Should Hollywood Make More Movies About Climate Change?

The Director of the UCLA Institute of the Environment (my old home) is Peter Kareiva.  Here is a recent Variety Fair piece he wrote with a very successful business man.    They seek to use Hollywood's influence to nudge perceptions about the risks posed by climate change.  A quote:

"So, in confronting this unsettling and urgent challenge, we pose the question: How can the entertainment industry — the most powerful network of storytellers in history — help spark and sustain the public determination necessary to restore the balance of nature before climate change, ocean acidification and extinction pass a point of no return?

In the story of Noah, a prophet’s swift action to save Earth’s biodiversity was successful. In today’s crisis, the outcome of our story is still uncertain — and up to us. Together, let’s write an ending that makes us all proud."

Now those who know me, know that I have many ideas.  Permit me to propose 5 Climate Change movie plot lines;

Story #1:   Coastal home owners adapt to rising sea level by putting their homes on stilts and moving to higher ground.  For a more detailed sketch of the plot click here.  

Story #2:  Businesses observing that their productivity is suffering from increased summer heat install air conditioning.  For a more detailed sketch of the plot click here.

Story #3;  While climate skeptics exist, the growth in climate change cognizant consumers leads to sufficient purchasing power to trigger induced innovation.  For a more detailed sketch of the plot click here.  

Story #4;    As agricultural productivity suffers in the heat, people move to cities and work and live inside and are shielded from the negative effects of extreme heat.  For a more detailed sketch of the plot click here. 

Story #5;   As nations experience more natural disasters caused by climate change, the death count from these shocks declines because of free market economic growth giving people and governments the resources they need to offset increased risk.  For a more detailed sketch of this plot click here.

So, I have just given you 5 new movie plots.  In each of my plots, climate change is a real threat.  A subset of the population is aware of this and they pursue their own self interest to protect themselves. The power of free markets in aggregate helps them to adapt and live on. So, my movies have happy endings.  This is Climatopolis.  Will you pay $12 to watch any of these?  I doubt it.  I wish we didn't have to live through any of these movies but the suburban and coal politics that I have analyzed in these political economy papers;

Jonathan Eyer & Matthew E. Kahn, 2017. "Prolonging Coal’s Sunset: The Causes and Consequences of Local Protectionism for a Declining Polluting Industry," NBER Working Papers 23190, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

Matthew J. Holian & Matthew E. Kahn, 2015. "Household Demand for Low Carbon Policies: Evidence from California," Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, University of Chicago Press, vol. 2(2), pages 205-234.

Michael I. Cragg & Yuyu Zhou & Kevin Gurney & Matthew E. Kahn, 2013. "Carbon Geography: The Political Economy Of Congressional Support For Legislation Intended To Mitigate Greenhouse Gas Production," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 51(2), pages 1640-1650, 04.

suggest to me that #my_movie_plots_matter.