The Problems with measuring and using Happiness for Policy Purposes

October 24, 2019 / Chhay Lin Lim / Leave a comment

Just came across this interesting paper of Mark White about measuring happiness and using it as a guide to implement public policies.

Abstract

Many governments around the world are considering measures of happiness or subjective wellbeing as alternatives to gross domestic product (GDP) for the purpose of guiding economic policymaking. Compared to GDP, happiness measures promise to better capture the quality of life of a nation’s citizens and lead to policies that are more effective and equitable. However, there are a number of problems with the concept of happiness that policymakers should be aware of before adopting it as a policy tool. In this paper, I focus on three interrelated aspects of happiness—definition, measurement, and policy implementation—and explain why each renders happiness a poor guide for policy. In general, happiness is a vague, multifaceted, and subjective phenomenon that is difficult to define precisely enough for measurement, hard to measure in a way that allows meaningful comparison between individuals and groups, and fraught with ethical complexities that complicate policy implementation.

You can find the whole paper here: https://www.mercatus.org/system/files/White-Happiness.pdf

Global Warming Policy Foundation: more Carbon Dioxide is actually good news

October 23, 2019October 23, 2019 / Chhay Lin Lim / Leave a comment

Interesting report, published by Indy Goklany and the Global Warming Policy Foundation, about the benefits of carbon dioxide.

The report introduces Goklany as

an independent scholar and author. He was a member of the US delegation that established the IPCC and helped develop its First Assessment Report. He subsequently served as a US delegate to the IPCC, and an IPCC reviewer. He is a member of the GWPF’s Academic Advisory Council.

Summary of the report

This paper addresses the question of whether, and how much, increased carbon dioxide concentrations have benefited the biosphere and humanity by stimulating plant growth, warming the planet and increasing rainfall.
Empirical data confirms that the biosphere’s productivity has increased by about 14% since 1982, in large part as a result of rising carbon dioxide levels.
Thousands of scientific experiments indicate that increasing carbon dioxide concentrations in the air have contributed to increases in crop yields.
These increases in yield are very likely to have reduced the appropriation of land for farming by 11–17% compared with what it would otherwise be, resulting in more land being left wild.
Satellite evidence confirms that increasing carbon dioxide concentrations have also resulted in greater productivity of wild terrestrial ecosystems in all vegetation types.
Increasing carbon dioxide concentrations have also increased the productivity of many marine ecosystems.
In recent decades, trends in climate-sensitive indicators of human and environmental wellbeing have improved and continue to do so despite claims that they would deteriorate because of global warming.
Compared with the benefits from carbon dioxide on crop and biosphere productivity, the adverse impacts of carbon dioxide – on the frequency and intensity of extreme weather, on sea level, vector-borne disease prevalence and human health – have been too small to measure or have been swamped by other factors.
Models used to influence policy on climate change have overestimated the rate of warming, underestimated direct benefits of carbon dioxide, overestimated the harms from climate change and underestimated human capacity to adapt so as to capture the benefits while reducing the harms.
It is very likely that the impact of rising carbon dioxide concentrations is currently net beneficial for both humanity and the biosphere generally. These benefits are real, whereas the costs of warming are uncertain. Halting the increase in carbon dioxide concentrations abruptly would deprive people and the planet of the benefits of carbon dioxide much sooner than they would reduce any costs of warming.

This coincides well with NASA’s findings that the earth is greening as a result of an increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

The report can be found here: https://www.thegwpf.com/content/uploads/2015/10/benefits1.pdf

Although NASA is still cautious to claim that the increase in cardon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere is a net benefit, it makes you wonder whether the debate on climate change, like the climate change alarmists would like to claim, is really settled. What do you think?

Babylon Bee – Woke Polar Bear Apologizes For Being White

October 23, 2019October 23, 2019 / Chhay Lin Lim / Leave a comment

SAN DIEGO, CA—A polar bear at the San Diego Zoo has apologized to black bears, brown bears, and all other mammals of color for his “problematic whiteness.”

The bear “got woke” after a leftist protesting the zoo for keeping animals in captivity bravely leaped into the bear’s exhibit. After eating the protester, the polar bear picked up the book on critical race theory the woman had in her pocket and devoured it, first figuratively, then literally.

“Wow,” he said. “I never realized how problematic my existence was before. I really need to think about this.”

Shortly after reading the book, the polar bear, whose name is Chad, held a press conference in which he apologized for his many years of not being “woke” to the struggle of non-white animals.

“I am so sorry for everyone I’ve hurt,” he said. “I am hereby canceling myself. Please listen to black and brown bear voices.” He also announced that he was donating his remaining walruses to minority bears in need. “The overwhelming whiteness of the polar bear community should give us all paws.”

The bear escaped the zoo, devoured several people, and cast himself into exile on an ice floe for his crimes.

Original source: https://babylonbee.com/news/woke-polar-bear-apologizes-for-being-white