The IMF has revised downward their GDP numbers for the United States from 2.7% annual growth to 2% annual growth. It was just a few months ago that economists were ballyhooing the idea that the economy was finally gaining traction, with some economists predicting 4% GDP growth for 2014.
Now that their predictions have proven to be ridiculously optimistic, the IMF is providing them with figleaf cover that blames global warming for the brutal winter that we just had, thereby bringing down GDP.
From the Associated Press via Townhall Finance:
"Extreme weather occurrences have a serious effect on the economy," Christine Lagarde, the IMF's managing director, said at a news conference.
Lagarde added:
"Extreme weather occurrences have repeated much more frequently in the past 20 years than the previous century. That's a reason to wonder about climate change and how to deal with it."
They can't just admit that they were wrong. And at this point they're almost getting Soviet in their attempt to revise history to fit their failed predictions.
Sequester, Fukushima, Libya, payroll tax increases, Obamacare have all been variously blamed for the economy not doing as commanded. While each in it's turn have had some effect on the economy-- especially Obamacare-- the larger lesson here is that Obamanomics just don't work.
That said, the IMF's attempts to blame the shrinking economy on global warming is likely history's first attempt, and unfortunately not the last attempt, to blame their own mismanagement on the natural phenomena known as global warming.