Does the Kyoto Protocol Cost Too Much and Create Unbreakable Barriers for Economic Growth?

We look to the literature on short-term cost models, long-term models based on endogenous growth, and long-term models that assume induced technical change, in order to demonstrate the current understanding of costs, which is the focus of the debate on abating climate change. Using these insights as well as other results-like the role of ancillary benefits and the lack of a relationship between decarbonization and economic growth-our contribution to this debate will be to help policy makers understand how economic analyses are conducted and how they should be used in the subsequent political discussions. (JEL "Q52, Q54, Q58") Copyright 2006 Western Economic Association International.

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