Thomas Gale Moore (Hoover Institution Stanford University)
Abstract
A somewhat warmer climate would probably reduce mortality in the United States and provide Americans with valuable benefits. Regressions of death rates in Washington, DC, and in some 89 urban counties scattered across the nation on climate and demographic variables demonstrate that warmer temperatures reduce deaths. The results imply that a 2.5° Celsius warming would lower deaths in the United States by about 40,000 per year. Although the data on illness are poor, the numbers indicate that warming might reduce medical costs by about $20 billion annually. Utilizing willingness to pay as a measure of preference, this paper regresses wage rates for a few narrowly defined occupations in metropolitan areas on measures of temperature and size of city and finds that people prefer warm climates. Workers today would be willing to give up between $40 billion and $61 billion in wages for a 2.5°C increase in temperatures.
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Publisher Info
Paper provided by EconWPA in its series Others with number
9604001.
Length: 27 pages Date of creation: 17 Apr 1996 Date of revision: Handle: RePEc:wpa:wuwpot:9604001
Note: Type of Document - HTML; prepared on Mac; pages: 27; figures: one. Prepared in Word and translated into HTML. A copy can be found with figure on http://hoover.stanford.edu/~moore/publications.html Contact details of provider: Web page: http://129.3.20.41
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Find related papers by JEL classification: Q25 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Water J17 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Value of Life; Foregone Income J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
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