Along with the peer review mentioned here, CAPAG and their mentors at the Center for Climate Strategies (CCS) have released the final version of the ASU Energy Center report on the economic consequences of all the new taxes, regulations and social engineering policies being proposed for NC?s citizens. What is interesting to see is how the results of each successive iteration of this paper have changed. The changes are very dramatic with differences of as much as 16 fold between results reported a year ago and what the same researchers using the same model and the same data are reporting today. Funding for this work was provided on behalf of the state of North Carolina by several left wing foundations in the form of grants to CCS.
October 23rd 2007
David Ponder, a graduate student in political science and one of two lead authors of the ASU study presented preliminary results to the NC Legislative Commission on Climate Change. Here?s what he reported:
Between 2007-2020, they reported
? A ?cumulative annual? employment gain of 328,738 jobs.
? An income gain of $14.21 billion.
? A net Gross State Product (GSP) gain of $20.561 billion.
The 300,000+ job gain number was reported in newspapers across the state.
6 months later presenting the next round of preliminary results.
The 328,738 cumulative job gain figure is dropped. In fact no cumulative job gain figure in mentioned at all. This time Ponder, in his presentation, switches and reports only the net job gains in three particular years:
2010– 9,149
2015–15,077
2020–32,424
Only the last and largest of these three was emphasized in the presentation and this is the only one that would exceed the annual average of over 25,000 new jobs a year that was implied by the cumulative number reported the previous October.
In this report the 2007-2020 numbers for income gain and value added Gross State Product (GSP) were reported and a direct comparison can be made to the information presented in October. The difference from October is dramatic.
Net Income—$5.799 billion (down from over $14 billion)
Gain in GSP—$7.598 billion (down from $20.5 billion)
October 2008?the final version linked above.
Once again estimated job gains were selectively reported for the years 2010, 2015 and
2020.
2010—5,094 (down from over 9000 6 months earlier)
2015—8,970 (down from over 15,000)
2020—15,042 (down from over 32,000)
Estimated Net Income Gain 2007-2020–$2.203 billion (down from $5.7 billion 6 months prior and $14 billion from the year before.)
Estimated GSP gain 2007-2020–$1.287 billion (down from nearly $7.6 billion in April and down from the estimate in the first preliminary draft of over $20 billion.)
My guess is that if the Energy Center was given a little more time their results would eventually coincide with the Beacon Hill Institute?s conclusion that these policies would cost the state over 33000 jobs and over $4 billion in GSP
