Environmental damages of the top ten percent consumers exceed global climate and biodiversity funding gaps

Schrijver, I.M.; Hoekstra, R.; Behrens, P.A. (2026)

Article / Letter to editor

The top 10% of global consumers is disproportionately responsible for transgressing planetary boundaries, causing damages for which broader society bears the costs. Here we monetise the climate change, biosphere integrity, biogeochemical cycles and freshwater-use footprints of these consumers using prices of the Environmental Prices Handbook. We find annual damages owed by the global 10% to be $1.7–$5.7 trillion, equivalent to $2.3k–$7.5k per person (in $2017). This surpasses international climate and biodiversity financing gaps. The top 10% US consumers see a bill of $19k–$63k, equal to 6–20% of their income or 0.8–3% of their wealth. The two biggest contributors to the damage bill are biodiversity loss at 47–56% of the total and climate change at 36–45%. These costs highlight the mitigation responsibility of the top 10% and illustrate the potential revenue of environmental taxes if the polluter-pays principle is adopted.

• Environmental damages, Environmental justice, Planetary boundaries

• All authors: Schrijver, I.M.; Hoekstra, R.; Behrens, P.A.
• Date: 2026-06-18
• Journal: Communications Sustainability
• Volume: 1
• DOI: doi:10.1038/s44458-026-00079-x
• Link: https://www.nature.com/articles/s44458-026-00079-x
• Sponsorship: Horizon 2020(H2020)
• Grant number: 101095219