Climate Change Has Already Made Poor Countries Poorer and Rich Countries Richer

From 1961 to 2010, rising temperatures cut the per-person gross domestic product of the world’s poorest countries by 17% to 31%, according to a study published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. That, in turn, widened the gap in economic output between poor and rich nations by 25% more than it would have been “in a world without global warming,” slowing an otherwise positive shift toward shrinking inequality over that half-century.

Numerous studies have predicted that poor nations will suffer the greatest devastation from climate change. (See “Hotter days will drive global inequality.”) A new analysis finds it’s already been happening for decades.

All of that has happened with only around a 1 °C rise in global temperatures, but far worse changes are in store. The planet could warm by 1.5 °C as early as 2030, and by more than 4 °C by the end of the century, according to the United Nations climate panel.

Read the story from MIT Technology Review by James Temple - “Climate Change Has Already Made Poor Countries Poorer and Rich Countries Richer.”