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Just 10% of fossil fuel subsidy cash 'could pay for green transition'
- beatgammit 7y agoWhat would the impact be if we just eliminate fossil fuel subsidies?
- smt88 7y agoLots of high-paying jobs would immediately be eliminated. Millions of people driving gas cars would see prices go up a lot. Airline tickets, plastic products... the prices of everything would go up. There would also be big national security concerns. It's hard to hold, for example, Saudi Arabia accountable for misdeeds when your economy depends on them. For the record, I think the US should do this gradually. Some of the money could go toward welfare and unemployment benefits for people negatively impacted by job losses or price increases.
- gm_fan_boi 7y agoLet's not forget all the senior citizens who rely on income from investments in fossil fuel companies, this includes most of the parents of the under 45 who like to say, "screw the oil companies"
- ragebol 7y agoOr sell those assets now before they depreciate: divest from fossil fuel and invest in in sustainable energy.
- rhinoceraptor 7y agoSell them to who?
- Ambele 7y agoSomeone who likes to buy small-cap-value companies. This person could be domestic or overseas and might not care about US corporate negative externalities; just the dividend yield.
- acollins1331 7y agoThey can literally put in a sell order at any time
- gm_fan_boi 7y agoIf they are self directed, yes.
- justin66 7y agoThe companies that stand to gain are likely to be publicly traded as well.
- Ambele 7y agoIf those senior citizens have index funds or mutual funds, they'll be fine because the indexes automatically rebalance to the companies with the highest market caps.
- shaftway 7y agoWouldn't taxes be able to come down by a commensurate amount? Isn't fossil fuel subsidies just a way to spread the cost from those who consume the fuel (directly or indirectly) to those who don't?
- mywittyname 7y agoProbably not; the USA runs a huge deficit.
- goatinaboat 7y agoWouldn't taxes be able to come down by a commensurate amount? No, because the “subsidy” is just that some people feel that taxes on fuel should be higher. Nowhere is the price of fuel less than the cost of extracting and refining it, which it would be if it were a true subsidy.
- gizmo686 7y agoNo, there are explicit subsidies given to fossil fuels. https://www.treasury.gov/open/Documents/USA%20FFSR%20progress%20report%20to%20G20%202014%20Final.pdf https://www.treasury.gov/open/Documents/USA%20FFSR%20progres...
- reitzensteinm 7y agoWhile true, those numbers are tiny. When people talk about fossil fuel subsidies, they're usually talking about the externalities not being accounted for, or the cost of wars/military.
- sandino 7y agoOkay, so human beings would be negatively impacted (to some degree). But how would you assess impact on the climate crisis (per se)?
- A2017U1 7y ago> the prices of everything would go up Sounds like what every Central Bank in the developed world is desperately trying to achieve.
- Ambele 7y agoTaxes could go down by the same amount as the subsidies for all of the tax-payers, corporations, and investors involved allowing for a positive overall return to the economy if you include all of the inefficiencies avoided by having our government involved in these subsidies.
- CountSessine 7y agoDepends. Which ones specifically are you talking about?
- rasz 7y agoover 50% of society would die of starvation?
- Ambele 7y agoDue to crop losses from dying pollinators, pest increases, crops producing unviable pollen, and stagnant plant growth?
- rasz 7y agoDue to people not being able to afford the food. Modern farming could be summarized as a giant fossil fuel->food conversion apparatus. Not to mention distribution on top of that.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- 8bitsrule 7y ago"In India, petroleum subsidies have been cut by around 75 per cent since 2014." The full IISD report the article mentions is here [0] (along with a key points summary) ...see 'PDF download' below the image at upper right. Very readable. [0]https://www.iisd.org/library/fossil-fuel-clean-energy-subsidy-swap https://www.iisd.org/library/fossil-fuel-clean-energy-subsid... "The report shares examples of four countries—India, Indonesia, Zambia and Morocco—that have already been taking concrete action and leading the way by implementing fossil fuel to clean energy swaps."