Carbon labeling has been proposed as a way to fill gaps in governmental efforts to reduce the impact of human activity on global climate. Carbon labels can provide information that allows producers and consumers to develop and choose lower-impact products, but they have not become widespread in...

This Essay argues for consideration of political opportunity costs in the criteria used to evaluate climate policy instruments. Law and policy debates typically evaluate policy instruments by their expected performance after adoption, tacitly excluding consideration of the timing of adoption....