Bo-Yeon Jang

Adaptation is an increasingly attractive option for addressing economic damages from climate change, which are subject to significant climate uncertainty. However, uncertainty in climate damages is expected to change over time as the pace of decline in emissions is observed and geophysical models are improved. I leverage an ensemble of climate models to quantify the current extent and expected path of uncertainty. I incorporate the results into a real options model to quantify how raising the speed of uncertainty resolution increases welfare while reducing the necessary level of investment.

We develop a novel method for assessing the effect of constraints imposed by spatially-fixed natural resources on aggregate economic output. Applying it to estimate and compare the projected effects of climate change and population growth over the course of the 21st century, we find that standard population growth projections imply larger reductions in income than even the most extreme climate change scenario. Further, climate change and population growth will have their most damaging effects in similar places. Relative to previous work on macro climate impacts, our approach has the advantages of being disciplined by a simple macro growth model that allows for adaptation and of assessing impacts via a large set of climate moments, not just annual average temperature and precipitation.

Total fertility rate, the average number of children over a woman’s lifetime given current trends, is a key fertility statistic. Differences in TFR are often read as signals of behavior, but may also capture composition. I examine the contribution of behavior and composition for TFR variation over time and across regions in South Korea, which leads the world in lowest-low fertility. Decomposing TFR into age- and parity-specific fertility rates and parity rates by age, I find that composition effects comprise nontrivial portions of TFR differences for South Korea, sometimes exceeding that of behavior effects. Because shifts in demographic composition should influence TFR differently than behavioral distortions, this raises further concerns for the use of TFR to evaluate responses to fertility policy.