Greg Easterbrook makes an interesting point.....

In an Atlantic editorial (most of the text is behind a subscriber wall) on climate change Easterbrook points out that

1. Many environmental threats have been met in the last 50 years, including stratospheric ozone destruction, urban smog, acid rain, and more
2. In every case the government regulation was necessary, and
3. In every case the cost was but a small fraction of what even the optimists had claimed

He attributes much of the low cost (3) to market driven technology development motivated by the regulations (2). He points out that politically climate change as framed today is a political loser: "Gloom City" but his bottom line is that

Here’s a different way of thinking about the greenhouse effect: that action to prevent runaway global warming may prove cheap, practical, effective, and totally consistent with economic growth.

Discuss