Note:
It's obvious that Americans
tend to move to warmer
climates after they retire,
or at least they go south
for the winters, if they
can afford to.
That's sure true of retirees
who move out of Michigan,
where I live.
Egan, P. J. & Mullin, M.
Nature 532, 357–360
(2016)
American attitudes
to the climate
have been analyzed,
based on US migration
patterns since the 1970s.
For many decades,
we have heard
fake predictions about
how climate change
will have catastrophic
global consequences.
Back to reality:
The mild effects
of climate change
up to now are
perceived
by Americans
to have been
positive.
Egan and Mullin find
that America's
domestic-migration
patterns reflect
a general dislike
for warm,
humid summers,
but an appreciation
of warm winters.
This means the effects
of climate change
since the 1970s
are perceived overall
to have been an improvement
— potentially undermining
public support for actions
that limit climate change.
Egan and Mullin1 report
that Americans regard
warmer winters
as a positive effect
of climate change.
“It matters globally
if US populations
feel that they have
benefited from the effects
of climate change up to now.”
Egan and Mullin show that
it may be hard for Americans
to understand how changes
in climate can be a catastrophe
when such changes apparently
make daily life more pleasant.
The study's findings
might also be relevant
to the attitudes
of European populations.
In colder regions,
such as in Canada, Russia
and China, future winter
warming may also
be perceived as a benefit
of climate change.
Claimed risks
of climate change
have been not been
sufficient to provoke
the US general public
to become a low-carbon
-emitting society.
In their study,
Egan and Mullin
estimated the US
public's weather
preferences
by using
an index score
that measures
the extent to which
the US migration
patterns are associated
with weather at different
locations.
Their index describes
climate effects that are
meaningful to people's
daily lives.
The index included information
about January's maximum
temperature, July's heat index
(a measure that combines
maximum temperature
and relative humidity),
July's mean relative humidity,
annual precipitation
and the number of days
with precipitation per year.
The authors weighted their
weather preference index (WPI)
to better reflect the geographical
density and distribution
of populations across
the United States.