\u201cThe world is getting scarier,\u201d Wucker writes in her new book, You Are What You Risk: The New Art and Science of Navigating an Uncertain World<\/em>. \u201cOften it feels harder and harder to do much of anything to exert control over the risks we face in our daily lives, much less over many of the global risks facing the entire planet.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n You Are What You Risk <\/em>introduces a new vocabulary for talking about these threats. Everyone has a personalized \u201crisk fingerprint\u201d that describes what kind of risk-taker they are, shaped by their personality, upbringing, and experiences. Strengthening your \u201crisk muscle\u201d can help you make good decisions. The book doesn\u2019t fit easily in any category: It could appear on the \u201cself-help\u201d shelf in the bookstore, or sit in a section devoted to economics, business, or psychology. Her focus zooms in to examine personal predicaments and zooms out to global crises, analyzing how people wrestle with choices and uncertainty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The book\u2019s release comes at a time when people are starting to pay more attention to the economic ramifications of climate change. \u201cThere’s just been a huge surge in attention to climate risk,\u201d Wucker said. Last year, six U.S. senators sent a letter<\/a> to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac warning that the housing market was unprepared for the devastating floods and wildfires headed its way. Some experts say that a failure to account for these climate risks could fuel a financial crisis<\/a> like the 2007 subprime mortgage crisis. Investors are beginning to grasp the consequences, Wucker says, pointing to \u201chuge inflows\u201d of money into sustainable investments <\/a>\u2014 such as Environmental, Social, and Governance funds \u2014 during the COVID-19 pandemic. Investors are also pressuring businesses to disclose the risks<\/a> that climate change poses to their operations and how they intend to address them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Wucker wants to break down misconceptions about climate change, starting with the common idea that it\u2019s a slow-moving threat. \u201cIt\u2019s actually not,\u201d Wucker said. \u201cIt\u2019s fast-moving, and it\u2019s getting faster and faster.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n In Chicago, where Wucker lives, she says the sunrise looked like the moonrise last fall when wildfire smoke from the West blew across the country. She has a friend in Australia whose brother got injured trying to protect his property from wildfires. Wucker says her asthma has gotten much worse in recent years, to the point that she had to start taking more medication to control it. (Yes, climate change is even making allergies worse<\/a>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Wucker recommends behavioral change \u2014 like eating less meat or ditching your SUV for public transit \u2014 as a response to a situation that otherwise feels totally out of control. It gives people a sense of agency. \u201cThe more each one of us feels that we can contribute to reducing the risks from climate change, the more likely we are to do something about it,\u201d she said. \u201cIt creates a virtuous circle.\u201d She cites an analysis<\/a> from the conservation organization Rare showing that if people started adopting eco-friendly habits on a large scale, their efforts could reduce greenhouse gas emissions worldwide by 20 to 37 percent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n She\u2019s interested in the reasons that some governments take action on climate change while others tend to ignore the threat. It\u2019s partly a matter of values and cultural differences, Wucker reasons in the book, and the risks are objectively different between countries, as are their financial resources. She also identifies one psychological reason that some countries might be more proactive than others. \u201cThe greater benefit you see to yourself, the more likely you are to see something as less risky,\u201d she told Grist. That\u2019s true for individuals, as well as businesses and governments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So countries that make a lot of money off fossil fuels \u2014 say, Saudi Arabia \u2014 have an incentive to ignore the risks from climate change. Conversely, those that see a benefit to their economy from clean energy are more likely to take the risk of specializing and innovating, Wucker said. Consider Costa Rica<\/a>, a tiny Central American country that has become a big player in international environmental policy. Costa Rica made \u201ceco-tourism\u201d its brand, and has also committed to total decarbonization by 2050 and regrowing its tropical rainforest.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cPlaces that see an economic niche for themselves in clean and efficient technologies, if they see something in it for them, they’re more likely to hop on it,\u201d Wucker said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Near the end of You Are What You Risk<\/em>, Wucker recounts meeting the teenage climate activist Haven Coleman in 2019. A 7th grader at the time, Coleman was the co-executive director of the Youth Climate Strike in the United States. She had been skipping school every Friday to protest the climate crisis, and had also publicly pleaded with Colorado\u2019s congressional representatives to take action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cTogether, young people and students around the world have been able to draw attention to the climate crisis in a way that we \u2018grown-ups\u2019 have failed to do,\u201d Wucker writes. \u201cAnd why shouldn\u2019t they? It\u2019s their future at risk even more than ours.\u201d<\/p>\n This story was originally published by Grist<\/a> with the headline \u2018The world is getting scarier’: How climate change multiplies risk<\/a> on Apr 9, 2021.<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/grist.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/04\/wildfire-sunrise-lake-michigan-e1617924379875.jpg\")