LEES Winter School

The Green New Deal Paradox

Concerns about inequalities and concerns about the environment are often shared by the same social and political movements, but economic analysis shows a tension between the two causes. Indeed, absent a geopolitical or Earth system cataclysm over the coming decades and centuries, the worst-off belong to the present generation, whereas the main beneficiaries of our efforts to protect the environment will belong to richer future generations. But several considerations show that the paradox is not as deep as it seems.