BOOK
Can We Afford the Future?
Doctor Frank Ackerman | Professor Bina Agarwal | Kevin P. Gallagher | Ha-Joon Chang | Ha-Joon Chang
(2009)
Additional Information
Book Details
Abstract
According to many scientists, climate change is a growing threat to life as we know it, requiring a large-scale, immediate response. According to many economists, climate change is a moderately important problem; the best policy is a slow, gradual start, to avoid spending too much. They can't both be right.
In this book, Frank Ackerman offers a refreshing look at the economics of climate change, explaining how the arbitrary assumptions of conventional theories get in the way of understanding this urgent problem. The benefits of climate protection are vital but priceless, and hence often devalued in cost-benefit calculations. Preparation for the most predictable outcomes of global warming is less important than protection against the growing risk of catastrophic change; massive investment in new, low carbon technologies and industries should be thought of as life insurance for the planet.
Ackerman makes an impassioned plea to construct a better economics, arguing that the solutions are affordable and the alternative is unthinkable. If we can't afford the future, what are we saving our money for?
Can we Afford the Future? is part of The New Economics series, which uses the ideas behind a new, more human economics to provide a fresh way of looking at major contemporary issues.
‘Frank Ackerman provides the ammunition that advocates of strong climate policy need to debunk the conclusion that stabilizing our future climate is "too expensive".'
Stephen H. Schneider, Stanford University
'This book is essential reading for anyone trying to understand the major economic debates around the major new long-term challenge of our times - global warming. Frank Ackerman has done us all a great service with this very accessible critical survey of the varied and complicated issues involved.'
Jomo Kwame Sundaram, UN Assistant Secretary General for Economic Development
Frank Ackerman is a research fellow at Global Development and Environment Institute and a senior scientist at Stockholm Environment Institute-US Centre, both at Tufts University. He is a founding member of Economists for Equity and Environment (E3) and a member scholar of the Centre for Progressive Reform.
Table of Contents
Section Title | Page | Action | Price |
---|---|---|---|
Acknowledgements | vii | ||
1 The status quo is not an option | 1 | ||
The new debate | 5 | ||
The invisible hand, and other fables | 8 | ||
Economics without equilibrium | 11 | ||
Four bumper stickers for better economics | 13 | ||
2 Your grandchildren’s lives are important | 15 | ||
Discounting the far future | 18 | ||
Figure 2.1 \rCosts and benefits, by year | 21 | ||
Figure 2.2 \rPresent value of costs and benefits | 22 | ||
Discount rates and financial markets | 23 | ||
Discount rates and first principles | 24 | ||
3 We need to buy insurance for the planet | 28 | ||
The climate change card game | 28 | ||
Worst-case scenarios | 30 | ||
Climate policy as insurance | 32 | ||
Incalculable risks | 35 | ||
How sensitive is the climate? | 38 | ||
4 \rClimate damages are too valuable to have prices | 41 | ||
Expensive, or priceless? | 43 | ||
A bargain at twice the price | 47 | ||
A craving for heat | 48 | ||
Is hotter weather healthier? | 50 | ||
Agriculture in a warmer world | 51 | ||
5 Some costs are better than others | 55 | ||
Energy savings without costs | 56 | ||
Good costs and bad costs | 60 | ||
Waiting for technology | 64 | ||
6 Hot, it’s not: climate economics according to Lomborg | 70 | ||
Whom can you trust? | 72 | ||
Table 6.1 Lomborg’s bibliography: selected authors and frequency of citation | 75 | ||
Costs, benefits, and consensus | 76 | ||
Three hundred years of Kyoto | 78 | ||
7 Much less wrong: the Stern Review versus its critics | 82 | ||
What did Stern conclude? | 83 | ||
Is the Stern discount rate too low? | 85 | ||
How do risk and uncertainty affect climate economics? | 88 | ||
How should damages and mitigation costs be estimated? | 91 | ||
Did Stern underestimate the problem? | 92 | ||
8 Climate, equity, and development | 97 | ||
Responsibility based on emissions: should the polluters pay? | 98 | ||
Figure 8.1 Shares of world population and CO2 emissions, selected countries | 101 | ||
Responsibility based on income: should the rich pay? | 102 | ||
Greenhouse development rights | 104 | ||
All together now | 107 | ||
Cost–benefit analysis versus climate justice | 109 | ||
9 What is to be done? | 113 | ||
Magic bullets that miss the target | 116 | ||
The logic of carbon prices | 119 | ||
The inefficiency of the market | 121 | ||
Getting refrigerator prices right | 124 | ||
Sulfur trading and why it works | 125 | ||
Can we change fast enough? | 127 | ||
Notes | 133 | ||
Chapter 1 | 133 | ||
Chapter 2 | 133 | ||
Chapter 3 | 134 | ||
Chapter 4 | 134 | ||
Chapter 5 | 135 | ||
Chapter 6 | 136 | ||
Chapter 7 | 136 | ||
Chapter 8 | 138 | ||
Chapter 9 | 139 | ||
References | 140 | ||
Index | 146 |