley. “If we continue on the current path, our analysis indicates it may result in the largest transfer of wealth from the United States of America to the developing nations of the world in the country’s history
“If we continue on the current path, our analysis indicates it may result in the largest transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich in the country’s history…”
This statement reveals the true nature of Mr. Hsiang. He is a propagandist for the left; fear-mongering in an attempt to manipulate the population into surrendering to his ideology. There is nothing scholarly, or even truthful about his work.
Wealth is not ‘transferred’ from the poor to the rich. Wealth is created. The rich are richer today than in anytime in history. The poor are also richer today than in anytime in history. ‘Rich’ people do not ‘take’ money from the poor in this country, unless they are rich politicians. The legitimate rich offer the poor goods and services that enhance their lifestyles. The poor freely choose to part with their meager funds for those things that will make their life easier and more enjoyable (like fossil fuel). A carbon tax is not one of those things. A carbon tax simply takes from the poor and gives nothing in return. The poor would not freely choose to pay a carbon tax.
Mr. Hsiang uses the imaginary threat of a huge transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich to trick us into agreeing to a much larger and more certain transfer of wealth from the poor, middle class and rich to the pockets of left wing politicians and bureaucrats!
Is Berkeley still a University, or has it become a home for the criminally insane?
Wealth is transferred from developed countries (the perceived haves) to developing ones (the proclaimed Have-nots) via Carbon Taxation and Climate Reparations
Almost good for satire.
Way to GO! Got to Love the re-do!
RCP8.5 is BS and they know it.
Is it surprising that an alarmist model output generates, in the hands of these researchers and prognosticators, more alarming model outputs?
One sign of ‘fake’ is the imputation that Hurricane Katrina was ’caused by global warming’ during a time lamented by the UEA as not witnessing any global warming at all. At the time it had only been eight years, but still, the putative link is without evidence.
Suppose we uncritically take all their calculations at face value and reduce the RCP to a more realistic 1.0 degrees, the effects and outcomes predicted will be reduced by 88%. Meh.
As for the prediction that the poor will remain but the rich will free, that is silly! The poor have nearly nothing to lose and can shift quickly away, just as the rural poor shifted quickly and easily to urban conurbations in the past. It is the invested rich who are reluctant to move. They are the same ones who hold ‘hurricane parties’ when a storm comes instead of sensibly leaving. They are ‘protecting their property’ in their minds.
My thoughts turned to the Irish Potato Famine. In that case, we had a nation of poor, starving people in the mid 1800’s, before automobiles, planes and the wonders of fossil fuels. Somehow, millions of them managed to get passage to the United States to start a new life and hold big parades every March 17th! They made better lives for themselves in the States, and Ireland eventually recovered from the British telling the remaining residents what they had to do.
Humans have always been adaptable, but now it is easier than ever, by a long shot. A gradual warming over the next 100 years would be easily handled by the anyone, including the poor. Our biggest threat, by a long shot, is ourselves! More specifically, we are threatened most by our fellow humans who seek to dictate how we must live. In this, we all have a lot in common with the Irish peasants of 170 years ago.
well measure taken to mitigate alleged ‘climate change’ certainly hit the poor worse. Energy prices continue to climb.
More guilt.
More indulgences to buy.
You do accept Paypal now dont you?
Agitprop. It’s pointing out the blazingly obvious that ‘poor’ people will be ‘hardest hit’. They always are. Not because the system is prejudicial but because wealthy people live in better housing in better areas with more food, greater levels of protection and so on. It’s an apolitical statement of fact. Never stopped alarmists from using it to further their cause though.
So called climate mitigation efforts have hurt the poor. Just look at the government mandated turning of corn into ethanol to burn as fuel instead of using as food. It has forced the price of corn up and made those that rely on corn as food poorer.
“The US south will be hit the hardest” says to me “you dumb southerns who oppose our enlightened policies are going to suffer!” Have you ever seen a person with a southern US accent portrayed in a movie or TV show as educated, wise, or influential? The best you will get is a southern belle like Scarlett O’Hara. This has the air of elitism about: “Us wise northern democrats know what is best for you dumb rednecks. If you don’t listen to us and vote democrat, you will die.”
Well, if the south is so horrible and going to be destroyed by too much heat, then why are people from cold states rushing to live in the hot states? Of the 10 states with the most influx of people (not percentage, but actual number of people), 6 are hot weather states.
Like every claim of the CAGW cult, everything is based on their models and not actual, factual, verifiable data. The way I identify some scams is if THEY — whoever ‘they’ might be … ‘they’ could be Microsoft tech support, for example — tell you that you have a problem you did not know you had, but don’t worry because THEY can fix your problem for a fee. CAGW is a scam: They, the well-paid ‘scientists’ or well-paid bureaucrats or well-paid Hollywood elites, tell you that the earth is going to burn even though you would never know that if they didn’t tell you. But don’t worry, these well-paid individuals can fix your problem for a fee on your taxes and energy bill.
The US needs to pass a law making it legal for residences of one state to move to another.
Too many building code issues, not to mention giving legal status to an inanimate object.
Just limit the new law to residents….
Just did a quick check and found no laws in US stopping people from moving from state to state.
Are you talking about moving a house from one state to another? Buy an RV, problem solved. If you are talking about people moving between states, there are no laws stopping you from moving anywhere you wish.
China and EU to issue formal climate change statement at UN.
http://m.scmp.com/news/china/policies-politics/article/2100471/china-and-eu-could-issue-formal-climate-change
Should make for a hilarious WUWT post when it happens.
Perhaps off topic, sorry.
After the recent disater in the UK where Grenfell Tower went up in flames, there is another fire that took place in Bow Wharf. Where a block of flats caught fire, and the suspected cause of the fire is …. Solar Panels I have not heard much from the greens about this, do all Solar Panels installed on buildings need to be checked for fire safety ..
Story from Daily Mail: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4658696/Large-blaze-brand-new-block-flats-East-London.html
I don’t understand why “climate scientists” can’t start with a problem statement and develop reasonable solutions to that problem. Instead, they start with a solution and try to work backwards to determine how they can blame climate change. It’s such backwards logic, that I can’t even understand why everybody isn’t laughing at it.
1) Problem: Income inequality and energy poverty — Cause: World policies to restrict energy worldwide.
Solution: Develop the least costly energy technologies worldwide to drive wealth in all regions. The added wealth should enable economies to develop environmental mitigation strategies.
The solution is not “Tax inexpensive energy to force more poor people into energy poverty and benefit a few rich people who are well-positioned to exploit the windfall.”
2) Problem: Species Extinction — Cause: over-hunting/over-fishing, Invasive species, and habitat destruction. Solution — Conservation strategies to reduce hunting of threatened species and to incorporate habitats within populations have been the only successful strategies to combat species extinction. In addition, safe, inexpensive worldwide food distribution is vital to prevent the necessary exploitation of local resources for food.
Solutions do not include — “Destroy habitats so that we can grow fuel” or “Make fuel so expensive that we can no longer afford to distribute or refrigerate food” or “Find some minor contributor to blame for species extinction which distract from successful local conservation efforts.”
3) Problem: Heat Waves — Cause: natural cycles which may be exacerbated by land-use changes and/or greenhouse gases. Solution: Air conditioning and ice water (why is this not obvious?)
I could go on.
+10. They don’t start with a problem because there is no problem. We are witnessing the largest secular mass delusion since at least eugenics. All that we are witnessing is a projection of interior angst and bigotry and self loathing by the climate true believers.
Of course there are problems. People are killed by heat stroke, flooding and other natural phenomena. During such natural weather events, those living in poverty experience much greater disaster than those in economically developed nations. It’s this jump from cause to solution makes no sense — especially without considering the harms of the solutions.
This is like the FAA examining airline crashes and determining the solution is to increase the price of heating oil. We would never have developed a system with the dramatic drop in airline fatalities with that approach.
These two articles are discussing “income inequality” — carbon taxes will make income inequality worse and make it more difficult for those who live in poverty to afford homes which can resist flooding or air conditioning. The “solution” makes the problem worse.
Analyze this:
“our analysis indicates it may result in the largest transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich in the country’s history.”
Poor don’t have wealth; that’s why they are called “poor.”
Transferring wealth from people known to not have wealth is stupid. It reveals the political – not scientific – nature of the paper.
I think of Miami, Ft. Lauderdale, and countless other cities in Florida (/s) and conclude that you need to work harder and smarter.:
“Our work shows that people move away from areas hit by the largest natural disasters, but smaller disasters have little effect on migration. The data also showed that these trends may worsen inequality in the U.S., as the rich move away from disaster-prone areas, while the poor are left behind.”.
Hurricane Andrew was a major disaster….and South Miami to Homestead/Florida City is booming
Their work shows that the authors did no work or critical reviews. In fact their work shows they wrote a useless paper but managed to get paid well for it.
“Think of the children”. “Think of the poor”. “Think of the disabled (who can’t outrun climate change)”. “Think of the women.” Have I left any out?
For Climatists, it’s all about the Guilt.
Yes,,,it is all about trying to make us feel guilty, but it is just really stupid!
Imagine that the laws of physics were abandoned and we really did have runaway global warming of say 10 degrees over the next 100 years. In order for the ‘disabled’ to maintain the climate in which they were born (a completely unnecessary requirement), they would have to wheel themselves north about 3 to 4 miles per YEAR!
At least in Germany the “climate protection policy” (which is in reality a global redistribution of wealth) led to the fact, that the poor suffer more from “climate” than the rich.
The poor can hardly pay their electricity bill, which has risen sharply because of the subsidies for “renewable” energies (mostly wind turbines) in which the rich have invested Billions!
This CAGW madness, aka “climate change”, must come to an end!
I hope that a majority of Americans back President Trump and stop this “good-for-nothing” Paris agreement,
chancellor “Adolfine” Merkel calls non-negotiable!
(Snipped) MOD
My theory is that all civilisations die when the collective stupidity reaches a tipping point. If this point is reached the society will collapse. I believe we have passed when the number of genders passed 2.
The reactionary climate extremists are pulling out all stops. It us as if they are competing with each other to churn out the most deceptive inflammatory scary stories in defense of their apocalyptic delusions yet. The refusal of climate to actually do anything scary or unusual us driving the climate faithful a bit crazy. Like Heavens Gate believers seeking their seat on the starship, the climate kooks are willing to fabricate anything at all from nothing if it will support their delusional non-existent climate crisis.
Yet the proposed solution to CO2 emissions by the climatistas – renewables – absolutely hammers the less well off with higher energy prices, removing yet another margin from their ability to live their lives, grow financially, and raise children. They also have the added benefit of being far less reliable, leading to brownouts and blackouts in the coldest and hottest parts of the year.
This reminds me of the old joke about the end of the world. NYT headline announcing it reads: World Ends: Women and Children Hardest Hit. Cheers –
http://www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/world_ends_joke
Here’s a piece on flooding on Arizona Ave. in Atlantic City. This street is on a tidal flat. It has been flooding for forever, but this hit piece doesn’t mention that.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/economic-injustice-atlantic-citys-floods/