[jfoutz]

Is it a new problem? The dustbowl hit, and some people were completely unwilling to move, even though their way of life was unsustainable.

Change is inherently hard to deal with. I think one of the big roles of government, and perhaps culture, is to temper the peaks and valleys. Some of us are going to face hard hard choices. Some of those choices are very rapid, like an earthquake. Some of those choices are very slow, like rising sea levels.

We pretty much know that there will be earthquakes and rising sea levels. How do we influence people to minimize that impact today?

I'm a fan of big cash payouts for flood insurance in exchange for losing the land, ever increasing taxes on the sale of costal properties and converting coastline to national park.

When folks homes are inevitably destroyed, make sure they have plenty of money to move. Make it harder and harder to sell property on the risky coasts, and finally when enough homes have been destroyed (50%? 95%? doesn't really matter the higher the fraction, the more painful the change will be), take the land and turn it into parks for everyone to use.

I'm not exactly opposed to the very wealthy hanging on to a cabin or a mansion, but there needs to be a clear line that they are living on public land. People can camp in their yard.

Maybe it's a stupid idea. We do have an opportunity to unwind the massive, massive risk incurred by allowing, even encouraging, people to live in places where they will fail miserably, eventually.

Right now, the risks are low. So the stakes should be low. I have no problems with my tax dollars giving a small bonus for them to move away, and turn that land into national park. In 50 years when they are well and truly fucked - who cares? Maybe stop issuing flood insurance in 40 years. Plenty of time to figure out a plan.

But where they are living is increasingly risky. Slowly, gradually make it clear that we as a culture and government aren't going to subsidize that. It's ok if they are super-rich, and can afford to rebuild every few years. but the land will be nationalized eventually. And no one is going to subsidize rebuilding efforts in the very long run.

[Kim_Bruning]

I think this is an unsustainable strategy in the long term. Many of America's biggest most profitable cities are on the coasts. With rising sea levels many will be at risk. Some (eg. New Orleans) already are.

On the other hand, investing a little money in terraforming never hurt anyone and has a proven track record.

[jfoutz]

there are high and low density locations. The dutch have proven that very little technology can protect land from the sea. I'm not opposed to special cases, but the coastline is _huge_. I don't believe we can protect all of it anymore.

Perhaps it was an option at one point, but we're past that point (in my humble opinion. i'm not a climatologist or an economist, i'm likely full of shit).

i think it's too late to reduce carbon emissions, and that requires global buy in. I think it's too late to build a wall along the whole coast. I think there are obvious places for exceptions, but 99% of the coast is going to sink. let's just own that and make the change as painless as possible.

[Kim_Bruning]

The Netherlands - being situated in a delta- once had a disproportionately long natural coastline. One of the strategies employed is to shorten that coastline dramatically by strategic placement of walls. Of course, in a country like the USA, not even all of the coast requires additional protection; only parts of it.

I do agree with you that certain cities (like Miami) might be difficult-to-impossible to protect with current technology. Other cities (like New Orleans) have well-known challenges with well known solutions, and there is absolutely no reason why people couldn't protect them.

What is needed is for people to put together the political will, attitude and organization required to survive and thrive in those kinds of conditions (with a strong push towards prevention rather than recovery).

That too has already been done many times over the centuries; and there's no reason to believe that Americans (or Louisianans) are in any way inferior to other peoples.

Which is not to say I agree or disagree with you completely:

See also perhaps something like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZ6tbIJAuYk ( How cities can prevent flood disasters | A Dutch water expert weighs in )