Though I was impressed by UNC students’ participation in this election — anyone who doubts our involvement should have seen the Pit on Election Day — I also noticed a restrictive way of thinking. There is a clear partisan divide over certain issues, most obviously between the environment and the economy.
When listening to students debate about the candidates, I realized climate change is generally considered a liberal concern, while the economy is dominated by the right. This divide prevents people from understanding how these issues affect each other, and more importantly, how solving one can benefit the other.
Climate change will affect every sector of the economy by raising prices, reducing income and causing job losses. Some of the most crucial sectors of the economy — agriculture, transportation, energy — depend on the climate.
The Southeast region produces about a quarter of U.S. agricultural products. North Carolina has a huge livestock and crop industry. Since temperature rises negatively affect crop yields, climate change could cause a loss in millions of jobs across this state.
And as any freshman in ECON 101 knows, supply is directly linked to prices. Since the demand for food is never going to decrease, prices will increase. Higher prices mean that we as consumers can buy much less with our dollars — bad news for college students on tight budgets. Restaurants like Olive Garden and Chipotle have raised prices partly because of higher food costs.
Superstorm Sandy illustrated another looming threat of climate change — an increase in the number and severity of extreme weather events. Global warming is expected to contribute to an increase in hurricane intensity and duration. It will increase floods, droughts and forest fires.
Apart from devastating effects like loss of life, weather disasters also lead to huge economic loss. Property damage forces consumers and insurance companies to spend billions in cleaning and rebuilding. There are also indirect effects like decreases in job productivity.
So, if we realize that climate change will directly affect the economy, why is environmental policy so often ignored by political economists? After all, there can also be an opposite side to the climate change coin: Policies that improve our country’s environmental performance can benefit our economic agenda.
Green jobs are one of the only sectors of the economy experiencing growth right now. A national policy to invest in alternative fuels and green technology will create new jobs, hopefully for those workers displaced by the negative effects of climate change.
