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Human-generated greenhouse gas emissions imperil a global resource: a biosphere capable of supporting life as we know it. What is the fair way to share this scarce resource across present and future generations, and across regions of the world? This study offers a new perspective based on the guiding ethics of sustainability and egalitarianism.

Sustainability is understood as a pattern of economic activity over time that sustains a given rate of growth of human welfare indefinitely. To achieve this, the atmospheric concentration of carbon must be capped at some level not much higher than exists today, and investments in education and research should be higher than they currently are. International cooperation between developing and developed nations is also vital, because economic growth and the climate problem are intertwined.

The authors propose that the guiding principle of bargaining should be that the dates at which developing countries' living standards catch up with those of developed countries should not be altered by the agreement. They conclude that developed economies would have to agree not to exceed 1 percent growth in per capita GDP annually, while developing nations should grow at a faster rate, but still lower than current projections, until they converge. The authors acknowledge that achieving such a dramatic slowdown would carry political and economic challenges.

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• Preface(p. ix)
• Introduction(p. 1)
• 1 Sustainability and Discounted Utilitarianism(p. 33)
• Chapter 1 Appendix: The Ramsey Problem(p. 63)
• 2 An Introductory Model with Education and Skilled Labor(p. 72)
• Chapter 2 Appendix: Proofs(p. 89)
• 3 Sustainability for a Warming World(p. 124)
• Chapter 3 Appendix: Proofs(p. 164)
• 4 The "Climate-Change Economics" Literature: Nordhaus and Stern(p. 174)
• 5 Sustainability in a Warming, Two-Region World(p. 208)
• Chapter 5 Appendix: Formal Details(p. 232)
• 6 Modeling Catastrophes: Two Extensions(p. 241)
• Chapter 6 Appendix: Proofs and Calibration(p. 257)
• Conclusion(p. 264)
• Appendix A Calibration(p. 271)
• Appendix B Mathematica Code(p. 289)
• References(p. 301)
• Index(p. 311)

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CHOICE Review

This monograph applies infinite-dimensional optimization modeling to climate change. Authors Llavador (Pompeu Fabra Univ., Spain), Roemer (Yale Univ.), and Silvestre (Univ. of California, Davis) are economists by training, but they are also deeply knowledgeable in ethics and political economy. The book focuses on the prospect of society's achieving sustainable levels of well-being given the coming changes in world climate, a topic the authors see as being neglected in the climate change economics literature. Major contributions to the discussion include the application of infinite-dimensional optimization to the problem of climate change, the incorporation of ethical dimensions of distributive justice across generations and regions into the mathematical modeling, and the inclusion of education in the models as both a factor of production and an important determinant of human welfare. The authors' analysis builds, in particular, on Nicholas Stern's The Economics of Climate Change: The Stern Review (2007) and William Nordhaus's The Climate Casino (CH, Apr'14, 51-4560). Given the advanced mathematics, the book is best suited to graduate level courses in public economics and environmental economics and will, no doubt, be required reading in many such courses. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Graduate students, researchers, and faculty. --Kevin J. Murphy, Oakland University