SALON

Tuesday, Aug 24, 2010 10:19 PM UTC

Ask Google: Jobs trump global warming

Climate bill failure explained: Search patterns reveal Americans care less about the environment during recessions

By

Topics: Global Warming, How the World Works, Great Recession, Unemployment, U.S. Economy, Proposition 23,

Ask Google: Jobs trump global warming

The provocative research conclusions of Matthew Kahn, an environmental economist at UCLA, have intrigued How the World Works on numerous occasions, with the most recent occasion being just this March. But his latest discovery — that people care less about global warming and more about unemployment during recessions — belongs in the way-beyond-obvious category. (Hat tip: Freakonomics.)

Using data from Google Insights, we have created a weekly database from January 2004 through February 2010 of keyword searches by state for two terms –”global warming” and “unemployment.” We then ask the question: How do changes in a state’s unemployment rate affect Internet search activity for these two keywords within the state?

We find that higher unemployment rates within a state decrease Internet search activity for global warming, but increase search activity for unemployment. Based on this revealed preference for interest in global warming, therefore, it appears that recessions crowd out concern for the environment, while not surprisingly increasing concern about unemployment.

I will not question the fact that Google Insights can be employed by academic researchers as a powerful tool to discern zeitgeist changes over time. That’s neat, and I’m sure we’ll learn a lot from future creative research projects. But in this case, Kahn and his co-author Matthew Kotchen are operating in clear dog-bites-man territory. The worst labor market in generations is naturally going to dominate our attention spans to the detriment of other overarching problems. I’m also guessing that higher unemployment rates are correlated with lots of other shifts in searching behavior. I’d bet good money that the number of searches for “new boat,” “vacation in Hawaii,” and “no money down option-ARM mortgage” also registered significant declines relative to concern over unemployment. There’s a reason why Proposition 23, the oil-company-funded initiative on the California ballot aiming to suspend the state’s global warming law, is being framed as a job-saving plan. Charity starts at home — and when you’re unemployed, or worried about your existing job, that is — and should be — your first priority.

An opinion piece in yesterday’s New York Times by Thomas Homer-Dixon spells out the cruel reality in unblinking terms. The political will to deal with global warming will only be generated by a disaster equal to or worse than the financial crisis we just lived through.

[W]e’ll almost certainly need some kind of devastating climate shock to get effective climate policy. That’s the key lesson of the recent financial crisis: when powerful special interests have convinced much of the public that what they’re doing isn’t dangerous, only a disaster that discredits those interests will provide an opportunity for comprehensive policy change like the Dodd-Frank financial regulations.

Of course, the most cutting criticism of the Dodd-Frank bank reform bill is that it does not appropriately deal with the root causes of the financial crisis, so maybe even a devastating climate shock won’t be enough. But the underlying point is still valid. Humans are lazy and short-sighted and rarely get their ass in gear unless someone lights a fire under their butts.

We didn’t need a rigorous Google-driven analysis of search patterns to tell us that.

Andrew Leonard

Andrew Leonard is a staff writer at Salon. On Twitter, @koxinga21. More Andrew Leonard.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 26 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Paul Krugman’s right: Austerity kills. "In an economy where we’re all in the same boat, one person’s spending is another person’s income. So when the government cuts spending, it reduces people’s income, leading to less business, more unemployment, and a vicious spiral of slowing down the economy."
276 points277 points | 248 comments
vote
FBI reportedly joins Bachmann campaign finance probe
254 points255 points | 20 comments
vote
Jon Karl makes things worse: He regrets “inaccurate” Benghazi email but says his story based on it “still entirely stands.” Really. ABC News?
219 points220 points | 31 comments
vote
“Jodorowsky’s Dune”: The sci-fi classic that never was.
81 points82 points | 16 comments
vote
Austerity Kills: Brian McArdle, a 57-year-old man who had had two strokes and could barely walk, was found "fit for work" by a government subcontractor, and had his benefits stopped. He died the next day.
92 points93 points | 8 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations