How Climate Change Will Reshape Where Americans Live - FiveThirtyEight
How Climate Change Will Reshape Where Americans Live | FiveThirtyEight
For decades, Americans have been moving south and west. That migration pattern become apparent in American politics, when seven congressional districts moved states after the 2020 census, and it continues to be visible in the booming construction and job markets in cities across the Sun Belt.
In this installment of the FiveThirtyEight Politics podcast, Galen speaks with author Jake Bittle, who argues that it’s only a matter of time before those trends reverse, or at least shift. Although, this time, he writes in his new book “The Great Displacement,” it won’t be cheap housing, low taxes and plentiful jobs that attract people to new places. It will be a worsening climate that pushes them away.
Related Knowledge Center: Climate economics
Climate change is now a driver of the world’s economy. The impact is profound:
- Catastrophic weather events — hurricanes, floods, droughts, high temperatures — are more frequent and more extreme. The cost can be measured in both the initial damage caused and the longer-term impact on the economy.
- Vulnerable communities are increasing climate-related investments, hardening infrastructure and taking other protective measures.
- Investment in carbon capture and storage technologies is increasingly rapidly.
- Governments are making investments and crafting regulations to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.
On top of all of this is the cost of uncertainty. As the Fourth National Climate Assessment, released in 2018 by the U.S. Global Change Research Program, says, “The assumption that current and future climate conditions will resemble the recent past is no longer valid.”