Annual Meeting
“Revising the Social Cost of Carbon: Key Economic Policy Priorities”
Panel Session
Sunday, January 9th, 2022, 10:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. (EST)
Hosted by: American Economic Association
Chair: Gernot Wagner, New York University
Abstract
By early 2022, the current administration seeks to issue recommendations for using and revising the social cost of carbon (SCC), a key metric used in cost–benefit analyses to inform climate policy. Climate science and economics have advanced since 2010 when the SCC was first calculated. The time is ripe to reestablish the SCC as central to science-based climate policy that accounts for mounting losses from storms, wildfires and other climate impacts. Panelists will discuss how revisions to the SCC can address key policy concerns related to the effect of climate damages on long-term economic growth, the impacts of extreme temperatures on people’s abilities, and equity considerations for vulnerable communities and future generations, as well as share insights from the latest and best science and economics.
Panelists
Tamma Carleton, University of California-Santa Barbara
Kenneth Gillingham, Yale University
Robert Kopp, Rutgers University
Fran Moore, University of California-Davis
JEL Classifications
Q5 – Environmental Economics
H5 – National Government Expenditures and Related Policies
Related: “Eight priorities for calculating the social cost of carbon,” Nature (25 February 2021); “A tale of two carbon prices,” Bloomberg Green Risky Climate column (19 February 2021); “Recalculate the social cost of carbon,” Nature Climate Change (29 March 2021); “Improving the social cost of nitrous oxide,” Nature Climate Change (17 November 2021)