When Opportunity knocks, you have to open the door! I am looking forward to being on Nevada NPR radio tomorrow morning to talk about climate change adaptation. Unfortunately, we are not being proactive and reducing our GHG emissions. While this doesn't surprise any economist, I have been surprised by the refusal of many smart economists to broach the topic of climate change adaptation. I wrote Climatopolis because it was obvious to me (back in 2009) that adaptation would become the central piece of the puzzle. The New York Times and other "informed sources" are now running more and more pieces about adaptation but they keep making government rather than individuals and profit maximizing firms the star of the show. I view this emphasis on "collective adaptation" as misplaced and in many cases counter-productive. Were Facebook and Google built by government? Similar innovation will now take place in helping us to cope with the "new normal".
I'm not saying that government has no role in helping us to adapt but economists need to start to work on the "moral hazard" effects of local government intervention (i.e sea walls attract more "victims" to move to a flood plain) and to think about the economic incidence effects of such government investment (i.e do land owners nearby new sea walls enjoy a sharp increase in land values?).
The broad topic of "free market climate adaptation" will become a central issue over the next 30 years and I hope that the academic nerds who read this blog start to work and think about this topic!
