UPDATE:
I will be announcing my decision on the Paris Accord over the next few days. MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 31, 2017
***Original Post***
According to the White House and POLITICO, President Donald Trump plans to pull the United States out of the Paris Climate Agreement.
The agreement, entered into by the Obama administration, costs Americans taxpayers millions and heavily regulates how countries use energy. The goal of the agreement is to decrease the overall temperature of earth by nearly four degrees.
According the the Heritage Foundation, the agreement would have a negative impact on American jobs, increase electricity prices, decrease household wages and shrink U.S. GDP while having little impact on stopping changes in climate around the world.
Policies adapted from domestic regulations emphasized in the Paris agreement will affect a variety of aspects of the American economy. As a result of the plan, one can expect that by 2035, there will be:
-An overall average shortfall of nearly 400,000 jobs;
-An average manufacturing shortfall of over 200,000 jobs;
-A total income loss of more than $20,000 for a family of four;
-An aggregate gross domestic product (GDP) loss of over $2.5 trillion; and Increases in household electricity expenditures between 13 percent and 20 percent.
More on the details from Americans for Tax Reform:
Today the Obama Administration will sign the Paris climate agreement at a ceremony in New York, a move that is projected to severely impact the U.S. economy with ironically negligible impacts for the environment. The agreement will not only set the stage for increased regulation, but will crush U.S. economic output, reduce household income for millions, and likely lead to hundreds of thousands of lost jobs.
The agreement is a product of the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris, where President Obama met with world leaders to commit the U.S. to non-binding emission reduction targets. Under the agreement, Obama committed the U.S. to wholly improbable reduction goals of 26 to 28 percent by year 2025.
Through a litany of regulations stemming from the agreement, Obama has essentially offered up the U.S. economy as a sacrificial lamb to further his own legacy. Sadly, the agreement will not just hurt the country’s growth as a whole, but will trickle down to low-and-middle income Americans. As a result of the agreement, energy costs will skyrocket, in turn raising the cost of utility bills for families and increasing the costs of consumer goods.
The decision comes after months of consideration and after the President met with world leaders at NATO and the G7 during his first foreign trip last week.
In his domestic budget the President stripped funding for climate change, arguing it is a waste of taxpayer money.
"As to climate change, I think the President was fairly straightforward saying we’re not spending money on that anymore," Budget Director Mick Mulvaney said in March. "We consider that to be a waste of your money to go out and do that. So that is a specific tie to his campaign.”
This post has been updated with additional information.
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