Economic impacts of climate change

Climate change will probably have a limited impact on the economy and human welfare in the 21st century. The initial impacts of climate change may well be positive. In the long run, the negative impacts dominate the positive ones. Negative impacts will be substantially greater in poorer, hotter, and lower-lying countries. Poverty reduction complements greenhouse gas emissions reduction as a means to reduce climate change impacts. Climate change may affect the growth rate of the economy and may trap more people in poverty but quantification is difficult. The optimal carbon tax in the near term is somewhere between a few tens and a few hundreds of dollars per tonne of carbon.