Economists. Sheesh.

With all due respect, this is the sort of thing that gives economists a bad name:

N.Y. Times Columnist Says Time Ripe for Carbon Tax to Cut Emissions

In a column published in today's New York Times, David Leonhardt wrote that a dispute among academics about the cost of climate change suggests the middle ground should be the imposition of a carbon tax. Among the strongest critics of Sir Nicholas Stern, who recently led a study stressing urgent action against climate change to prevent massive future economic damage, were Yale economists William Nordhaus and Robert O. Mendelsohn.

Wrote Leonhardt: "The two professors raised some questions about the science in the Stern Review. Mr. Nordhaus wondered if carbon emissions and temperatures would rise as quickly as the report suggests, and Mr. Mendelsohn predicted that people would learn to adapt to climate change, reducing its ultimate cost. But their main objection revolved around something called the discount rate."

The discount rate argues that a dollar of economic damage prevented a century from now is about as valuable as a dollar spent reducing emissions today. But Leonhardt points out the opposing argument is that a dollar today is more valuable than a dollar a century from now and that dollar would be better spent on something like education to improve the earning power of future generations so climate change can be dealt with at that time.
New York Times, column , Feb. 21.

~Source: EEI newsletter

Yeah, Nordhaus, let's just put off doing anything about climate change and hope that our well-educated progeny aren't killed in another Katrina-type event just as they're about to solve the problem. Are you on crack?