This paper uses the Kaldor-Hicks compensation principle to compute the present value (PV) of a non-marginal future event. Three theoretical results stand out: First, decreasing returns to capital create a wedge between the PV of future generations' willingness to pay (WTP) and the PV of their...

Nearly all discussions about the appropriate consumption discount rate for climate change policy evaluation assume that a single discount rate concept applies. We argue that two distinct concepts and associated rates apply. We distinguish between a social-welfare-equivalent discount rate...

The choice of the proper discount rate is important in the analysis of projects whose costs and benefits extend into the future, a particularly striking feature of policies directed at climate change. Much of the literature, including prominent work by Arrow et al. (1996), Stern (2007, 2008),...

We present a modification of the most commonly used integrated assessment model (IAM) of climate change (DICE-2016), AD-DICE2016, which is designed to address three key aspects of climateeconomy models: treatment of uncertainty, the use of more appropriate utility functions, and including...

The integrated assessment literature frequently replicates uncertainty by averaging Monte Carlo runs of deterministic models. This Monte Carlo analysis is, in essence, an averaged sensitivity analyses. The approach resolves all uncertainty before the first time period, drawing parameters from a...

Climate change not only impacts production and market consumption, but also the relative scarcity of non-market goods, such as environmental amenities. We study fundamental drivers of the resulting relative price changes, their potential magnitude, and their implications for climate policy in...

Climate change not only impacts production and market consumption, but also the relative scarcity of non-market goods, such as environmental amenities. We study fundamental drivers of the resulting relative price changes, their potential magnitude, and their implications for climate policy in...

We study how the scarcity of non-market goods, such as environmental amenities, affects the economic appraisal of climate policy. To this end, we perform a comprehensive analysis of the change in relative prices of non-market goods in the widespread climate-economy model DICE. We show that DICE...

The social rate of discount is a crucial driver of the social cost of carbon (SCC), i.e. the expected present discounted value of marginal damages resulting from emitting one ton of carbon today. Policy makers should set carbon prices to the SCC using a carbon tax or a competitive permits...