New study calculates climate change’s economic bite will hit about $38 trillion a year by 2049

By SETH BORENSTEIN
AP Science Writer

A new study says climate change will reduce future global income by about 19% in the next 25 years compared to a fictional world that’s not warming, with the poorest areas and those least responsible for heat-trapping gases taking the biggest monetary hit. Wednesday’s study says climate change’s economic bite in the global domestic product is already locked in to be about $38 trillion a year by 2049. By the end of the century, the financial cost could hit twice what previous studies estimate. Poorer nations and those that didn’t cause climate change will take bigger financial hits.