Latest William Nordhaus Stories

Combining lights and statistics may yield high-resolution global economic dataThe glow of lights in a city at night means different things to different people. For some, the amazing hues along Broadway, the Las Vegas Strip or the Sunset Strip in Hollywood mean a fun night out. For an economist, these dazzling lights signify people's pockets are flush with cash; and in fact, a new study confirms it.Research by William Nordhaus, Sterling Professor of Economics at Yale University and Quinnipiac...

For global warming policy, the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference (Copenhagen Summit) was a major disappointment. Designed to negotiate a successor to the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012, the Summit concluded without a binding agreement because of deep divisions on the distribution of emissions reductions and costs. In addition, the United States failed to take action on a carbon cap-and-trade bill in 2010. Confronting this policy vacuum, leading climate economist William...