A hurricane in a teacup
The greedy capitalists are once again going to be on the short end of the stick. The reason? Global warming, of course. Why? Because of hurricanes, as Americans call low-pressure system storms also known, depending on where they occur, as cyclones or typhoons.
As everyone knows, global warming is going to make hurricanes worse, so they’re going to increase the payouts insurance companies have to carry. It will, “generate more storms and more intense hurricanes,” says hurricane historian Jay Barnes of Pine Knoll Shores, North Carolina in paragraph two. Paragraph three continues: “Numerous studies in recent years have found no evidence that the number of hurricanes and their northwest Pacific Ocean cousins, typhoons, is increasing because of the rise in global temperatures.”
Nevermind paragraph three. Let’s try this again.
As everyone knows, global warming is going to cause fewer killer hurricanes, so they’re going to decrease insurance premiums insurance companies will be able to charge. “Using data extending back to the middle nineteenth century,” the story quotes physical oceanographer and climate scientist Chunzai Wang of the NOAA, “we found a gentle decrease in the trend of U.S. land-falling hurricanes when the global ocean is warmed up.”
An explanation I’ve heard before for predicting fewer and lighter storms is that global warming will decrease the temperature gradient between the poles and the equator, which is the engine driving the atmospheric circulation that causes disturbances such as low pressure systems that could turn into cyclonic storms.
Wang’s explanation is different. He attributes the historical data to increased vertical wind-shear caused by an increased temperature gradient between low-altitude and high-altitude air. Which also makes sense, if the presupposition that global warming is a long-term trend is true (which, of course, it probably is not).
So one way or another, there will be either higher payouts or lower premiums. Or lower payouts and higher premiums. Nobody knows. Either way, insurance companies are screwed. Or not. But then, I guess that’s why they call their business “risk management”. Who’d be stupid enough to try to manage risk? Them capitalists have it coming.
Whatever the facts, we must act now, before it’s too late. Must act. Must act now!
Can we really risk the future of mankind when even the scientists have no clue what’s going to happen? No! We must make commitments! We must make sacrifices! We must atone for our sins! We must make election promises! We must soak the rich, to buy the votes of the poor! No, wait, that’s old. We must do more! We must soak the sensible, to buy the votes of people who risk living in hurricane-prone states! In fact, let’s soak everyone, to buy the votes of the soaked! With enough taxes and subsidies and government funds and wealth redistribution, everyone’s a winner!
That’s exactly what half the US presidential candidates campaigning in states such as Florida are proposing to do. They promise to transfer the risk to the US taxpayer. And, would you believe it, that’s the Republican half. Imagine what the Democrats could get up to. The only way they could improve on this populist glad-handing and socialist redistribution is to outlaw hurricanes that make landfall without the proper government authorisation.
That’s how it always ends with eco-politics. No matter what the data says, you can be sure someone, somewhere, is setting up to fleece you.
