A comment on Fisher's letter in The Economists' Voice

I read Jeffrey Fisher's letter in The Economists' Voice (Climate Change Debate Needs Two Sides). Here is the summary:

Where are the economists who think climate change isn't happening, isn't manmade, or is too expensive to prevent, wonders Jeffrey Fischer.

His concern is that The Economists' Voice is presenting only one side of the argument. My concern is that economists should have nothing to say about his first two concerns:

• Economists who think climate change isn't happening? Based on what professional knowledge? Your ability to teach ECO 760: Advanced Micro?
• Economists who think climate change isn't manmade? Based on your extensive ecological and geological fieldwork?

Forgive me for my snide rhetorical questions. My view is that economists, as part of their professional role, have absolutely nothing to say about the first two concerns. Economists should take estimates of temperature rise, sea-level rise and etc. (and their uncertainties) and plug them into economic models and determine the costs and benefits of mitigation. The only question we can, and should, address is: "is climate change too expensive to prevent"? There is plenty of economists working on this issue, whether or not it is in The Economists' Voice.

Comments

[David Zetland]

hear hear!

PhD != master of the universe....

[Dano]

Ah. So you didn't sign the New! Improved! Oregon petition then. Too bad - they needed your PhD for credibility.

Anyway, aaaaaa-men, bruddah.

Best,

D

[John Whitehead]

For the second one, I should have said, instead of fieldwork: Based on your climatological modelling ability?

[Tom]

John,

As usual, you are not making any sense when it comes to global warming. You say economists should have nothing to say about whether climate change (global warming) is happening or if it is man-made, but economists should have something to say if it is too expensive to prevent. Obviously, when an economist makes a judgment on whether global warming is too expensive to prevent he is making the implied assumption that 1) it is happening and 2) it is man-made and, therefore, preventable.

Also, your two questions could also be asked:

• Economists who think climate change IS happening? Based on what professional knowledge? Your ability to teach ECO 760: Advanced Micro?

• Economists who think climate change IS manmade? Based on your extensive ecological and geological fieldwork?

[Tim Haab]

I'm pretty sure there is a global climate.

[Rick McGrath]

I have issues with John's view on the third question and Tom's response.

Any scenario presented by scientists regarding the nature of global warming could be the basis for a cost analysis under the simple assumption that the given scenario is correct. The economist does not need to make any conclusions about the science or judge the quality of scientific analysis. He or she just assumes the science is correct.

As for the third question....since when is economics the appropriate set of tools for determining whether something is worth doing? Economics is good at estimating costs, but it pretty much ends there. At the beginning of principles most of us teach students two key ideas that are critical here: (1) there is a trade-off between efficiency and equity that results in the need for a normative rather than positive analysis, and (2) economics is an incomplete tool for making normative decisions. We are limited to estimating what it will cost and leaving it to the politicians and philosophers to decide whether it is worth it. Proper policy analysis weighs efficiency against other concerns but does not necessarily place efficiency above other concerns.

[John Whitehead]

Anonymous Tom,

I agree with your additional bullet points.

However, I disagree with your paragraph. I would say "when an economist makes a judgment on whether global warming is too expensive to prevent he is making the implied assumption that 1) it might be happening and 2) it might be man-made and, therefore, preventable. An objective economist can remain agnostic to the physical science."

[John Whitehead]

Rick,

Ooops. I agree, and I usually don't make that mistake. Here is what I think:

Economists can come up with estimates of net benefits of government actions and make recommendations about their efficiency.

[John Whitehead]

Anonymous Tom,

"As usual, you are not making any sense when it comes to global warming."

Thanks,

John Whitehead

[Wy]

I would imagine that economists build upon the work of the subject matter experts in climatology and ecology, in a collaborative fashion. But that might be asking too much in some worldviews, where people are supposed to know things de novo.

[Don Strong]

Could this be a moment for an ecologist to witness a discussion among economists about Stern report economics? I would like hear the thinking of "subject matter experts" in economics.
Don, the ecologist.

[John Mashey]

APPROACHING SCIENCE OUTSIDE ONE'S OWN DOMAIN
When approaching a problem in a scientific domain outside one's own:

It's not that hard to decide whether or not there is a scientific consensus amongst the actual researchers in the field. One reads Science or Nature, sees if the relevant National Academies and other scientific societies have positions, checks authors via Google Scholar. If one sees a lot of OpEds, letters to editor, but few or no relevant publications in relevant refereed journals, that's a warning. It helps to understand science publication styles.

THEN, assuming a clear consensus exists, one can:

a) Accept it without question.

b) Accept it provisionally as the likely best guess by experts in a domain in which one doesn't want to spend the time to become an expert.

c) Have reservations about the consensus, and have the background and the time to study it enough to feel confident one way or another. This usually involves making a list of reservations or conflicting evidence, and learning more and watching for new evidence. Attend lectures, talk to scientists, ask questions.

d) Know the consensus is wrong, get well-educated, then spend a lot of time looking for uncertainties, cherry-picking, drawing misleading graphs, to attack the consensus at every chance. Endlessly repeat long-debunked arguments, and cite every half-baked paper that comes out as having disproved masses of evidence.

e) Know the consensus is a conspiracy, without knowing the science or needing to know. Many people have profound doubts about science in multiple domains, even without any great encouragement.

===
ECONOMISTS
Many economists have good statistics skills, and are familiar with issues in analyzing time series. A few are even physicists by background or have some physics in their background, and that makes it much easier.

For most, though, I'd guess that John's position (b) is exactly right. Nobody has the time to be an expert at everything that might be relevant.

SCIENTIFIC CONSENSUS
Of course, among actual climate scientists, there is an overpowering consensus that AGW is real and a problem, even as they argue about details and try to bound uncertainties. The key elements were in place by the 1980s, causing the IPCC to be started, and in 1989: Georege H. W. Bush to write:

"President Bush announced today that the United States has agreed with other industrialized nations that stabilization of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions should be achieved as soon as possible."

That stirred up some serious pushback, but from outside science.

Naomi Oreskes (a fine geoscientist / science historian) ha a nice 58-minute video, of which the first half describes the history of the scientific consensus in the making. The second half describes the start of extra-science pushback via PR tactics well-honed in the cigarette wars, and with some of the same people.

Serious discussions of the economics around climate change are really welcome, and rare. If people want to debate whether or not it's happening, an economics blog is a silly place for it, although perhaps not quite as bad as YouTube.

WISH FOR STERN, ETC.
I'd second Don Strong's wish, although I'd love to see as well economists' comments on Nordhaus' DICE, the MIT Global Change Joint Program's models, the NRDC study, Martin Weitzman's "fat tails", etc.

[John Mashey]

APPROACHING SCIENCE OUTSIDE ONE'S OWN DOMAIN
When approaching a problem in a scientific domain outside one's own:

It's not that hard to decide whether or not there is a scientific consensus amongst the actual researchers in the field. One reads Science or Nature, sees if the relevant National Academies and other scientific societies have positions, checks authors via Google Scholar. If one sees a lot of OpEds, letters to editor, but few or no relevant publications in relevant refereed journals, that's a warning. It helps to understand science publication styles.

THEN, assuming a clear consensus exists, one can:

a) Accept it without question.

b) Accept it provisionally as the likely best guess by experts in a domain in which one doesn't want to spend the time to become an expert.

c) Have reservations about the consensus, and have the background and the time to study it enough to feel confident one way or another. This usually involves making a list of reservations or conflicting evidence, and learning more and watching for new evidence. Attend lectures, talk to scientists, ask questions.

d) Know the consensus is wrong, get well-educated, then spend a lot of time looking for uncertainties, cherry-picking, drawing misleading graphs, to attack the consensus at every chance. Endlessly repeat long-debunked arguments, and cite every half-baked paper that comes out as having disproved masses of evidence.

e) Know the consensus is a conspiracy, without knowing the science or needing to know. Many people have profound doubts about science in multiple domains, even without any great encouragement.

===
ECONOMISTS
Many economists have good statistics skills, and are familiar with issues in analyzing time series. A few are even physicists by background or have some physics in their background, and that makes it much easier.

For most, though, I'd guess that John's position (b) is exactly right. Nobody has the time to be an expert at everything that might be relevant.

SCIENTIFIC CONSENSUS
Of course, among actual climate scientists, there is an overpowering consensus that AGW is real and a problem, even as they argue about details and try to bound uncertainties. The key elements were in place by the 1980s, causing the IPCC to be started, and in 1989: Georege H. W. Bush to write:

"President Bush announced today that the United States has agreed with other industrialized nations that stabilization of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions should be achieved as soon as possible."

That stirred up some serious pushback, but from outside science.

Naomi Oreskes (a fine geoscientist / science historian) ha a nice 58-minute video, of which the first half describes the history of the scientific consensus in the making. The second half describes the start of extra-science pushback via PR tactics well-honed in the cigarette wars, and with some of the same people.

Serious discussions of the economics around climate change are really welcome, and rare. If people want to debate whether or not it's happening, an economics blog is a silly place for it, although perhaps not quite as bad as YouTube.

WISH FOR STERN, ETC.
I'd second Don Strong's wish, although I'd love to see as well economists' comments on Nordhaus' DICE, the MIT Global Change Joint Program's models, the NRDC study, Martin Weitzman's "fat tails", etc.