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\n <\/figure>\n Europe will likely be better off, according to the modeling, but its economy would still lose $10 trillion and 110 million jobs over the same time period. By 2070, the United States would suffer $14.5 trillion in economic losses, and GDP would be $1.5 trillion lower.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If countries quickly shift away from fossil fuels and limit warming to just above 1.5 degrees C, however, modeling shows \u201cthe equivalent of an Industrial Revolution occurring in 30 years,\u201d Ibrahim said \u2014 a huge boost to the global economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Although people often talk about jobs and industries vanishing if the world shifted to a low-carbon economy, Ibrahim said, they won\u2019t simply disappear. \u201cThey transform into something else in line with what is more productive, what is more competitive, what makes sense as part of global trade,\u201d she said. \u201cIt is a more modern economy. There are higher-paying jobs.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There\u2019s some appetite for that transformation. According to a survey by Deloitte<\/a> last fall, 89 percent of C-level executives around the world agree that there is a \u201cglobal climate emergency,\u201d and 79 percent believe the world is at a tipping point for responding to it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While the initial switch to a carbon-free energy system would temporarily lower economic activity, thanks to the combination of upfront investments and the already locked-in damages of climate change, the benefits would come to outweigh the costs for every region on Earth, adding new sources of growth and job creation. Deloitte expects this turning point, where the benefits of taking action exceed the costs, to come the earliest for the Asia Pacific region \u2014 during our current decade, the 2020s. On the other end of the spectrum, it may come as late as the 2050s for Europe and 2048 for the United States. That\u2019s because these regions have more emissions-intensive structures to replace and aren\u2019t seeing as severe consequences from climate change as some parts of the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Philip said he hopes that the report can help leaders see that everybody benefits by taking coordinated steps to reduce emissions, breaking through some of the deadlock in global climate discussions. \u201cBecause now, those who said, \u2018You can’t make us bear the costs\u2019\u201d \u2014 like China and India<\/a> \u2014 \u201ccan see they can gain the most,\u2019\u201d he said. And the rich countries that have previously benefited from fossil fuels can see that taking action is also less costly for them in the long run.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe have squandered the chance to decarbonize at our leisure,\u201d the report says. \u201cGiven the costs associated with each tenth of a degree of temperature increase, every month of delay brings greater risk and forestalls the eventual economic gains.\u201d<\/p>\n This story was originally published by Grist<\/a> with the headline Think climate action is expensive? Inaction\u00a0could cost $178 trillion.<\/a> on May 24, 2022.<\/p>\n