Ben Groom

Ben Groom is a PhD student at the Department of Economics, University College London and a research fellow at the Centre for Social and Economic Research on the Global Environment. He is a member of the Biodiversity and Economics for Conservation project, funded by the EU under the 5th Framework. His research interests include economic instruments for biodiversity conservation, applied demand and production analysis, especially water and agricultural economics.

Papers Published in World Economics:

Valuing the Future

Authors: David Pearce, Ben Groom, Cameron Hepburn & Phoebe Koundouri

One of the most controversial areas of economics is the practice of discounting: attaching a lower weight to future costs and benefits than present costs and benefits. Discounting appears to offend notions of sustainable development and the interests of future generations. Recent advances in the theory of discounting hold out strong hope that the ‘tyranny of discounting’ can be avoided through the use of time varying discount rates (TVDRs). This paper reviews the recent rationales for TVDRs and applies the results to issues such as nuclear power and global warming control.

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