Are the probable future negative effects of climate change an argument for decreasing the discount rate to promote the interests of future generations? The analysis of the present paper suggests that such stronger intergenerational altruism might undermine future wellbeing if not complemented by...

Climate change is an externality since those who emit greenhouse gases do not pay the long-term negative consequences of their emissions. In view of the resulting inefficiency, it has been claimed that climate policies can be evaluated by the Pareto principle. However, climate policies lead to...

The future effects of climate change may induce increased intergenerational altruism. But will increased intergenerational altruism reduce the threat of climate change? In this chapter we investigate this question. In a second-best setting with insufficient control of greenhouse gas emissions in...

We consider the question of how to integrate carbon emissions in comprehensive national accounts for the purpose of indicating whether countries' development is sustainable. We derive an expression for national saving which includes not only the national effect of current global emissions, but...