Solomon Hsiang PhD ’11 Is Co-Leader of Research Team Behind High-Profile Climate Change Report
A high-profile report on climate change released June 24 relies on the work of a SIPA PhD graduate and two current PhD students. Solomon Hsiang PhD ’11 is an economist at the University of California, Berkeley, and the leader of a team of econometrics researchers including Amir Jina and James Rising, current PhD students in sustainable development.
The report, “Risky Business: The Economic Risks of Climate Change in the United States,” summarizes findings of an independent assessment of the impact of climate change at the county, state, and regional level, and shows that communities, industries, and properties across the U.S. face profound risks from climate change. The findings also show that the most severe risks can still be avoided through early investments in resilience, and through immediate action to reduce the pollution that causes global warming.
riskybusiness.org website and report
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About the Risky Business Project
Launched in October, 2013, the Risky Business Project focuses on quantifying and publicizing the economic risks from the impacts of a changing climate.
Risky Business Project co-chairs Michael R. Bloomberg, Henry Paulson, and Tom Steyer tasked the Rhodium Group, an economic research firm that specializes in analyzing disruptive global trends, with an independent assessment of the economic risks posed by a changing climate in the U.S. Rhodium convened a research team co-led by climate scientist Dr. Robert Kopp of Rutgers University and economist Dr. Solomon Hsiang of the University of California, Berkeley. Rhodium also partnered with Risk Management Solutions (RMS), the world’s largest catastrophe-modeling company for insurance, reinsurance, and investment-management companies around the world. The team’s complete assessment, along with technical appendices, is available at Rhodium’s website.
The Risky Business Project is a joint partnership of Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Paulson Institute, and TomKat Charitable Trust. All three organizations provided substantive staff input to the Risky Business Project over the past 18 months, and supported the underlying independent research being released today. Additional support for this research was provided by the Skoll Global Threats Fund and the Rockefeller Family Fund. Staff support for the Risky Business Project is provided by Next Generation, an independent 501c3 organization.
Researcher Biographies
Solomon Hsiang PhD ’11 (lead economist and co-leader of the research project) is an assistant professor of public policy at the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley, and a faculty research fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research. Hsiang is at the forefront of using econometrics to understand the social impact of climate change.
Amir Jina is a doctoral candidate in sustainable development at Columbia SIPA and visiting researcher at the University of California, Berkeley. His research focuses on climate impacts in developing countries, using methods from economics, climate science, and ecology.
James Rising is a doctoral candidate sustainable development at Columbia SIPA. Rising studies and develops frameworks to model the feedback loops between environmental and human system.