Paper in Nature Climate Change journal reveals major role wealthy emitters play in driving climate extremes

Paper in Nature Climate Change journal reveals major role wealthy emitters play in driving climate extremes

The world’s wealthiest 10% are responsible for two-thirds of global heating since 1990, driving droughts and heatwaves in the poorest parts of the world, according to a study.

While researchers have previously shown that higher income groups emit disproportionately large amounts of greenhouse gases, the latest survey is the first to try to pin down how that inequality translates into responsibility for climate breakdown. It offers a powerful argument for climate finance and wealth taxes by attempting to give an evidential basis for how many people in the developed world – including more than 50% of full-time employees in the UK – bear a heightened responsibility for the climate disasters affecting people who can least afford it.

“Our study shows that extreme climate impacts are not just the result of abstract global emissions; instead we can directly link them to our lifestyle and investment choices, which in turn are linked to wealth,” said Sarah Schöngart, a climate modelling analyst and the study’s lead author.

    • piranhaconda@mander.xyzEnglish
      3·
      1 day ago

      I immediately started searching this up on seeing the article. Should’ve known someone in the comments already beat me to it. Thanks for the links!

    • Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.worldEnglish
      11·
      1 day ago

      Global top 10%’ or ‘access to wealth’

      • You are 18-25, your net financial wealth is $50,000 or more.

      • You are 25-29, your net financial wealth is $100,000 or more.

      • You are 30-35, your net financial wealth is $200,000 or more.

      • JLock17@lemmy.worldEnglish
        343·
        1 day ago

        Undeniably a majority. We can’t ignore the fact that we have impact on climate too. Big interest want us to argue over blame rather than try to fix the problem (Them). That said, I don’t commute by aircraft daily like Taylor Swift and every other rich person.

        • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
          81·
          1 day ago

          I don’t commute by aircraft daily like Taylor Swift and every other rich person.

          That shit shouldn’t be legal. In short private jets shouldn’t be legal IMO.

          • JLock17@lemmy.worldEnglish
            5·
            1 day ago

            Yeah, but if they didn’t they might actually have to interact with the poors, and they can’t have that.

      • hark@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        19 hours ago

        Plus things like planned obsolescence they push for to keep people spending. The system is formed around their whims and the system they want demands waste to continue the flow of money.

      • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        1 day ago

        Probably about or more than half of that. At least that’s what I seem to recall having read.

    • kameecoding@lemmy.worldEnglish
      193·
      1 day ago

      Hmm, I am probably not, 10% is what, 700 million?

      Between all the rich people, USA, Canadians, UK, Germany, and the rest pf Western Europe that number likely includes enough people to exclude me as a central European

      • JLock17@lemmy.worldEnglish
        161·
        1 day ago

        The last number I was given was that anyone who makes more than a converted $20,000 per year is in the global top 10%. There used to be a global income comparison tool that showed where you stand on the global scale. I feel 90% confident that any individual person reading this is someone who is above that line, especially if they can afford things like internet and electric together. Those kinds of guys are driving cars to work and eating out, instead of making their food every single day and listening to radio because they can’t afford any luxuries.

        I agree that it ain’t exactly smart to say everyone in a developed economy is doing well, but I want to remind anyone reading this to count their blessings and consider their own impact just as much as they try to hold the worst offenders accountable.

        • kameecoding@lemmy.worldEnglish
          6·
          1 day ago

          Copied from reddit comment

          According to https://wid.world/world/#tptinc_p90p100_z/US;FR;DE;CN;ZA;GB;WO/last/us/k/x/yearly/t/false/0/200000/curve/false/country , the global 90th percentile income threshold in 2023 is at about $46,7k USD, market xchg rate.

          So yeah, it’s quite a bit higher than that, plus I think you vastly underestimate how expensive it is to have your own internet connection and electricity.

          And I also make my food everyday that’s quite normal for almost everyone but US citizens

          • JLock17@lemmy.worldEnglish
            3·
            1 day ago

            Making your own food is normal for a lot of people here too, but I know a ton of people who just eat garbage all the time. My grandmother just eats all the time. She will just sit down and eat an entire pan of fried potatoes back to back, and my dad and stepmom just eat fast food every day. I had a nightmare where I was forced to watch my family eat junk off a table and then they got taken away once they got so fat to be butchered. I’ve been getting sick lately thinking about it, and my room mate keeps nagging me to eat way too much. I hate how fat I’ve gotten.

  • Voyajer@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1162·
    1 day ago

    The threshold to be in the top 10% is €42,980 or $49,000 (grossing from what I can tell).

    The top 1% and 0.1% for comparison are 20x and 76x.

    • PlzGivHugs@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      7·
      1 day ago

      According to Wikipedia, citing the 2022 US census, median annual personal income is $48k, meaning the average american is right on that line.

      • LwL@lemmy.worldEnglish
        80·
        1 day ago

        Yeah, what people forget is that even average americans (and central/northern europeans and some other plaves) are quite wealthy from a global perspective. Many people on lemmy, self included, are in that global 10%.

        And many of those emissions aren’t something you can just avoid either, they often come as a result of being a user of local infrastructure etc.

          • sensiblepuffin@lemmy.funami.techEnglish
            11·
            1 day ago

            In fairness, what are they going to do about being born into a richer slice of the world pie? As shitty as it is, people won’t have much sympathy for those doing worse than them unless they’ve achieved a certain baseline. If they can’t conceive of how life could be worse (many issues in this fragment), they won’t accept or care that others are suffering.

            • grue@lemmy.worldEnglish
              17·
              1 day ago

              At the very least, us 10%ers could be advocating for things that lower the carbon cost of our lifestyle, such as zoning reform.

              Note that I’m not talking about reducing the quality of our lifestyle. I’m talking about maintaining or improving the quality while making it more efficient.

              • sensiblepuffin@lemmy.funami.techEnglish
                5·
                1 day ago

                It’s true. And we should all be doing that. If you’re in the US, I promise you there are people in your community/local government who are desperate for any sort of support. Build bike lanes, build community gardens, help your neighbors. A lot of them need it.

                My previous statement was purely in reply to people getting mad when you point out that they’re in a certain percentile. Realistically, what do you expect people to do with that information? What you’re basically telling them is that in Sudan, they’d be the kings of the castle. But that’s kind of useless information to someone living in middle of nowhere Kentucky, for example.

        • Saleh@feddit.orgEnglish
          161·
          1 day ago

          If my taxes would go towards make that infrastructure sustainable, i would happily pay more taxes. As it stands my taxes mostly go to more Autobahn, upkeep of parking spots, subsidies for desastrous industries and cross-financing the retirement insurance, so the boomers can go on cruise vacations.

      • homoludens@feddit.orgEnglish
        16·
        1 day ago

        The article talks about income (the headline seems a bit confusing), the wiki about net worth?

      • BrightCandle@lemmy.worldEnglish
        143·
        1 day ago

        No most people in the developed nations earn less than this. It’s heavily biased towards Americans and high earners, the typical just above the minimum wage earner isn’t in this group.

        • taladar@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          3·
          1 day ago

          Pretty sure that doesn’t even cover the “just above the average wage” earner in most western countries though I suppose it depends a bit on if you count the parts that directly go to the government without even counting as gross wages (employer parts of social security, health care,…).

  • ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.worldEnglish
    381·
    1 day ago

    Nice to see the phrase “global heating” instead of the wimpy “global warming” or the even more milquetoasty “climate change”. I prefer the phrase “anthropogenic runaway global heating” because it makes clear the scale and severity of the problem as well as its origin, and also for the handy acronym.

  • Absaroka@lemmy.worldEnglish
    51·
    1 day ago

    To produce their analysis, the researchers fed wealth-based greenhouse gas emissions inequality assessments into climate modelling frameworks, allowing them to systematically attribute the changes in global temperatures and the frequency of extreme weather events that have taken place between 1990 and 2019.

    I do take studies like this with a grain of salt. I don’t know this organization, but they certainly have a point of view, and it certainly is reasonable to think they could have run those computer simulations to say what they wanted it to say.

    Now with that said, I’d wager many of the folks in this thread are included in that 10%. The top 10% of the world makes like $50,000 a year. “Rich” is subjective and varies from country to country, region to region. Hell it can vary widely just in the US. And even in a single state (look at average wages for somebody in the NYC area versus Syracuse).

      • iamjackflack@lemm.eeEnglish
        11·
        20 hours ago

        I’m not sure why your direction is misplaced at me but whatever. Remove me too. My intent to get rid of the richest would be intending to help you but you may be too stupid to realize the goal is to help all of humanity.

        • untakenusername@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          1·
          10 hours ago

          Remove me too

          the solution isn’t to kill yourself to help the climate, its to find carbon neutral alternatives to what we have now. like data centers would be fine if the electricity they used came from solar, and driving cars is fine if their electric

    • Coreidan@lemmy.worldEnglish
      61·
      1 day ago

      You realize you’re talking about yourself in this context right?

      If you live in the US you are the rich.