The Top Ten Solutions to the World's Biggest Problems

[Michaelangelica]

Reason Magazine - The Top Ten Solutions to the World's Biggest Problems

Not what I would of expected.

Want to write your own list first?

 

Copenhagen Consensus Center - CCC Home Page

 

 

Copenhagen Consensus 2008

- The best solutions to 10 of the world's biggest challenges, Copenhagen, May, 2008

 

More than 55 international economists, including 5 Nobel Laureates, will assess more than 50 solutions and assemble a list of priorities for everyone involved in solving the world's biggest challenges.

 

The aim of CC08 is to take stock of the world's biggest problems and the most promising solutions and provide informed input into the policy making process surrounding efforts to deal with these

Copenhagen Consensus 2008 - Home

[freeztar]

So what proposed solutions are at the bottom of the list? At number 30, the lowest priority is a proposal to mitigate man-made global warming by cutting the emissions of greenhouse gases. This ranking caused some consternation among the European journalists at the press conference. Nobelist and University of Maryland economist Thomas Schelling noted that part of the reason for the low ranking is that spending $75 billion on cutting greenhouses gases would achieve almost nothing. In fact, the climate change analysis presented to the panel found that spending $800 billion until 2100 would yield just $685 billion in climate change benefits.

 

Noting that he has been concerned about climate change for 30 years, Schelling argued that tacking climate change will take public policy responses such as carbon taxes to address the issue. Schelling added, "The best defense against climate change in the developing countries is going to be their own development." He explained that funding education to create a literate labor force boosts the productivity of a country enabling economic growth. Economic growth produces wealth that helps people address and adapt to the problems caused by climate change. Bjorn Lomborg, head of the Copenhagen Consensus Center, pointed out that funding research and development of low-carbon energy technologies is ranked at a respectable number 14 out of the 30 solutions considered.

 

Hmmm...I wonder if they considered Biochar? :rolleyes:

 

It's hard to believe that spending $75 Billion on curbing GHG would accomplish almost nothing. It's hard to believe that the price tag is the inhibitor. All the money in the world will amount to nothing if we have ecosystems collapse as a result of man-made causes. :(

[Michaelangelica]

Hmmm...I wonder if they considered Biochar? :rolleyes:

 

It's hard to believe that spending $75 Billion on curbing GHG would accomplish almost nothing. It's hard to believe that the price tag is the inhibitor. All the money in the world will amount to nothing if we have ecosystems collapse as a result of man-made causes. :(

Yes I wonder if we gathered all the dumbest or the craziest people in the world we would get a different or better list.

[Moontanman]

I wonder if anyone really thinks that dropping all trade barriers would be good for anyone but third world countries? it looks to me like such a step would pretty much destroy the economies of the first world:shrug:

[Michaelangelica]

I wonder if anyone really thinks that dropping all trade barriers would be good for anyone but third world countries? it looks to me like such a step would pretty much destroy the economies of the first world:shrug:

It seems a very complex and politically fraught area.

 

It seems to me that First world countries are not helping the Third World.

 

But I have just received a severe beating about the head on a thread I started on USA farm subsides.

SEE

http://hypography.com/forums/social-sciences/14765-usa-farm-subsidies-socialism-corporate-welfare.html

 

It is complex.