Bilal and Kanzig take a fundamentally different approach to modeling the economic impacts of global climate change than their predecessors. They argue in a recent working paper that the economic damages of climate change are likely six times worse than previously estimated. A 1-degree Celsius rise in global temperature, they say, would lead to a 12 percent decline in world GDP. “If it’s a little hotter in Germany than in France this year, how does Germany’s GDP change?” he offers, as an example. Such declines would leave individuals with “a 31 percent drop in purchasing power relative to a world without climate change,” Bilal adds.