(MENAFN) A new study estimates that southern areas of the US, many of which are already poor, could face a 20 percent decline in economic activity if carbon emissions continue unabated through the 21st century.
The study was issued by economists with the Climate Impact Lab, a consortium of experts from the Universities of California, Chicago and Rutgers and the Rhodium Group.
"We found that the southern United States, the southern parts of the Midwest and also the Atlantic coast are some of the most hardest-hit parts of the country," says Solomon Hsiang, a public policy professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and one of the study's lead researchers.
"There was a pretty good explanation for that, once we did the analysis and we understood [what] was going on," he explains. "The economic impact of warming is much worse if you are already pretty hot. So, going from 90 to 95 degrees is a much bigger deal than going from 70 to 75 degrees. Because the southern parts of the country are already so warm, a bit of warming does a lot more harm to them than to the northern parts of the country that tend to be cooler."
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