Two Koches = One standard unit of harm.
One Koch will be initially set to a value equal to one gigaton of carbon emissions. This is fitting, both in the sense of measurable harm and in conveying the image of large volumes of pollutants emitted from both industries and certain “information” sources.
Adopting a standard of harm is very helpful in comparing impacts on people in different areas such, but not limited to, social equity, climate change, and war. In world having so many disparate types of human-created harm and potential harm, this is important in order to not get lost in the swirling array of threats. Which harm matters the most? They ALL matter. Now, you can compare apples to oranges and see where to best focus your attention and energy.
Once initially set, the Koch will float against a basket of harms in the same way that the value of the dollar can be measured against a basket of other currencies. This way, if the harm related to a gigaton of carbon emissions is found to be substantially greater, or less, than currently understood, the unit of measure is not upset, but rather the measure of that harm is revised, as measured in Koches. By this time next year a gigaton of carbon emissions may have a harm value of 1.1 or more Koches. The relative ratings between different types of harm will change daily, and may track on Intrade.
So how harmful is a gigaton (1 GT, one billion tons, 2,000,000,000,000 pounds) of carbon emissions as compared to other types of harm?
Well, current world-wide carbon emissions are about 9 GT per year. In the past century, some amount over 300 GT of excess carbon emissions have occurred. The most recent UN estimate of deaths from global climate change is pegged at about 300,000 premature deaths per year. It’s a little difficult (okay, impossible) to reconcile two non-linear measures, and I have no history to work from other than the single 300,000 number, but for the sake of simple math, I’ll assume that this rate has ramped from zero to 300,000/yr over 10 years, with most effects occurring recently. That yields 1.5 million premature deaths from 300 GT of emissions.
So one Koch, based on 1 GT emissions, is roughly equal to (1/300) * 1.5 million = 500 premature deaths. [For simplicity, I am neglecting collateral damage of global climate change and totally ignoring non-linear effects].
Can a Koch be measured in monetary terms? Of course (why does it always come down to that?). EPA has rated a premature death as a harm measurable at 7 to 9 million dollars. Let’s go with 8. So, one Koch is equal to 4 billion dollars of lost value.
Certain types of harm can only be estimated based on future projections. Loss of the ability of several million people to collectively bargain? There are effects both tangible and intangible, not just loss of wages and working conditions but also loss of dignity and health.
Where a harm may extend indefinitely into the future, a present value of the harm will need to be calculated, using a harm depreciation schedule so that the calculated value does not trend toward infinity. For instance, if loss of collective bargaining rights for 100,000 employees may cause a loss of $2,000 a year in employment-related benefit per employee, the $200 million per year (0.05 Koches per year) can be projected forward over a number of years, with a depreciated amount of harm each year.
Alternatively, a rate of harm, in Koches per year, can be used. In the above case, the harm rate of 0.05 Koches Per Year (KPY) would apply.
The harm associated with one action might require the addition of multiple harms. For instance, the Iraq war would have to be evaluated as the sum of Harm-1 through Harm-n, where n is a large positive integer. It's hard to imaging that final number, except that it would be in thousands of Koches.
Some harms have, at least in theory, offsets. Cut wages for hard working patriotic Americans who have chosen to sacrifice potential income by serving in the government? You save budget money, that’s an offset. In theory. Go to war and lots of people die? Well, the activity provided some jobs.
Any proposed offsets should be evaluated carefully because they are often not what they seem. For instance, budget savings are often translated quickly into tax cuts for very wealthy companies and individuals, concentration of wealth is a demonstrable and quantifiable harm. Jobs provided by war? No comment needed.
Okay, who volunteers to identify the standard unit of benefit and goodness? One Gaia?