Letter

In response to Environment: Murray-Darling Plan delivers profits, but not environmental improve

The unreal predictions of climate economists

Rarely has the chasm between “economic modelling” and reality been more spectacular than in the prognostications of climate economists. William Nordhaus won a Nobel prize for work which included the assumption that the 85% of economic activity which occurs indoors will be unaffected by climate change.

The summary graph in Richard Tol’s recent meta-analysis, presented to us by Peter Sainsbury, is further evidence of the utter failure of climate economic modelling: any secondary school science student knows that at six degrees of global warming, there will be no meaningful economic activity at all – yet Tol’s line of best fit suggests a mere 7% reduction in living standards at that unliveable level. No mention of tipping points. No mention of the cumulative impact of change over time.

This would be risible if it were not so serious. Policymakers are rarely scientists, so they have depended upon the work of climate economists (rather than scientific experts) to guide the urgency and scope of our climate responses. Which, not surprisingly, have been and remain grossly inadequate.

— Richard Barnes from Melbourne