ABSTRACT
On September 27th, 2006, Arnold Schwarzenegger signed California's Assembly Bill 32 (AB32) into law which set in motion the promulgation of state wide regulations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2020. At the time, California was the eighth largest economy in the world. Margo Thorning's assessment of the negative economic effects of AB32 was made up of three key claims: first, that it would cause job loss. The Treasury's opposition to these policies largely revolved around concerns about the United Kingdom's competitiveness. Yet that was not the only consideration. The key to the legislation, as enacted, was the concept of multiyear binding carbon budgets which effectively institutionalized the priority of climate policy over other objectives. There is of course an irony in this in that it was the Conservatives who began the push for the United Kingdom's climate policy legislation in the first place.
