Work

Why Economic Analysis Supports Strong Action on Climate Change: A Response to the Stern Review's Critics

Year: 2008

Type: article

Abstract: Economic research that opposes the strategy of strong and urgent reductions in greenhouse gas emissions often makes the observation, misleadingly, that while scientists, environmentalists, politicians, and others would favor strong action, economists would not. Drawing on the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change, this paper argues that strong and urgent action is in fact good economics. Much of the previous economic literature on climate change has failed to grasp the necessary scale and timing of action because it has failed to simultaneously assign the necessary importance to issues of risk and ethics. The case for strong and urgent action set out in the Review is based, first, on the severe risks that the science now identifies and, second, on the ethics of the responsibility of current generations for future generations. It is these two issues—risk and ethics—that are crucial.

Source: Review of Environmental Economics and Policy

DOI: 10.1093/reep/ren001

Authors: Simon Dietz, Nicholas Stern

Institution: London School of Economics and Political Science

Language: English

Topic: Climate Change Policy and Economics

Subfield: Economics and Econometrics

Field: Economics, Econometrics and Finance

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Climate action

Open Access status: green

Funder: Economic and Social Research Council