11 replies to this topic

[Tom Butler]

See the yahoo article: Global warming talk heats up, revisits carbon tax (http://news.yahoo.co...--politics.html)

The intention of a carbon tax seems to be that people should pay for their “carbon footprint.” In my mind, this is a corollary to paying the real cost of energy. If there was a carbon tax, then I would think purchase decisions, and even operating practices would be affected.

My wife and I own a hybrid car. It cost us more than a regular one but we pay the extra because we can and it makes us feel a little better. (it is pretty neat in “golf cart” mode.) In the back of my mind when I put out the money is the expectation that the price of gas will eventually go up to account for a carbon tax. If/when that happens; it would make our hybrid much more financially feasible. “Financial feasibility” is an important factor in corporate planning.

Done right, it could be a strong motivator for conservation.

What do you think?


:wink:Moderation team edit-fixed title. Spacing was off.

[still learning]

Tom Butler, on 13 November 2012 - 04:26 PM, said:

What do you think?

Yes Yes Yes
I'm in favor, if done right.   Been in favor of such a thing for some years now.

Probably more than one way could do a good job, but the kind I favor would:
1 Be phased in gradually, the intent being to make fossil fuel CO2 emissions prohibitively expensive by 2050.
2 Be simple.  As simple as a tax program can be anyway.
3 Be revenue neutral, or nearly so.
4 Rebate the tax proceeds.  Rebate the tax proceeds in equal shares to all adult US residents.

Tax fossil fuels at the first point of sale only.  It's reasonable to expect that the tax will be passed on to the final consumer in the form of increased prices.  The equal rebate will offset the increase prices, more or less.  More than offset for conservers, less than offset for high-consumers.  Fosters conservation and renewables.  Got a battery auto charged by rooftop solar?  Get the same rebate as the Hummer driver.  Got a 2000 square foot house to heat and air-condition?  Get the same rebate as the 10000 square foot owner.

Because the CO2 emissions of China and other nations could make any US CO2 reduction ineffective, a tax program would have to provide for that.  Might mean trade restrictions, might even mean scrapping the whole CO2 tax program if ther nations don't go along.  Doesn't necessarily mean going along with exactly the same setup, but some acceptable program.

See  http://www.carbontax.org/
http://www.nytimes.c...ansen.html?_r=0

[FamilyTreeClimber]

I like the idea of a carbon tax.  My concern is how something like this affects poor and lower middle class people who may not have very many options.  In California, there are already gas taxes which help to pay for road construction and repairs.  If you add another tax on top of that will poor and lower income folks be able to cope?  Will they have to give up their cars which might be their only form of transportation to and from work?  Sadly, some people just cannot afford to buy a better, more fuel efficient car.

Would this be something the consumer pays or would it be something a business pays?  If the business pays it, it would be interesting how that cost is passed on to the consumer.  I was kind of surprised to find that gas station owners make very little money off of gas.  It's something like 20 cents a gallon.  To them, the mini mart and other automotive services that they offer are where they make the real money.  So, when you plunk down your money for gas, there is the gas station's take, the taxes, and then the rest goes to the corporation that produces the gas.

[Tom Butler]

Still Learning, I like the http://www.carbontax.org/ link. I will keep an eye on the site.

I think it is very important that any income from a carbon tax be used to remediate carbon in some way. It could be as individual or corporate incentives for reduction or damage control such as sea walls and relocating people. All of that has to be funded one way or another it is everyone’s problem.

It is difficult to imagine a tax system that would not hurt lower income people the most. Each person’s carbon footprint is due to basic living plus “luxury.” Food, shelter and transportation should be considered basic necessities in the USA. A “luxury” would be anything above average.

Normalizing carbon footprints so that the average person has a 0.0 footprint, what is considered luxury would be anything above 0.0. If a carbon tax was based on the 0.0+ people, than that would avoid the lower income people. It might also be sensible to give special breaks for 0.0- people. But, how much would one have to tax the 0.0+ people to do any good?

In my town, the people who would pay most carbon tax at the gas pump are the same ones who can least afford it. They are also typically driving the least efficient vehicles. I have in mind the huge population of oversized pickups in this town. Most are owned more as a macho statement than out of need. (In Australia, they typically drive what look like Ford sedans with an aluminum utility bed. There are hardly any American-style pickups.)

A second consideration is the concern of how can people be more economical with the grocery store being typically so far away from homes, highway speeds way above 55 mph and all of those oversized vehicles on the road? There are a lot of adjustments we as a society need to make before we begin making people go green. If we want people to economize, we need to meet them half way with rules that favor economy. This is way past the days of protecting a person’s right of excess.

[still learning]

FamilyTreeClimber, on 14 November 2012 - 12:19 AM, said:

......My concern is how something like this affects poor and lower middle class people who may not have very many options......

Sure, need to be careful and not excessively burden those who can't handle the cost.

Implement the tax slowly, gradually, predictably, a little at a time, over a couple of decades.  Give people time to learn how to conserve, learn that the next car to buy really shouldn't be that nice low milage used Hummer.  

Rebate the tax proceeds equally to all adult residents.  Not according to income, not according to fossil fuel use, but equally.  The rebate will offset the increased costs passed on to the final consumer, more-or-less.  More than offset if you are a conserver, less than offset if you have an oversize "carbon footprint."  





peoplr

[Shortpoet-GTD]

A piece I found on Grist.
Here.

[Tom Butler]

Shortpoet, thanks for the link. Overall, it is a very informative article. As an aside, after sparing with the pseudoskeptical editors in Wikipedia, I have come to be cautious about authors who characterize a group of people with less than flattering terms. Terms such as "climate types," "economists and climate hawks" and "greenies" which David Roberts used are not a good start.

He wrote, "It’s the revenue, stupid," I expect as a reference to the Clinton campaign "Its the economy, stupid," and not as a disarranging remark. Even so, I think he misses the point. A carbon tax is a punitive tax intended to provide a harsh incentive for people to go green. It really has nothing to do with industry.

Look at the automotive industry. It does not matter what the auto manufacturers build if the people will not buy their product. Right now, there are a number of incentives that make pickups attractive to build and buy, but increasingly, I am seeing people park their pickups in favor of a compact sedan. As it costs more to operate vehicles, people are going to begin looking for more economical alternatives.

Capitalism works really well as long as actual costs are included in the equation and not false economies. We have been operating in a false economy in which few people are paying the actual cost of their carbon footprint. I am convinced that, with a little guidance from economists and scientists, a carbon tax could "level the playing field" of capitalism. Demand would lead supply.

An interesting aside, I have heard economists talk about capitulation. That is a threshold concept. For instance, when the public more or less of one mind decides gasoline is too expensive and begins to take more drastic measures to economize, then the price of gasoline will "turn the corner" and retreat. I am told that this is an important dynamic. A carbon tax needs to take us to that threshold and make it more a necessity to go green.

[r. zimm]

I disagree. Over the same time frame you are talking about we could switch over to an environmentally friendly and sustanable liquid fuel for vehicles with no problem at all thus eliminating (or vastly reducing) the need for carbon based fuels. We should be looking at algae which could be grown in unused tidal areas and also use CO2 and generate O2 before being processed into fuel.

The problem I see in doing it through taxation is that it is a very, very inefficient way of getting things done as it becomes self perpetuating in creating an organization to oversee the taxation.

[Shortpoet-GTD]

r. zimm, on 05 December 2012 - 04:47 PM, said:

The problem I see in doing it through taxation is that it is a very, very inefficient way of getting things done as it becomes self perpetuating in creating an organization to oversee the taxation.

The IRS has been around since 1863 when President Lincoln created it.

[Shortpoet-GTD]

A tax on carbon may be coming sooner than we think. (Happy dance icon goes here ____________)

"At that increase of nearly $15 per metric ton, that figure could significantly affect anything and everything from the aforementioned microwave ovens to the Keystone XL pipeline. It also brings the possibility of a carbon tax into play."
Story here.

[Dingo]

Thinking of the grist article I'd love to get a serious carbon tax, even if it were all kicked back equally to US citizens, similar to the Alaska program. My problem with self-styled conservative free market types is I can't get them interested in anything resembling a real free market, which essentially means incorporating the down stream costs into the cost of the product. Their faux free market really is just business as usual minus government taxes and regulations they don't like. And then of course most of them won't even acknowledge AGW,

Here is one conservative free market guy who does acknowledge AGW and does seem to be muddling toward the idea of absorbing carbon costs in the price of fossil fuel. Of course he sticks with the "revenue neutral" mantra but compared to the usual republican with their standard AGW denialism and merely faux free market ideology he seems to at least offer something.

http://thinkprogress...imate-solution/

Quote

So what exactly are Inglis’s solutions to the climate issue?
He believes there are “three pillars” to a conservative and free-market solution to energy and climate policy:

• Eliminate all subsidies for all fuels, from fossil fuels to renewables
  
• Attach all costs to all fuels—in order to get a true cost comparison
  
• Ensure revenue neutrality, to prevent the growth of government

On the importance of all forms of energy being held “fully accountable” for how they impact the environment, Inglis suggested, “Let the government be the cop on the beat.” (Ironically, he does not support EPA regulation of carbon, defining it as “costly, cumbersome, and litigious.”) In the long run, he deems price signals as being more effective than government regulations.

As Dave Roberts indicates, a lot of it is retarded but it's miles ahead of anything I'm getting from republicans. From my perspective a serious carbon tax would shut down coal mining for instance. And it's simple. I'm getting to the point where I think only simple solutions will work. That comes partly from my evolutionary perspective. With that in mind, I don't trust cap-and-trade with all its fun and games. Neither does James Hansen. As for revenue neutral, how about cutting the military by a half just as a start?

[still learning]

Some Congresscreatures are still as beholden to fossil fuel interests as ever.  See http://blog.sfgate.com/nov05election/