Here is the latest round of comparisons between two scenarios, the BAU (Business as Usual) and the Fanatic Scenario. In the first scenario, the player does nothing; in the second scenario, the player raises carbon taxes up to the maximum: $100 per ton. Here are the results:
BAU Fanatic
Be careful here: note that the BAU score is nearly 30 times greater than the Fanatic score. The shapes are in the right ballpark. The BAU score should start off positive but steadily descend to a very negative final result; the Fanatic score should start off very negative but steadily climb. These are close, but still off the ideal. Why? Let’s delve into the details:
BAU Fanatic
Once again, note that the scale for the BAU score is ten times greater than for the Fanatic score. The big difference here is primarily in the Rich Death score; a LOT more rich people are dying in the BAU scenario. A lot more poor people are dying, too, but that doesn’t cost as many points. And there’s definitely more loss in Gaia points – that comes from greater amounts of extinction, probably caused by more deforestation. The two big questions to answer here are first, for BAU, why are Rich Deaths so large at first? And second, for Fanatic, why does the Gaia score stay so large?
BAU Fanatic
Here’s part of the answer: economic growth in both scenarios starts off strong, but then plummets in both scenarios. In the BAU scenario it plummets lower than in the Fanatic scenario. That seems about right to me. The strong negative growth in the late BAU scenario explains all the rich deaths; it triggers social instabilities that manifest themselves in violence. Hmm… let’s look at energy production:
BAU Fanatic
This is pretty much as expected: the Fanatic scenario really cuts short the use of fossil fuels, forcing replacement by solar and wind. But looky here: Total Energy Production in the Fanatic scenario is 250% of what it is in the BAU scenario. Why?
BAU Fanatic
Here’s the reason: the price of energy in Fanatic is higher than in BAU. But such a higher price should have suppressed Industrial Production. But look at Industrial Production:
BAU Fanatic
Huh? Greater Industrial Production in the Fanatic scenario? Here’s why that happened:
BAU Fanatic
High Technology, which boosts Industrial Production, was much better advanced in the Fanatic Scenario. That’s because 20% of the tax money generated in the Fanatic scenario is funneled into Education, which in turn helps High Technology advance:
BAU Fanatic
This is voodoo economics, similar to the Laffer Curve. I think that it gives way too much power to education to influence High Technology. After all, you don’t get great research results merely by having a bunch of scientists coming out of schools – you need to employ them to get all those lucrative research results, and that costs more money, and it won’t happen unless there’s a perceived need for it. Necessity is the mother of invention. I need to add another input into High Technology, reflecting the perceived need for High Technology. Or I need to remove High Technology entirely. After all, if this simulation is so complicated that I have difficulty figuring it out, how’s a high school student going to understand it?