Time Horizons for Policymakers
To determine the rate of heat transfer between a hot and cold zone, for example to consider how an air conditioning system works, an engineer creates a system boundary, and defines the conditions that hold true in their calculations at the system boundary. Drawing a system boundary makes a given thermodynamic problem solvable. For a government policy decision, system boundaries are more subjective and are chosen at the policymakers’ discretion. So how do they choose? ...