Is concern for the environment a luxury good? Evidence from Google searches

CALGARY — A new poll shows that concern about the environment around the world is at a 20-year-low, pushed down by a bigger worry: the weak economy. When Toronto-based GlobeScan asked 22,812 people in 22 countries, including the U.S. and Canada, how worried they were about six environmental problems — air pollution, water pollution, species loss, automobile emissions, fresh water shortages, and climate change — fewer people said they now consider them ‘very serious’ than at any other time since tracking began 20 years ago.

"None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free."- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Below is the nine step process bankers have used to enslave us all with nary a peep of resistance until recent times. Hopefully recognition of this process can help us to free ourselves from the grip of bankers that wish to financially destroy us all.  

OTTAWA – Just as one federal cabinet minister is urging a more sophisticated tone to the climate change debate, a second cabinet minister has sparked an angry response from environmentalists over comments he made to a newspaper. Environment Minister Peter Kent this week said the federal government would never opt for a carbon pricing scheme itself, but would be open minded about pricing arrangements set up by the provinces.

A Harvard academic has put the blame squarely for America's failure to act on climate change on environmental groups. She also argues that there is little prospect Barack Obama will put climate change on the top of his agenda in his second term.

|Peter Boettke|

Matthew E. Kahn, 11 September 2010Most scientists agree that climate change is underway or at least on the horizon. This column introduces the author's book 'Climatopolis: How Our Cities will Thrive in Our Hotter Future.' It outlines an optimism and an irony: Urban economic growth may have caused climate change, but through the free market, it will also help us to adapt to it. Full Article: Climatopolis: How will climate change impact urbanites and their cities?

I think the answer to that question is pretty simple: not much.

Here’s another thing that puzzles me about Copenhagen: why is the issue of climate change being conflated with that of global justice? For example, the Copenhagen editorial says:Social justice demands that the industrialised world digs deep into its pockets and pledges cash to help poorer countries