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A comment on "Economy-wide estimates of the implications of climate change: Human health"

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  • Ackerman, Frank
  • Stanton, Elizabeth A.

Abstract

In a recent article in this journal, Francesco Bosello, Roberto Roson, and Richard Tol make the remarkable prediction that one degree of global warming will, on balance, save more than 800,000 lives annually by 2050. They introduce enormous, controversial monetary valuations of mortality and morbidity, varying with income; they then focus primarily on modeling the much smaller, indirect economic effects of the changes in health outcomes. Their calculations, large and small, are driven by the huge projected reduction in mortality -- an estimate that Bosello et al. fail to substantiate. They rely on research that identifies a simple empirical relationship between temperature and mortality, but ignores the countervailing effect of human adaptation to gradual changes in average temperature. While focusing on small changes in average temperatures, they ignore the important health impacts of extreme weather events. They extrapolate the effects of small changes in average temperature far beyond the level that is apparently supported by their principal sources, and introduce arbitrary assumptions that may bias the result toward finding net health benefits from warming.

Suggested Citation

  • Ackerman, Frank & Stanton, Elizabeth A., 2008. "A comment on "Economy-wide estimates of the implications of climate change: Human health"," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 8-13, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:66:y:2008:i:1:p:8-13
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    Cited by:

    1. Anderson, Blake & M'Gonigle, Michael, 2012. "Does ecological economics have a future?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(C), pages 37-48.
    2. Marko Korhonen & Suvi Kangasrääsiö & Rauli Svento, 2017. "Climate change and mortality: Evidence from 23 developed countries between 1960 and 2010," Proceedings of International Academic Conferences 5107635, International Institute of Social and Economic Sciences.
    3. Roberto Roson & Martina Sartori, 2016. "Estimation of Climate Change Damage Functions for 140 Regions in the GTAP 9 Database," Journal of Global Economic Analysis, Center for Global Trade Analysis, Department of Agricultural Economics, Purdue University, vol. 1(2), pages 78-115, December.
    4. Veronika Huber & Dolores Ibarreta & Katja Frieler, 2017. "Cold- and heat-related mortality: a cautionary note on current damage functions with net benefits from climate change," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 142(3), pages 407-418, June.
    5. Bosello, Francesco & Roson, Roberto & Tol, Richard S.J., 2008. "Economy-wide estimates of the implications of climate change - a rejoinder," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 14-15, May.
    6. Tjasa Redek, 2010. "The Economics Of The Fight Against Climate Change," Economic Thought and Practice, Department of Economics and Business, University of Dubrovnik, vol. 19(2), pages 311-329, december.
    7. Thomas Longden, 2019. "The impact of temperature on mortality across different climate zones," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 157(2), pages 221-242, November.
    8. Thomas Longden, 2018. "Measuring temperature-related mortality using endogenously determined thresholds," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 150(3), pages 343-375, October.

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