Climate change is one of the largest obstacles to humanity. We have recently seen an iceberg four times the size of London being dislodged into the ocean after the Larson C ice shelf gave way. This rapid rate of retreat in the polar ice caps has disastrous consequences as sea levels currently are rising at their fastest rates for 2,000 years at 3.5mm per year. This may seem negligible and any serious implications may seem distant, however this is not the case. An average of 21.5 million people have been forcibly displaced since 2008 due to climate changed-related weather hazards. The recent increase in the intensity and frequency of Hurricanes in the Caribbean region have also been attributed to climate change. While contemplating the long-term impacts gives rise to mind-numbingly terrifying prospects, I will focus on the short-term impacts that climate change is having on global communities and how it may exacerbate economic inequality.

A recent paper from Solomon Hsiang and Robert Kopp has under gone statistical analysis for three different temperature scenarios to see how 15 economic variables may change for each American county. From this they have been able to produce a probability distribution of the costs America may sustain by the end of the century. Their findings have painted a bleak prophecy for the impact of climate change. For a slight increase of 1.5 degrees Celsius annual output is likely to reduce by up to 1.7%, whilst a more substantial rise of 4% will lead to a fall of up to 5.6%. However these facts conceal the distribution of these negative impacts which is demonstrated below.

As shown while some regions will actually benefit, namely the most northern and inland states, other coastal states are set to experience sever decline. Moreover the states in the firing line are mainly the country’s poorest. For example Mississippi which is the poorest state in America with a median household income of $40,593 in 2015 compared with $75,847 in the richest state of Maryland.

The impacts of more volatile weather will lead to falling crop yields which will be especially significant in the American south. On the other hand in richer states like New England winters will be milder yields will rise from the global warming. This therefore gives rise to the exacerbation of economics inequality as the poorest lose their assets to sever climate hazards and suffer from a lack of opportunities as economic growth is hampered by the climate. As well as this the richest people in affected areas will be far more mobile in the face of catastrophes and are more likely to have more property or savings to fall back on. Not only is the rise in inequality highly unethical, especially since the rich are disproportionate contributors to climate change in the first place as shown below, but it may not be healthy for the American economy since a rise in inequality may cause certain members of the society to be excluded from achieving their potential; being forced to pursue work as soon as possible rather than pursue higher education or career training for example.

This effect will also occur in a global scale as shown below many of the developing countries will have damage to their agricultural economies. This is particularly damaging for these countries since they are far more reliant on agriculture for their populations labour so a collapse in the market could lead to a severe rise in unemployment. Also it will be damaging since the poorest countries will inevitably have the fewest resources to deal with climatic catastrophes. In these cases foreign aid may help but it will most likely be only short-term relief and will not be sufficient to help economically rebuild the poor regions which will therefore inevitably suffer an economic disadvantage. As well as this the most vulnerable countries nowadays are small island nations in the Pacific or Caribbean that have poor resources or plans to deal with rising sea levels that seriously threaten to consume their entire land. A wide-scale migration will occur which will cause a far bigger migration crisis than the Syrian crisis that the EU and the West in general have been reluctant to help. So if this was to occur sadly a lot of people will likely be stranded in vulnerable or poor regions.

However this study is only forecasting with current trends and this bleak future need not come into fruition. As Robert Swan once said “the greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it,” we need to take action now to help reduce climate change. Leaving these problems to the distant future will be at a huge cost to the poorest which can significantly hurt the economy itself. Awareness of climate change issues is increasing, especially so in European countries where electric cars are increasing in popularity. However a key player is America where Trump has firm belief that climate change is just a money-minded hoax. This has become a conventional wisdom, as it is a convenient fact and easily explains away many problems Americans hesitate to confront. However there are signs that the American population are gaining more awareness especially after the wake of hurricanes Harvey.

Sources:

http://science.sciencemag.org/content/356/6345/1362

http://www.wired.co.uk/article/climate-change-facts