Even 1cm of sea level rise makes the problem worse. That does not mean on it's own it's the only cause, just that without sea level rise NYC would have received slightly less than 19 billion in damages. I am not saying that's 10B or 18.999B, but the point is not the scale of the difference just which side sea level rise sit's on.

Further, going from 1cm to 2cm or 20cm to 21cm of rise again makes the problem worse. The point is you don't wake up one day and the worlds on fire, just spend slightly more on reconstruction year after year.