the epa just released a comprehensive report that outlines the alarming truth that failure to act on climate change will result in dramatic costs. critically concern for low-lying states like florida and like delaware and others up and down the east coast. without action on climate change, we're going to need to spend billions of dollars on this century to protect our states from rising sea levels and extreme storms. study also projects inaction on climate change could lead to extreme temperatures and cause thousands of deaths throughout the northeast and mid-atlantic regions of our country. it's clear, at least, it's clear to me that as each year passes without the action, the more severe, the more costly and perhaps irreversible the effects of climate change are becoming. and for those of us who come to states being impacted by climate change, i think the message is clear and that's we can no longer afford inaction. many states such as new york, represented here today, thank you, welcome, and delaware, have

already taken action to reduce the largest emitter of carbon pollution and that's power plant emissions. we'll hear the economics of these states continue to grow at a faster rate than the states that have yet to put climate regulations into place. however, we need all states to do their fair share to protect the air we breathe and stem the tide of climate change. the epa's clean power plant attempts to do that. and under the clean power plan, states are given their own carbon pollution targets and allowed to find the most cost effective way to find cost reductions. in fact, it sounds similar to the compromise, i tried to foist on my colleagues a number of years ago. i believe instead of undercutting the clean power plan, we should be working in good faith with the agency to find ways to improve the regulation. for example, regulation could be improved several ways. one, to ensure early action states are not penalized for being climate and efficiency leaders. number two, to ensure that all clean energy, including nuclear is treated equitably.

and three, to ensure we meet our carbon reduction goals. no compromise is ever perfect. the worst thing that we could do is to do nothing while we try to find the perfect solution. must act now while the ability to mitigate the most harmful impact is within our grasp. choice between curbing climate change and growing our economy is as i've suggested many times a false one and instead we must act on curbing climate change in order to protect the future economic prosperity of our country. all right. madame chairman, thank you for letting me give a statement and ask questions. i was delayed here today. we had a caucus lunch today. part of the lunch discussion was about the transportation bill. secured transportation bill authored by chairman inhofe, senator boxer, senator ritter, myself, and i think going to be well received and we're excited about that. and so, we had a little discussion of that before i came. so i got here a little bit late, and i apologize for that. i thought i would joke and i like to joke around a little bit.

and thought i was going to come here and say i was delayed, taking a call from the pope. but i'm not catholic. and he rarely calls me. but if he did, we would talk about ash -- you know, i must say i'm impressed with this guy. i'm impressed with, one, i think he's read the new testament and has a real commitment to the least of these in my society. when i was naked, did you clothe me, when i was sick in prison, did you come visit me? he gets that and calls on us to do the same. the other thing that he gets and those of white house are familiar with the scripture, most of you probably more than me, but the other thing that he gets is we have a moral obligation to make sure we will have a plan wet a decent quality of life and he believes and a lot of folks believe that there's a real serious problem here. and we have a moral imperative to do something about it so we can talk about all those these studies and everything but i would have us keep that thought in mind. now, a couple of questions.

fifrs, i'd ask consent to have submitted for the record two items, one is a latest report of the lance it and commission on health and climate change of health and climate change policy responses to protect public health for the record. that's number one, madame chair and ask consent 0 submit the epa's recent peer reviewed report of climate change in the united states benefit of global action to the record. >> without objection. >> thank you madame chair. okay. dr. rice, mother of three, i -- you mentioned in your testimony that many different -- the many different ways that the climate change has already impacting the health of americans. who would you say are the most vuler in to believe the affects of climate change and what will have the most to gain from reductions of carbon pollution, please? >> thank you for this question

senator carper. a number of groups are especially vulnerable to the health consequences of climate change. the ones that i would identify would be the elderly because many of them already have chronic health conditions like heart and lung disease that makes them especially vulnerable to high heat and high air pollution levels and low-income people. people who have less income have less access to air conditioning during heat waves. there have been a number of studies looking at cities which suffer the most in some ways from extreme heat because of an island effect of the buildings in the cities and the poorer neighborhoods of cities have been found to have the worst urban heat problem. and people who have low income also are the same people who are often exposed more to higher levels of air pollution to begin with. and have less access to health

care and resources to help them manage climate change. >> all right. >> and there's a third group i would identify. i know i'm short on time but that's children and as ma is especially prevalent in children and at high prix for all of the issues, high heat high ozone levels air pollution from wildfire. higher pollen levels is a major consequence for american children. >> good. thanks. one quick yes or no question if you will. study by the lancet, concluded that the impacts of climate change threatens to undermine this listen this, last half century of gains in global health. would you agree with this conclusion. just say yes or no. >> i certainly agree. it's major health problem facing the planet. >> thank you. my time expired. thank you. >> thank you. >> thank you. madame fischer? >> mr. cicio nebraska's public

power state and 100% of our power is owned by the people of nebraska. we're going to be hit especially hard by these regulations that are proposed in the clean power plan. and we're going to see rate increases that i believe will be substantial. what do you believe will be the impact on our increase that we're going to have in these electricity rates on business operations like manufacturing? what's going to be the impact there? going to be the impact there? >> you know, all of these companies compete globally. there's almost no exception. anymore. and as i alluded to specifically, the competition is very fierce. companies win or lose business based on a cents a pound or pennies on the ton of the product that they make. and so all of these costs are

additive. and when we get to, like this clean power plan it's not just the cost of the clean power plan. there's, you know, in the embedded in those electricity rates that give your state a problem, there's already the cost of pm 2.1, 2.5. there's already the mercury rule cost. for us industrials, there's already the industrial boilerman cost and the clean power cost and then ozone. it is a cumulative cost of doing business that our competitors don't have overseas. and it there's no way around a higher cost and loss of competitiveness and eventually it impacts jobs. >> exactly. >> and most of our jobs are middle class jobs. >> so what's the impact then on american families when we see these costs continue to increase on businesses. that has a direct cost on american families correct?

and how would you say the arena act will address some of these issues? what specifically is in the proposed legislation? >> well i'd like to say from a common sense standpoint everyone in the country that has followed this, knows that this is going to be litigated 100% sure. there's no doubt about it. and we know, including the epa knows there's costs. and the epa does not want to hurt people by higher energy costs, but this rule will. and so it is just common sense to say, let's wait till we have this settled out by the courts before states act to technically shut down as the eia report of last month said that they are not going to shut down 40000 gig watts, it's now 90,000 gig watts of coal-fired power plants prior to 2020. that will have a draw hattic increase on producing electricity costs.

>> thank you. mr. alford, i think most of us in this room take our ability to have electricity for granted. but, as you mentioned, there there's a large number of americans who are balancing whether they can afford an electric bill or whether they can pay rent or whether they are able to put food on the table for their families. that's going to, as you mentioned, lead, i think, to those hard choices that people make and send some of them to the streets when they become homeless. can you talk about more about those tough choices that low-income families have to make when they look at their electricity bills and why you think the costs that are going to be driven up through this action by epa will be so harmful? >> yes i'm a father to six.

>> i think you have to turn on your microphone, sir. thank you. >> i'm a father of six. i guess i'm up to 11 grand children. but my wife and i have been the godmothers and godfather of the very extended family. and there are a lot out there who need help, and we do all we can to connect them, connect them with some of our members who can create jobs for them, but it's an ongoing task, and it's rough out there and i have children in mobile atlanta, los angeles, and it gets worse and worse and worse. and lord knows what happens to someone who does something wrong and gets into the judicial system. they'll never have a job. unless i create a job for them. it is very rough out there. and i think we need a government that is sensitive to what's

going on in these communities and to come up with some policy that builds a greater america and a more secure america. not put people on thin ice. >> well said. well said. we all, we all want clean air. we all want clean water, but we need to be aware of what these regulations will do to american families. thank you, sir. >> i've been having discussions with the omaha black chamber of commerce too. >> good to hear. thank you. >> is that thor markly? >> thank you very much, madam chair. i wanted to follow up dr. rice. the statistics that i've seen say that 78% of african-americans live within 30 miles of a coal-fired plant. and that an african-american child is more likely to go do the hospital for asthma than a white child. is there a connection between

the coal-fired plants and the higher death rate for african-american children in. >> the health effects from coal-fired plants are very well documented. and it's now well-established in the scientific community that air pollution causes increases in hospitalization for asthma, asthma attacks, more medication for, to treat the asthma symptoms. and there are also inequities in where people live and where the services are located. that's environmental injustice and communities of color and low-income communities are disproportionately exposed to the emissions. if reduce the emissions, those communities stand the most to benefit, right there where the pollution is emitted. >> so to sum rye, you're saying

yes there is a connection between the coal-fired power plant pollution and the illnesses and deaths that are disproportionately occurring? i think you said -- >> i don't like to answer yes or no questions. >> okay. well, it certainly sounds like you were drawing an explanation of why that is indeed the case. the, and you ended on the note that disproportionate benefits from changing the quality of the air go to those most affected. and that would be those closest to the pollution. so public health benefits are estimated to be 55 to $93 billion per year, 15 years from now. that's compared to the estimates of $7.3 billion to $8 billion for the rule. so on the order of 8-1 or 10-1

health benefits versus cost that seems a pretty good tradeoff for an investment when you can get an eight-fold return, and it's a huge quality of life issue. would you share that opinion? >> the public health benefits of reducing greenhouse gas emissions are tremendous. and they've been looked at in a number of different ways, including the report that you just cited that showed that the public health benefits from mortality and other health issues far outweighed the i am membertation costs. that's just one study but there are many other studies. there was one done by jason westman, a group at unc chapel hill looking at the benefits of the better air quality from reducing greenhouse gas emissions. not even looking at all the health effects i was talking about from climate change, just the air pollution benefits that would be gained right away. and estimate thad those

mortality benefits would exceed abatement costs by 2030. >> in your testimony, you noted the impact on forest fires. this particularly is a concern to us out west where we have large large ca any of rouse trees. we have seen a huge correlation of more acres of timber burning. you were pointing out in your testimony, i believe the health impacts of that smoke and that smoke plumes can basically travel across the nation. >> yes senator could i give an example. and the wildfire from wildfire smoke can travel very far distances. so there's health effects for communities right there where the fires take place, but there's also respiratory and heart health effects in very

distant places. so the wildfires that affected russia some years ago, those plumes traveled the distance from chicago to san francisco. that equivalent difference. that means that thousands and thousands of people in the regions of wildfires are experiencing health effects due to the reduced air quality. >> and since the prevailing winds go from west to east when our fires are burning out in oregon and california and washington state, the rest of the nation is experiencing those, those impacts it's also an impact on a rural economy. because when we lose both to fire and tobeetles. and i understand that's not your expertise. i'm over my time, so thank you very much for your feedback. >> thank you. i'd like to turn it over to our chairman of our full committee, chairman inhofe. >> thank you, madam chairman. i remember in this room when we

had the first appointed director of the epa, lisa jackson, was in the room, and i remember it was right, i tell you when it was. it's when my friend senator markly, it was right before during the hearing or the c.o.p. thing in copenhagen. and i asked her the question at that time, i said, you know, if we if we were to pass the legislation that has been proposed here, let's keep in mind it started way back in 1997 when they said we passed a thing, the bird-hagel rule by 95-0 that if you come back from rio de janeiro or one of these places with a treaty that either hurts our economy or does not require the same thing from china and other countries as it

does here, then we will not ratify it. and consequently, they never ratified it. and clinton never put it forward for ratification. now what she was saying at that time, i asked her the question. i asked her if we to pass either by regulation or legislation these reductions, isn't this going to, is this going to have the, the effect of lowering co 2 emissions worldwide, her answer was no. because it only affects here in the u.s. but that's not where the problem is. it's in china, india, mexico and other places wouldn't you say that it would actually have the effect of increasing co2 worldwide emissions if we were

to you knowunilaterally reduce our emissions, where are they going to go? they're going to go where they have the least restrictions. am i missing something there? >> no you are not missing anything. as a matter of fact, under the i testified before the house energy and power sub committee, and one of the key points i made is if we want to be serious about reducing global greenhouse gas emissions the single most important thing we need to do is increase the manufacturing of products in the united states versus china, for example. >> exactly. >> we manufacture goods on average that has over less than well turn it round the other way. when china produces goods they emit 300% more co2 than we do here. so if energy cost goes up here then it's going to result in more imports of these energy-intensive products. and as a reminder 70% of our imports is from one country --

china. >> good to see you again. i had not seen what you, and i asked her to give me the printed copy of your study that you did key findings it's just fascinating. i've never seen, it concentrates on the regressive nature of this type of legislation or rules. is that, is that -- >> that's absolutely correct sir. >> i hadn't seen it done before where it's specific like this. so this is something that we wiuel use. was this done for you by an outside group? >> roger dr. roger bessdeck whom we have been using oh we do about a study every two to three years with that group and they're very very on the money. >> thank you. appreciate that. mr. trishcoe, i think you made a vague reference to a study of decisions of middle to low income people. so i ask for a written copy. could you elaborate a little on

that? i don't think you had a chance to do that in your opening statement? >> yes chair inhofe. this study that i attached to the statement is one in a long-running series if you will going back really to the time of the kyoto protocol. we wanted to know what american families spent on energy, defined as residential utilities and gasoline. and i've been updating that study more or less on an annual basis ever since. and what we found is that as a general matter the percentage of after-tax income that american households spend on energy has more than doubled over the course of the last 10 to 15 years. now you mentioned the regress ive'veve asperkts. the study i've attached today let's look in particular at the percentage of after-tax income

for energy that is spent by households with gross incomes of $30,000 or less. that's about 30% of our population. those households are spending 23% of their after-tax income on energy. >> their expendable income. >> 23% of their after-tax income goes to residential utilities and gasoline. now that compares with an average 7% for households earning more than $50,000 a year. so it's three times greater for the low-income katzcategory of $30,000 or less. it's three times greater for those households than those households making $50,000 or more a year. >> that's almost exactly what you're saying, mr. alford, that it is regressive in that

respect. >> yes, it is. and they brought up asthma. you know, and if you, if you look at the mayo clinic there's no prevention for asthma. and there's no correlation of asthma and air. asthma has been increasing, even though through the clean air act we have been good stewards in decreasing and decreasing ozone and all the emissions, but asthma continues to rise and no one knows why, but there's this big, false projection that it's global warming causing asthma. we don't know what's causing asthma. and most of the people who have it get out of it by the time they're adults, because their lungs and their bodies are strong enough to fight it off. but i'm getting sick very sick of people saying asthma and dirty air or global warming. it's a myth. >> thank you. my time has expired. >> thank you, senator markey.

>> thank you very much. dr. rice you're here from harvard medical school. people are getting sick, are they not? and they're not getting sick the way harry alford is getting sick. they're really getting sick, aren't they? and so maybe you could bring to us a little bit of your information about the increased hospitalizations, the respiratory-related diseases, all of the things that are implicated in having this additional pollution in our atmosphere. can you talk a little bit about how it is inpacts especially children in our country. >> thank you. this is certainly an area where i feel that i have a lot to add to the discussion because i'm a lung doctor. i take care of patients with lung disease, and i also study air pollution. that when i'm not taking care of patients. and in addition to my personal

observations as a doctor when i see patients come see me more often because the pollen levels are worse or the ozone levels can get high in boston on very hot days. we also have the observations of the physicians of the american thoracic society. the survey i mentioned. and the doctors completing the survey, the vast majority of them commented that they personally observed that their patients' lung function is worse, their symptoms are worse during high-pollution days. >> there are real implications for the 12 million americans who already have respiratory illnesses, huh? >> certainly, and we can look back at the incredible success story of the clean air act. the reductions in air pollution as a result of the clear air act have been astounding, and we've really come a long way, and when we look back researchers look back at the health benefits of the clean air act they've been

astounding not just for respiratory illness asthma symptom control but also mortality and heart disease. >> onmentioned your own son earlier in your testimony, who has a respiratory illness, huh? so what could, just additional pollution that we send up there, uncontrolled mean, long-term for him and for those others of millions of victims across the country? >> so there's a variety of sources of air pollution. and one of them is the power points, power plants through the burning of greenhouse gases. there's also traffic and other things. so the reality is that if we do not do anything about greenhouse gas emissions the epa report looked at just that piece of the pie and found that ozone levels

will increase predict that we actually have increases in ozone, whereas ozone levels have declined and we've experienced health benefits as a result of those gains. >> thank you for putting that out there so there's real sickness, not metaphor cal sickness that is occurring because of global warming. and you're here representing new york but you're representing one of the regional greenhouse gas initiative states, all of new england, those six states, new york, maryland and delaware. nine states they band together and over the last several years, massachusetts has seen a 40% reduction in the green house gases we're sending up while we're seeing a 20% growth in our economy. can you talk a little bit about that virtuous cycle that seems to elude the observation of those who are critical of the ability to increase the health of individuals and the economy

simultaneously? >> yes senator, thank you. as i said in my testimony, the experience has been an extraordinarily successful one. we had an independent study done by the analysis group that quantified the benefits over a three-year period from 2009 to 2011. $1.3 billion in reductions in bills over the region. $1.6 billion in extra or incremental economic activity. it's been an extraordinarily positive experience all the while, as you said the region has experienced economic growth. we've reduced bills. we've reduced bills for low and moderate-income families especially in the beauty of the approach is that -- >> say that again? you've reduced the electricity bills for low and moderate-income people?

>> yes, the cumulative benefit to just new york low and moderate income bill payers has been $60 million to date. through the first quarter of this year. and those, those are going to keep those benefittings will continue on into the future because new york has specified in two of its programs income eligible patients excuse me patients income eligible ratepayers. the beauty of the program is that states have the ability to target the revenue from the sale of those allowances to a variety of programs. so industrial customers can benefit. low and moderate-income rate payers can benefit. businesses, your average homeowners. so it has been a tremendous success story. >> and it is my understanding that under the proposed rule making that for example new jersey and pennsylvania could join our regional greenhouse gas

initiative. and already plug into an existing system that is working that is lowering costs for low and moderate income lowering the amount of greenhouse gases while seeing tremendous growth in our gdp. so i think there's a reason to be very optimistic about our ability, listening to the pope's admonitions to us that we should be the global leader on this, and we can use market forces to accomplish the goal while still enjoying tremendous economic growth and taking care of the poor and the moderate income people in our country. >> i agree with you entirely, senator, i think there's places around the country that could benefit from that model. it may not be identical to the model but certainly states cooperating makes great sense, because the efficiencies of dealing with multiple states and energy systems that cross state boundaries is obviously of great advantage to the rege states.

>> i am afraid that too many people are pessimistic in general. they're not optimistic of our ability ago americans to be the global leaders, to use new technologies to protect young people and the economy at the same time and they harbor a great doubt about our country's ability to do that. but i thank the two of you for your testimony, because you point out the problems and the solutions and you have devolved on it in a way that should give people some hope. >> i think that concludes our hearing. i want to thank the witnesses for bringing forth some very great information and facts and lots for us to think about. and appreciate all of you all taking time today to be with us. and i want to thank my ranking member, and with that we'll conclude the hearing, thank you.

>> while the panel comes up i'll give a little introduction as to what the social cost of carbon is and i think building on what the senator said, if you look at the past, and i think that will tell us exactly how much moderation of warming are likely to get from any of these

policies are even much more extreme policies. that's a depressing number it if you're going to push climate policy to say it has so little impact. instead they have come up with a substitute because as you said 500 some degree by 2050 that's not enough to motivate people into the end of the world mentality. so that something called the social costs of carbon which purports to give a number that is equal to the damage done to the economy by a ton of co2 emitted any particular year, aggregating all the damage from that year until the year 2300 which is a long ways away in anything. what i will do is i look at the introduction of the panelists all at once and then i will have them come up and speak so we won't have a break in between and then we'll do questions at the end. the first speaker is patrick j. michaels director of the center

for those who study science at the cato institute. he is past president of the america association of state climatologists and as program chair for the keeping unemployed climatology of the american meteorological society. he was a research professor of environmental sciences at university of virginia your he has written and has been function major scientific journals including climate research, on the change, geophysical research letters, journal of climate, nature, and science as well as these written or edited six books. i'm sure he would like you to buy multiple copies of all of them. i have read three of them. they are very, very good entertaining and insightful. he holds a bachelor and match -- master's degree and climatology from the university of chicago and a ph.d in ecological climatology of the university of wisconsin at madison. the second speaker is her own kevin who growth in preston junction new jersey

undergraduate work at uc berkeley and his major there was applied mathematics with a specialty in mathematics and physics. he also holds two master's degrees from university of maryland, one in business and management and the other in mathematical statistics. he followed that up and finish his ph.d there at the university of maryland a year ago with specialties in statistical computing. is not just some egghead. he is our egghead. no. [laughter] so he does science. he does business and he has math with a focus on policy which is not that, and we feel lucky to have him here. batting cleanup is marlo lewis. marlo lewis a junior, if you

google marlo lewis you find his father's name pops up. his father was the producer and creator of the ed sullivan show and one of my favorite sergeant bill goes the phil silvers show. is also a bluegrass musician. is at the competitive enterprise institute. he's been published in the "washington times," "investor's business daily," tech central station, the "national review" and interpretation of journal of political philosophy. prior to joining cei he served as director of external relations at the reason foundation in los angeles. doing one of six congress he served as staff director natural resources and regulatory affairs. he also served in other places on the hill. he served in the state department as a teenager i think come in the reagan administration. he holds a ph.d in government

from harvard university and a ba from political science from claremont mckenna. we thank all of the speakers and we will just have to come up starting with pat. [applause] >> good afternoon. it's an honor to be here. it's an honor to talk about climate change because i like talking about humanity. no, to give an example. our epa issued a report yesterday in preparation for the paris meeting that says we're all going to die unless we agree to limit our emissions to a value that we can limit them at paris. and a spinoff story was that global warming will increase severe weather in the united states. that means tornadoes, floods hurricanes, et cetera, severe

thunderstorms. in what state in this country has the largest exhibit of individuals in the united states? california. by far. california's economy has got some problems, some of which probably have to do with the greenhouse gas rules. and what state has the largest inflow of people? texas, country. so california severe weather in california. there is none. if you want to talk about the drought in california that is man-made by the people, the effects of the amended by the people in sacramento. the caliphate water system can hold five years worth of water and so you should not be a problem there except they chose to make it a problem. texas has the highest frequency of tornadoes in the country severe thunderstorms. it's hotter than hell then the houston. this is houston you know, on a

good day. extreme cold or go down to the panhandle of texas brownsville if the temperature plummets. hurricanes can anyone say the galveston hurricane that killed 7000 people in 1900. largest single weather-related disaster in history of united states. and floods. tropical storm claudette i believe holds the 20 our rainfall record for the united states. so people would choose to go from environment where there is no severe weather to one where severe weather is a daily occurrence. and yet epa says that this is going to cause all these problems. very clear that people adapt to their environment and as long as they have enough money okay without diatribe, how do i push this thing? interagency working groups

determination of social costs of carbon, is a scientifically justified? that's an easy one to answer. let's talk about global warming for a second. you were taught in school in the mid-atlantic is not the he'd come it's the humidity are like to run that with which you should think about global warming, which is not the heat, it's the sensitivity. sensitivity is defined as the amount of warming that you get for an arbitrary doubling of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere after all is said and done. it's the sensitivity is low, we have a non-issue. if the sensitivity is high or the probability that the sensitivity is high is not negligible, then people will invoke the precautionary principle and legislate to their hearts content. let me to you about the undercover to working group the group to put together the social cost of carbon. this menu is mr. gorbachev in case you can't tell -- this man.

he is fond of saying that's old thank you. what the interagency working group did, does, is literally old thinking. this is their old thinking. this is a plot of the frequency probability of x amount of warming from about eight authors of the early part of the 21st century, they are leaders of the 21st century. the black line that the top of the horizontal line is the frequency distribution used by the intergovernmental interagency working group for social cost of carbon. the point of this is on the right, what you see are fat tails. so that's why people invoke the precautionary principle on this issue, et cetera. [inaudible] >> i wish i did. do i have a pointer? no.

you want media because you're recording, right? yes. >> whatever you want. [inaudible] >> this is the fat tail and this is the probability distribution is by the interagency working group. in my upcoming book global lukewarm it, one of the chapters is called people fear their fat tails. now, we've already seen this. the problem is we have a busted forecast. you cannot look at this graphic which is the red line of the five year running means for lower tropospheric temperature for the 102 united nations model that give a lower tropospheric temperature. the u.n. is one of eight models at six don't give a lower tropospheric temperature that can be used. the green and blue dots are respectively the two simulations

or the two summits of the satellite data, lower tropospheric satellite data. the other dots are the lower atmospheric temperatures as measured by weather balloons which are calibrated instruments of that go up twice a day. you are for summaries of these and these figures are the average. you cannot look at this picture and not realize that a tragedy is occurring. by my profession, inability to admit the three most important, say the three most important words in life which is not i love you. it's we were wrong. i was wrong. and this is not just going to take on climate science. this illustration is going to take out people's faith in science. it cannot go on much longer. the longer we wait, the worse it's going to be. here's the satellite record.

senator inhofe, i realize you're not here, but it's not 15 years. this is the new summary of the satellite record from universe of alabama. on july 1 that would be six days from today, we will begin our -- looking at the camera -- 22nd you without a significant warming trend. that's correct. and the other analysis of the satellite data there does. remote sensing systems, begins its period without warming in november of 1994. the records are very, very similar now. 22 years without it. so here are the recent estimates of sensitivity, beginning first papers on this with one exception which i will note in a minute, started to come out in 2011. you can see these are the 95%

confidence limits for sensitivity given in 2014. the top arrow is what's used by the interagency working group. you can see why i said it's old thinking. and by the way there was one paper published in 2002 that showed the same thing, but in the words of andrew rivkin in an article about a year and half ago, he said there was an article on climate sensitivity and said scientists are reluctant to admit that the sensitivity may have been overestimated because the paper was published 10 years ago by a scientist normally associate with libertarian think tanks. you've made in it in this world when you have no name. anyway, and i don't want to talk about the implications of that.

here is from nick lewis thomas very recently using the latest estimates of sulfate cooling. that's the knob of the computer model that allows you to make it simulate the pass wonderfully if you don't know what the sulfate load was which we did in to this paper came out by stevens in 2015. and this is the probability distribution for the sensitivity after doubling of carbon dioxide. take a look. there are four different calculations better made and we fall somewhere around 1.2 degrees celsius. my god, the epa uses three degrees celsius as a matter of routine. vendors also a measure called -- by the time to carbon dioxide doubles in the atmosphere effectively doubles. should probably be somewhere around 2065.

that is this one here. this is total warming caused by greenhouse gases plus everything else around 2065. so about 1.1 one degree celsius closely. let's say we .8 degrees celsius. that's a half of that is due to human activity. that means you'll get .6 of the degree over the next five decades. that's nothing compared to what has been forecast. the disparity between the orange line in the killer slide and the lower tropospheric temperatures as measured by satellites and weather balloons will grow and grow and grow and grow and to this professionthe profession that i am not happily a member of says we were wrong. now, this was presented over to

the american geophysical union in december, and it's a little complicated. i'm going to stand over there and ruin the video presentation. solid dotted lines are the average of all 107 of the united nations computer model. the average warming trend predicted for the last 10 years the last 11 years the last 12 years, the last 62 years. so beginning in 1951. 2004 through 2013 2003 through 2013, et cetera. while we have -- [inaudible] ninety-five-97.5% confidence limits around the mean value predicted by the winners seven

bottles. and seeing as the model output is greg pretty normal distributed you can apply standard statistics to. the colored dots are the odds are temperature changes for the last 10 years, for the last 11 years, on out to the last 62 years. where the colored dots are green, the predicted changes fall within the 95% confidence level made of the model distribution of warming. where the dots turn yellow, about 37 years ago they fall out of the 95% confidence limit. and where the dots turn red they fall out of the 97.5% confidence limit. if this were normal size this along with the plot of the model versus observed no trumpets their temperature would provoke those three words, and those three words are we were wrong. but we calculate the climate

sensitivity based upon old thinking. and now evan is going to talk about that part is. [applause] >> okay, so thank you, pat. thank you, david and more for being there. i'm going to talk about the social part of carbon which is the primary justification for this type of policy. so the first important question to ask how does a government estimate the social cost of carbon? and second is a reliable tool for energy policymakers? is a picture of a roulette wheel and i'd like you guys to keep it

in mind as the talk goes on. so the social cost of carbon firstly, what is equipped \80{l1}s{l0}\'80{l1}s{l0} defined by bp as the economic damages per metric ton of carbon dioxide emissions. so the general question is how do we estimate this and the general question is what is the long-term economic impact of carbon dioxide emissions across a particular time horizon? there are three primary statistical models used by the interagency working group to answer this question. namely that by small, the fun model, and the page model. these followers to me by what we call monte-carlo simulations were very suspects are random they are therefore repeatedly estimated, and has resulted there is distributional properties of the social cost of carbon are generated. so the thing is as with any statistical model these models are grounded by assumptions. namely a discount rate, a time

horizon and specific of what we call an equilibrium climate sensitivity should vision. obligated that an event. so at heritage we ran to of to three miles out we examine the assumptions. firstly a discount rate. we talked about some in damages. the thing is not often which are created equal. in particular some people are for benefits sooner rather than later and costs later rather than sooner. its message to quantify this inequality. the epa is discount rates to decide these 2.5% from 3% to 5% discount rates. despite the fact office of management and budget suggested 7% be used. in our research we address this question by running these models using the 7% discount rate as recommended. secondly there's the assumption

of added time horizon. projected economic damages are some as i was alluding to earlier in estimating the social cost of carbon. but the question is for how long backs now how far into the future can we see? here's a picture of john adams. has anyone seen the hbo miniseries or read the book? so long ago john adams predicted that america would one day become the greatest empire in the world and he was right. but despite that fact he and our other founding fathers would've almost surely had no idea what the american economy would have looked like today. similarly we have no idea what the american economy will look like 300 years now yet these models may to make projections about far into the future. at heritage we made a list unrealistic assumption of trying to project say one of 50 years into the future and we estimated the models accordingly. lastly, these models make the specification of and pat

alluded to this, an equilibrium climate sensitivity is tradition. global warming alarmists will tell you the site is on global warming. at the thing is, if it's science, and how can it be settled? new studies consistently come to light replacing existing studies. the concept of equilibrium climate sensitivity distributions is no different. it was suggested and was published in the journal of science eight years ago. sense of in a broad avenue or this division have been published including by alexander otto and his colleagues in the journal nature as well as nick lewis in the journal of climate as well as many others. if you look at this table for example, if you compare the outdated distribution to the up-to-date this tradition you

can see some dramatic differences. the first column concerns the probability that a temperature will exceed a particular route and disciplined columns depict the actual to build according to the particular distribution. if you look at the ipod the increasing about the 3.5 degrees celsius, you will notice probably a slightly over a third under the distribution compared to drastically lower public under the more up-to-date distribution specified by alexander otto and his colleagues as well as nick lewis lewis. in fact,lewis. in fact, under the listed should be about probability a slightly under one and a thousand. you notice is the potential as well. if that distressed by the attempt acceding 3.5 degrees celsius. let's take a step back and see what this tells us. essential this tells us the iwg's assumption fast overstay the probability of extreme global warming in the social cost of carbon.

so now what happens and particularly if we tweak the discount rate from the time horizon for the ecs guest vision. let's take a look what happened to care which is the override a discount rates and ecs distribution. for example, if we increase the discount rate under both the dice and found my we see lower estimates of the sec from going to size $56 or so under the dice model to as low as around $4 or $5. and even potentially going negative in the fun model and we'll get to that in a second. you a notice under the up-to-date ecs guest vision estimates are also lower. for example even if you stick to the low 2.5% discount rate at the ivy beachy actual use the sec dropped by over $20.

and again this should surprise you because the distribution uses overstated the problem of extreme global warming convertible recent ecs distribution. now, you notice a negative in these slides, particularly under 7%, and even under some of the other distributions. sec estimates excuse me under the fun model. let's take a step back and think about that. do these models necessary suggest global warming is a good thing or a bad thing? that is commented on suggest that our economic damages associate with carbon dioxide emissions. this is an interesting aspect of the modeling, and with the fun model, the answer is no and it allows for a negative social cost of carbon. in our research at heritage we did was we computed the probability of a negative social cost and you notice in some cases a special entire discount rates it is a drastically hud estimates of the probability of

it negative sec even under the outdated road they could distribution under pashtun the probability are well over 60% for 2020. so what if we actually wanted to take these models seriously? supposed to have legitimacy. which they don't. if you do take them seriously we found using heritage energy model, our cloak of the system used by the eia that by 2030 you have average of the shortfall over 300,000 lost jobs. a peak employment shortfall of over a million jobs and over 500,000 lost manufacturing jobs. so the bottom line is the models can't be trusted. you saw the results of the sec were literally all across the map. if you do trusted him and the moment is hosted regulations that the ministry is adjusting the results would literally be

an economic disaster. so let's just think about this but is there any reason to believe these models? they are externally sensitive to the slightest tweaks. with results literally scattered across the map going from positive to negative in some cases high probabilities of negative social cost of carbon. it's difficult to take him seriously. moreover, that damage functions used are arbitrary. so going back to our picture of the roulette wheel essentially taking the social cost of carbon seriously for our mental rulemaking is tantamount to going to vegas, spinning the roulette wheel and using that as an estimate of the sec. who here wants to spend the roulette wheel on the social cost of carbon? thank you. and happy to take questions at the end applause might -- [applause]

>> well, thank you david and heritage foundation for really such a pleasure to be on a panel with all three of you, my mentors i think on the subject. what al-qaeda is just maybe elaborate of viewpoints that they couldn't get to because of the short time we have here and i see that screen is too tiny for me to see so i'm going to grab my printout of this. this first lady are actually that's not just like i want to show you first. it's the one called overview which is is basically how i see the big picture of this whole discussion the social cost of carbon. out how to illustrate some of these points without duplicating too much of what has come before. but one big point i want to get

across is that the social cost of carbon is an unknown quantity and i would even content and unknowable quantity because it's not discernible in the date of the real world. it's not testable in meteorological data don't economic data. so where does it come from? we just heard, it comes from computer model which combined a speculative climatology which a speculative economics. and by fiddling with the inputs of these models, which as we for include discount rates, climate sensitivity of such income but also beyond that how global warming rates would affect weather patterns and how weather patterns would affect climate sensitive areas of the economy like agriculture and forestry. and an intern how that that would affect employment and consumption and human health. so it is a multilayered set of assumptions in which the uncertainties been propagate through each layer, and so this

means that the social cost of carbon analysts can get just about any result they desire by fiddling with knobs by tweeting the inputs. well, what is it that they desire? they desire to get the biggest possible social cost of carbon number that they can, and why is it that? because the bigger the social cost of carbon, the easier it is to justify the more costly anti-carbon regulations. could be carbon taxes, cap-and-trade. soviet style production quota for renewable energy. the bigger the social cost of carbon, the more plausible it seems that all of that is good for us and in fact, one of the things that they're really trying to do here and this is what i call these social cost of carbon computer aided sophistry. i'm using sophistry in the old

greek sense of shame wisdom raised to an art. [laughter] this is tied up with a computer. it's to cells on the proposition that fossil fuels are unaffordable no matter how cheap and renewables are a bargain at any price. that's what they're really after and that's why they can claim all of these policies they are proposing will only make us better off all the wealth that we think is real which we can trace to the fossil energy technologies attacks of how our civilization, our illusory. because we are not seeing the hidden costs which are revealed by the social cost of carbon analysis. now, another big point that it want to make is that even if the social cost of carbon were an exact science, even if they got the site and economic exactly right, which they can't because if this is all based on these

highly speculative assumptions and arbitrary inputs like how high you set the discount rate even if they got it exactly right, it would still be biased, it would still be one side. it would still be a partisan agenda masquerading as science. why is it that? has it is never combined with a rigorous assessment of the social benefits of carbon energy, and consequently never combined with an assessment of the social costs of carbon mitigation. and one point that i will try to get to by the end is about the social costs of carbon mitigation vastly outweigh the alleged social cost of carbon. now, let me get to the first point, and i'm not going to go through all 50 of isolate. don't worry, david. i just wanted to be loaded for bear because i did to how i would've to fit wonderful presentations from my mentors, so i decided to be like a boy

scout, have as many arrows in my quiver as i could. but the first point that he made was that the social cost of carbon is an unknown quantity. and this is just one example of dozens of got in my slideshow, which i guess will be posted by heritage and so you can all look at all of them. but he we see the frequency of land falling hurricanes in the united states since 1900. there is even no trend in the data or it is slightly declining. this comes from roger pilkey junior. the same thing with the power or strength of u.s. hurricanes land falling hurricanes since 19 as measured by the power dissipation index. no trend or slight downward trend. now, you might think well but hurricane related losses economic damages are increasing, yes, but that's because there's more stuff and more people in harm's way. when you normalize the loss of data, that's a technical term

that means you adjust it for changes in population, wealth, and the consumer price index, then once again using nutrients. so i defy any of these social cost of carbon modelers to find a greenhouse fingerprint, the actual social cost of carbon in this very important data. the same thing is true worldwide. this is from a study in 2012. no trend in the strength and frequency of land falling hurricanes globally since 19511970, depending on how far back the data sickos in which hurricane basin. no trend in i.t. related cycle energy globally since the 1970s. you see profound inner decade of variability. and then once again we see this is not all forms of extreme weather, normalized damages, and juicy no trend going back to 1960.

if you look at something like floods which was mentioned earlier before in the united states, no trend since 1950. at the u.s. geological survey study. the palmer drought separate index for the united states going back to 1895 you to see an increase in drought in the united states overall. what you see rather is a slight increase in wetness and thank you, pat, for the wonderful slide. many of these flights i've taken. this is what the ipc latest report said about droughts and floods globally. basically since the mid-20th century, which is about as far back as global data goes on droughts and floods, there is no confidence in any kind of trend. so once again you cannot find the social cost of carbon or evidence of a social cost of carbon in economic data over meteorological data. what we define is just since

1982 there's been an 11% increase in green foliage in arid areas in all continents of the world. that looks like a social benefit of carbon dioxide to me. here's a study that brother pat over your was instrumental in producing, and it just shows that decade by decade in the united states as are the air temperatures have gotten hotter, heat related mortality has gone down. where is the social cost of carbon and there? this is another set a pat put together but he is i think one of the really important slides which is historically the most lethal form of extreme weather was a drought because it limits access to food and water. and in the 1920s, 472000 people, that's an estimate, died from drought conditions, okay?

and since then what is happened? about 90% of all the industrial carbon dioxide emissions ever released into the air since the dawn of the industrial revolution occurred, okay, and we have maybe .8 c. of warming since that time and you know fossil fuel consumption went through the roof of globally and we had a 99.98% decrease in deaths related to drought. even though you about a tripling of the global population. if you're looking at death rates, it's a 99.99% decrease. find the social cost of carbon in that. naturally essential to we are talking of life and death on a very large scale, and you can find the same thing with extreme weather generally. you can look at mall area. malaria has been, even though yes, there's a relationship

between malaria and warm weather. you give mosquitoes more months of hot weather and you get more mosquitoes. but wealth and technology has dropped climate dramatically. this graph shows the difference between 2007 and 1900 and the latest report by the world health organization on malaria shows a dramatic decline in malaria incidence and death in africa just since the year 2000 even though there was a 43% increase in the population in africa literally in those historic malay transmission as. so someone please find the social cost of carbon. you can see that you shows that all these major food crops since 1960, the yields have increased by a minimum of one of%. in some cases it is way more. so we announcing global warming taking a huge toll on global food production. quite the contrary. them ago.

this is from a study done by our friend craig who calculated that the co2 fertilization effect just since 1961 has added about $3.2 trillion the global agriculture. that's a huge increase in making food more affordable, and food security. so this is a carbon benefit. and he projects based on this largely experimental data that it will see another $9.6 trillion in additional agricultural output between now and 2050, thanks to the carbon dioxide fertilization effect. and so then if you look at the bigger picture, the biggest picture of all, which is civilization, since year one you will see an amazing hockey stick here. he was the carbon dioxide concentration zooming up at the

end. you also see per capita incomes zooming up and population zooming up the kind of the some people are, you know some people of the greater persuasion have a problem with population but to me it means sheer abundance of human life. it is obviously an indicator of health. i mean, you wouldn't have billions more people if people were getting sick and dying. and also per capita incomes zooming out. so i just want to mention, well i guess i went through this already. there's a whole train of assumptions they play with in order to get these -- i'm not? pretty close to outcome okay. well, let me just jump to the very end. anyway, as i said, you folks can read the rest of the story online if you're interested. if i have tweaked your interested -- interest at all.

i mentioned that they overlook entirely the social and economic benefits of carbon energy and hence the cost of carbon mitigation, the social cost. this set of slides j. shows that even without the whole suite of climate policies that they would like to ram down the collective throat of the american economy the energy costs have been rising over the last 20 years and especially for people in lower income brackets. that is to say as a proportion of income. and then you could see also in the second graph that low income households that have have to cope with higher energy costs actually have to make real sacrifices in terms of medical care, you know paying the rent, food. so these costs are not just hypothetical. and i'll in with this. this is the grand program of the obama administration, the whole

green movement the whole u.n. bureaucratic complex. this is the climate treaty that is being negotiated, and the goal of this thing is to reduce global co2 emissions 60% below 2010 levels by 2050. this is a wonderful little slide put together by alfred at the chamber of commerce committee shows that this really requires that about a 75% reduction in global emissions from the baseline in 2050. he asked the simple question, who is going to make those cuts and how much? here's how the simple arithmetic breaks down. if the industrialized countries which is us magically goes cold turkey and reduce our emissions to zero by 2050 for developing countries still have to cut their co2 emissions 35% in order to meet this u.n. target.

am i saying 35% below their baseline in 2050? know. 35% below their current emissions. and we're talking about a part of the world where about 1.2 billion people have no access to electricity whatsoever another 2.2.3 billion or so have only unreliable access to electricity, not enough to make their country an attractive place to invest money so it is a huge hindrance, one of the major obstacles to the growth. let's get back to this. what if more realistically or less unrealistically we can only cut our emissions 80% by 2050? well then those very poor developing countries that lack modern commercial energy, 87% of which comes from fossil sources they had to cut their emissions from today's levels pretty much after so that is a humanitarian disaster in the making. there is a huge social and

economic cost in such a disaster for and that is the kind of trajectory that there trying to justify based on based on sharon visit pseudoscience of social cost of carbon estimation. thank you. [applause] >> we will take some time for questions from whether we have that are not we are taking it. we have again the microphones because this is being taped by c-span. and, of course, for the heritage online archives. so if you have a question raise your hand wait for the mic of them from say who you are and if you have an affiliation or organization to say that. do we have a microphone on the side? thank you. >> my name is kevin -- my question is for kevin. i'm curious, this is a two-part question.

i'm curious if your answers were more sensitive to discount rate were more sensitive tec has? and, to come on thursday begin to me about why you chose a windy 7%? if memory serves in circular a4 i think is of intent for public investment like infrastructure. i know that just because omb says is a number but it doesn't mean it's the right one. i'm wondering if you could walk me through what you wanted to test that number specifically? >> the first part of the question was comparing ecs distribution's to the discounted rates. i think if you look at our dice model paper we handed out, i think we saw greater sensitivity to the use of the ecs distribution actually. so your second question why did we decide you 7% discount rate? if you read the circular carefully isn't just for this type of analysis, the 7% discount rate is appropriate. we just wanted to do this

primarily just to test the sensitivity to the assumptions. as you saw these results are literally scattered all across the map. >> i'll just jump in. the circular says three and seven come and some extreme cases you can use something outside that. but under no circumstances do they say you shouldn't use seven. >> let me quote from it if i could. i have it right here. quote, a real discount rate of 7% should be used as a base case for regulatory analysis. words have meaning. >> down here. >> kevin i guess and/or pat -- >> he happens to be randy randall. >> yes. do you know why the fun model gives us negative cost of the benefit of?

any reason at all? what if the damage function teach you the results because they defer the question from randy. i suggested it is toward the end of my talk to the damage function themselves are a determined priority by the researcher. the fun model allows a negative because there are certain potential benefits of co2 emission such as fertilization but it's just the way it's structured or any of these models can be tweaked to allow for negativity in terms of the damage function. >> the fun model is the only model of the three that has a co2 fertilization benefit. and a co2 fertilization benefit is a well-established in empirical science that the other two models should be rejected out of hand as inherently biased. i mean they do not pass muster under the data quality act. i will say this about the fun model. one reason why the social cost of carbon estimate jumped 60% in only four years, why climate

change some of the 60% worse, even though the global warming plateau lasted for another four years, and the divergence increased by that much more, the reason is that the fun model was updated in such a way that the same climate sensitivity generated a more rapid warming come and so they said that meant that the higher temperatures and the associated images are reached earlier and are therefore discounted less. so the fun model even though it is better than the others somehow contributed to that increase in the social cost of carbon between 2010-2013. that explanation seems to me just preposterous. because what we've seen over the last 18 and a half years or as pat was saying, 22 years is quite the reverse of an acceleration. there's no evidence that global warming is accelerating. and yet that assumption comes

out of the fun model into the interagency working group's calculation. go figure. >> time for another one? well, thank you all for sticking with us for the extra 50 minutes. appreciate it very much. applause and to our panel. [applause] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations]

>> c-span to brings you the best access to congress, by debate and votes from the senate floor, hearings and current public policy events. end of the weekend its booktv was nonfiction books and authors can live coverage of the book festivals from around the country and unite it seems look at the publishing industry. c-span2, the best access to congress and nonfiction books. >> out of housing on the afford what arrived, legal and ensures experts testified at a hearing on the impact of insurance premiums. peter roskam chairs this hearing of the house ways and means subcommittee on oversight. it is two hours.

>> the committee will come to order. before we began, i'd like to make, just take a point of personal privilege, and acknowledge the ranking member, mr. lewis. you know it's often said that people look at the united states congress today and they can be pretty discourage and pretty overwhelmed by what happens up here. and i began to reflect on that a little bit. i have been for the past several months sitting next to a man who brings everything that is good about this process to the forefront. that is a john lewis. and when i took over the gavel of the subcommittee i knew knew he was directing them and then you get an autobiography, and i read it. and i was fascinated by. and the part that fascinated the oftentimes i put myself into the place of some of the i'm reading about in terms of time and place, and to begin to think him

and to read about what john lewis did in the summer of 1961. that is he took on an incredible physical and moral challenge to be one of the original freedom riders that was to integrate interstate bus system and all of those things around and i was thinking, well what was i doing in the summer of 1950 -- 61? the summer of 1961 i was comfortably in my mother's womb to be born later on in september of that year. as i thought about it and i plan to do this before the events of charleston and now the events of charleston have come upon us and as i thought about it i thought what a privilege to sit on a dais with somebody who worked so hard to improve the world for all of us. because we are all better off, every one of us regardless of our racial background we are

all better off today because of the work and the tenacity and the moral clarity and courage in light of physical trauma that john lewis is a very young man was willing to endure. and so i've got a copy or we have a copy for every member "walking with the wind," mmr of the movement by john lewis, and i would even go so far as to say that i bet you if you give them i contact and cornyn, he will even sign the book for you. and i really commend it to get because it is a work that is an inspiration to if they work i think and guide us all and it's an invitation basically becomes a sense of clarity to say look we can take on these things. john lewis was able to be something other broken into system that was legal

segregation in the united states and was able to persevere through that, then surely we can take on india with a number of the challenges that are here before us. and so i am so deeply appreciative of his leadership and his clarity, and i am very anxious for my colleagues to read this. now, since you don't get a copy of your own book i'm i've got the gift for you. and that is of this. wife elizabeth is an oil painter, and she's painted a series of paintings and this is not yet been published or put out anywhere, but one of the paintings that she is done is called dreams of freedom. and dreams of freedom as a portrayal of martin luther king's speech in 1963. and i note, mr. lewis was a

very. i know he was inextricably linked to the time that was a pivotal in our history from the march of 63. and so i present this print to you of elizabeth's oil painting, dreams of freedom for you and i hope that you'll accept what the spirit with which it's presented to you today mr. lewis. [applause] >> whomr. chairman, thank you so much for those kind words your thank you for making "walking with the wind" of able to our colleagues. thank you and your wife for this

lovely beautiful painting, freedom. portraying dr. martin luther king, jr. standing at the lincoln memorial delivering that speech. i was there. i was 23. at all of my hair and a few pounds lighter. [laughter] i spoke number six and dr. king spoke number 10. of all the people who spoke that day, i'm the only one still around. thank you for your friendship. thank you for being you. and i will cherish it is. what i put in my office or take it to my house. just thank you so much. >> thank you. why don't you show the audience the print? powers that? >> beautiful. >> there you go.

>> welcome let's get down to business, shall we? today's hearing we're going to focus in on this discussion about big premium hikes that insurance can put our code proposing for 2016 under the affordable care act. for five years did michigan has insisted the law would reduce health care costs. the president said we can get cut the average family's premiums by $2500 a year. yet the nonperson fact checker politifact call that a broken promise. president obama pledged that insurance premiums would go down and get the "washington post" fact checker that as three pinocchio's. in fact, five years and health insurance costs and obamacare are not going down. they are going up. under the house rules the subcommittee's job is to be done with the application execution

and effectiveness of federal laws. and today we're going to do that. now, for the first time since the aca became law insurers are able to look at a full year's worth of claims data to calculate premium prices for the year ahead. that's an important distinction. the we have real data to talk about. the proposed premium hikes tell us a lot about how much healthcare cost last year and what insurers calculate healthcare will cost this next year. on june 1 cms made public proposed premium hikes of 10% or more for the 2016 plan year, and many of the proposed increases are eye-popping we huge. in maryland, carefirst blue choice, which covers approximately 80% of the individual market, has asked for an average increase of nearly 30%. in missouri, coventry health has requested an increase of 22.7%. in north carolina, blue cross blue shield has asked for an increase of 25.7%. in tennessee, blue cross blue

shield has asked for an increase of 36.3%. in south dakota one of the largest insurers wellmark, has asked for premium hikes between 24% and 51.5%. it is noteworthy that in many states, the largest insurers are also the ones proposing the biggest increases, which is especially troubling, because they benefit from the most customer data on which to base their calculations. i could go on. the are a number of these prices have real consequences in the lives of real people. in other words, this isn't just about insurance commissioners and scholars. this is about what people are actually paying, and they're paying this in the context of a false narrative, and the false narrative in my opinion was this is going to be great, or consequently competitive going to love it. here's a question. after constituents in south dakota have gotten 50% wage increase?

i would venture very, very queuing or to pay for those. to be for these are just proposals. nothing has been finalized yet. 36 states insurance, state and church authorities must improve the increases and often after negotiate with the insurers, but there's a reason that the insurers are asking for such big rate hike. the transport is a working to lower cost. it's actually driving them up in many circumstances. president obama's about the aca more people would have health insurance so that the costs calls emergency care would diminish, but there to keep cost down these plans have relied on network provider networks, meaning fewer doctors and limited availability. also, much of the law's new health insurance coverage came in the form of expanding medicaid. since many individuals can't get in to see their doctors, and many more doctors aren't taking medicaid patients, the aca is actually driving the number of emergency room visits up, just

the opposite of what the president said would be achieved. are these effects of the aca just growing pains? i don't think so. the law great a number of different programs to bail out billions in taxpayer funds to in the first few years to lower the cost seen by individuals and to protect big insurance carriers against financial losses, but those programs are beginning to phase out. as the government is slowly taking off the training wheels the affordable care act is looking pretty wobbly. even with the billions and billions of taxpayer dollars spent to reduce the sticker price of insurance for individuals, to lower their out of pocket costs, to pump up big insurance companies, to establish and operate the insurance marketplaces, and more, all hidden and shifted costs paid for by you, the taxer compete with all that health care costs and health insurance premiums are still going up. ..