Climate and economy

Will the cost of moving away from fossil fuels really be millions of jobs and trillions of dollars? “No,” says Jeanne Merrill, who cites California as an example. Merrill is the policy director for the California Climate and Agriculture Network. Ms. Merrill reports the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 in California helped fuel the state’s recovery from the Great Recession. Since passing the country’s most comprehensive climate change laws, California’s “GDP growth has significantly outpaced the national average.”

California, the sixth-largest economy in the world, has generated 13 percent job growth, and added 1.8 million jobs, billions in clean-tech venture capital and investment, as well as a GDP growth rate that doubled the national rate in both 2015 and 2016. All this was accomplished while dropping gas emissions 9.4 percent in the decade ending in 2014.

The carbon fee and dividend policy proposed by the Citizens’ Climate Lobby will drive a transition to a domestic energy economy, stimulate investment in alternative-energy technologies, and give business powerful incentives to remain competitive by increasing energy efficiency and reducing their carbon footprints.

Information on the carbon fee and dividend policy can be found at citizensclimatelobby.org. ROBERT PEKEL

Rogers