There’s always talk of climate change, of what is going to be left of the world. Sea levels rise, cities become submerged. Is there any hope? According to this article from Business Insider, the United States as a whole is, for the most part, safe. So no need to worry, right? Nope.
Though the infographic deems the U.S. safe from climate change, it is misleading. The map is a zoomed out effect. It doesn’t focus on smaller state, region, or city specific information. So on paper, the U.S. looks safe. But what happens to the cities at current sea levels? The coastal towns we love on the East and West coast? What happens to those?
Conveniently, Business Insider published an article to answer that question. New York City, a city with a population of nearly nine million, is among ten cities most vulnerable to rising sea levels. Miami, Florida is also a U.S. city on the list. If sea levels rise one half of a meter by 2070, a large portion of southern Florida will become submerged, putting about 4.8 million 
people at risk. That’s frightening. Many of the other cities on this frightening list are coastal cities in Asia: Bangkok, Shanghai, Ho Chi Minh City, Tianjin, Tokyo. And what’s interesting is that these countries, on the infographic of potential climate change survival, are deemed okay to survive. They’re colored in green. They’re in the clear. Misleading, isn’t it?
Many of the countries that are shown in red or orange seem to be countries we typically classify as “third world” or “underdeveloped”. Is there a coincidence there? Or is the level of development in a country and climate change survival entirely unrelated? It poses an interesting question, and one I don’t quite know the answer to. Most of Africa will not survive. Botswana will be the only African country to withstand climate change. You can basically forget about Central America. None of that will survive. Oh and South America? Nope. Not anymore. Sorry.
Will the United States survive climate change because of our infrastructure? It’s most definitely not because we don’t produce greenhouse gasses. Will we survive because we’re a “power country” and we have lots of resources? We’re not always considered the nicest when it comes to other countries (Take the movie, The Interview, for instance), and we all know the saying “Nice guys finish last”. Is it because we have a stable government? Is it because we’re a developed country? Or did we just get lucky and our country is a bit higher in elevation than the majority of the continent of Africa?
Regardless of the reason we seem to survive climate change, it isn’t an excuse to sit back and watch the world sink. We still need to be proactive. Maybe we can pull together our resources and help out our neighboring countries to the South. Maybe we’ll be able to save parts of South America or Africa from total destruction by climate change. Just because an infographic says we’re safe doesn’t mean we are.
I thought it was really interesting to observe the difference between appearing safe on the map, and the reality of rising sea levels in America. As as Southern California native, I have been informed the impending sea level change for quite some time. More specifically, the island of Balboa in Newport Beach has been noticeably sinking in recent years. Consequences like this concretely show that we are not in fact safe, although other continents may be affected more severely sooner.
Anna — your post raises some very interesting questions, and as to your question about the correlation between a country’s development and its ability to adapt to climate change impacts, the answer is yes. There certainly is a correlation, and it’s not a coincidence. The countries (and populations, communities) who have contributed the least to causing climate change are the ones that suffer disproportionately from the impacts of climate change (and this relates to Chris’s earlier post about seals and marine life: even other species suffer greatly, though they too don’t contribute to the problem). I think your ideas might potentially be interesting to consider in light of the short story “The Tamarisk Hunter,” which is about drought rather than sea level rise. In that story it seems like the people contributing least to the problem (the people living in the desert) are the ones suffering the most, while the people contributing the most to the problem (the people living in L.A.) aren’t suffering at all (or at least not that we know of). Thanks for the insightful post!
I really liked your intakes about the differences in climate change in third world/underdeveloped countries. I never really noticed that the climate change probably is making a big impact on how the countries are doing, and why that aren’t able to develop. Your question raised about the United States infrastructure made me wonder the same thing. I know that we will survive, but my question is how long do you think we would last or how long will we be living in misery?