Climate Change Denial: Bad for Business

[riqster]

http://bluntandcranky.wordpress.com/2012/12/10/climate-change-denial-bad-for-business/

[dballance]

1. Unfortunately not Significantly bad for enough businesses in the short term that anyone cares

Most of the current CEOs, and Wall Street traders will all be dead by the time the really severe effects of climate change kick in so they don't care. They're also passing along wealth to their greedy Mitt Romney like spawn that could never be spent in several lifetimes so they don't care. Their spawn will use the billions to buy their way to places where going outside does not mean you'll be fried by the sun in only minutes after we bake off the oceans and the atmosphere.

But it is not sufficiently bad for business right now for them to care. It is far more profitable for them to cause earthquakes and pollute the environment by Fracking. Funny how closely that seems to "Fucking." It is far more profitable to screw the people of the gulf coast by spilling oil and then dispersants into coastal waters and then pay what's thought of as a huge fine rather than actually do anything to correct the actual problem.

No, we're never going to see the time where corporations who are "people" and money is "speech" ever causes a corporation to suffer the death penalty for their illegal deeds or that those monied organizations ever get prosecuted for slander or libel.

[riqster]

2. All very true

It is most noticeable in the insurance markets at present: but they drive lots of downstream business decisions. In addition to the cases mentioned in the blog post, the increased severity and frequency of weather events is changing the risk (and so the cost) of the way we've been doing business in the global sphere: ocean and overland shipping, for instance.

So, short term it's not a big deal. Long term, if a business is required to cut their cost of risk, it'll help.

[dballance]

4. Very Good Point

It might be through the risk analyses of insurance companies and increased costs to businesses that change may come. Not only with respect to the costs of storms and rising sea levels claims by businesses to insurance companies but to the increased costs for individual and family claims as well.

[riqster]

5. Other costs and benefits, too

Like companies printing less so as to appear 'green', utility companies going to a small percentage of renewables for tax and P.R. reasons, etc.

These are small steps, but they can multiply when companies see that it is in their interests.

[dballance]

7. I wonder how much we'd save

Economically and environmentally if we just stopped printing and sending all those circulars and catalogs I never look at and walk right from the mailbox to the trash bin. Then there is the cost of disposing of them too.

[riqster]

8. Quite a lot

I know some companies have stopped sending catalogs, because most people look on the Internet, or can't afford to buy fancy stuff from catalogs. Same with Yellow pages and such.

[Speck Tater]

3. Doing anything about climate change is worse for business.

To save the planet, capitalism has to go. That's not going to happen. Ergo, the planet is dead.

[riqster]

6. Not that communism was especially good for the planet.

Nor any economic system. The only way most people will make a change is when they perceive a benefit. For a regime, the benefit is increased power and/or stability. For a business it'll be their bottom line. For individuals, there are a greater range of possibilities.

[Speck Tater]

9. You're right. I should have said "civilization" not "capitalsim".

You have heard them speak, and seen their eye... "It was fine there, where we camped on our fishing trip--sometimes I wished--of course I had to get back for the sales-conference"..."Do you ever think, George, of a desert island?"..."Just a cabin, in the woods, no telephone."..."The sand-spit by the lagoon, I like to fancy--but, you know, there's Maud, and the children."

What a strange thing then is this great civilization, that no sooner have men attained it than they seek to flee from it!

...

Why do the legends look back toward some golden day of simplicity?

Must we not think then that this great civilization grew up not by men's desires, but rather by Forces and Pressures. Step by step, as villages grew larger, men must give up the free wandering life of berry-picking and seed gathering and tie themselves to the security (and drudgery) of agriculture. Step by step, as villages grew more numerous, men must renounce the excitement of the hunt for the security (and drudgery) of cattle-keeping.

Then at last it was like Frankenstein's vast monster. They had not willed it, but it ruled them all. And so by a thousand little surreptitious paths they tried to escape.

--George R. Stewart in Earth Abides (1949)

[riqster]

10. A great quote from a great book

One of my favorites, and bang on the mark.