An amazing comment (here) from climate economist luminary Richard Tol epitomizes the narrow, linear, non-scientific thinking of the economics profession in the climate arena.
In Voodoo economists, part 3, I explained why a recent study, "Climate Shocks and Economic Growth [PDF], was a new favorite of global warming deniers. In projecting the economic consequences of global warming this century, the authors:
- knowingly ignored many of the key impacts (like sea-level rise, extreme weather, species loss)
- (unknowingly?) ignored all the other key impacts (like desertification and loss of the inland glaciers and ocean acidification)
- assumed the the tiny global warming impacts we have experienced in the last few decades could be be extrapolated in a linear fashion to determine the huge global warming impacts projected for this century on the business-as-usual emissions path
- absurdly did not assign China and India "significant negative consequences of climate change" because those countries would soon be rich.
That's the only way they could come up with conclusions like "we find very little impact of long-run climate change on world GDP" or "Changes in precipitation had no substantial effects on growth in either poor or rich countries" -- conclusions the right wing deniers at the Heritage Foundation and elsewhere were quick to embrace. But Richard Tol posted a comment here:
