Economic models would lead us to believe that, absent interference from governing bodies, consumers optimize utility. That is to say, we would start buying products and services that take into account our long-run well-being.

But America's consumers are more interested in the cheapest possible way of doing or getting anything since businesses have such a huge stranglehold on wages. As long as the downward pressure on wages is allowed to exist, climate change will not be a topic that is addressed with anything more than some sheet of paper that says they care about the environment.

And companies like that because it's an externality. A cost they would otherwise have to bear if the public weren't bearing it.

There will come a time when nothing can be designed without it being carbon-neutral, lest we all die. That is when companies will start taking it seriously. Kind of like approaching the limit asymptotically, but never really reaching it. So basically the market will correct itself when it needs to.