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Mark Budolfson on redistributing emissions to maximize well-being

In a study published in Nature Climate Change, CPLB’s Mark Budolfson and coauthors propose a utilitarian approach to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The authors —which also include Dean Spears from the University of Texas at Austin, Navroz K. Dubash from the Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi, Kevin Kuruc from the University of Oklahoma, Francis Dennig from Yale-NUS, Frank Errickson from Princeton University, and David Anthoff from University of California at Berkeley—argue that their utilitarian approach would lead to better outcomes for human development, equity, and the climate.

Climate policy analyses often rely on dollar-based outputs like maximizing global GDP, and therefore ignore the importance of global income inequality. This study models optimal worldwide emissions distributions that would maximize well-being, not economic outcomes, thus weighing the interests of every citizen of the world equally. The authors take into account not only the wellbeing impacts of direct harms from climate change, but also the wellbeing impacts of the costs of reducing emissions. This approach measures equality by a simple method that can be implemented in a wide range of climate policy assessment models and discussions, and creates an equitable model that reallocates emissions constraints to where they do the greatest good, allowing poorer regions the opportunity to continue economic development.