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There's an obvious public goods problem here. My personal emissions have no measurable effect on the climate. I could reduce my emissions to nothing and I won't
by DennisP 7y ago
There's an obvious public goods problem here. My personal emissions have no measurable effect on the climate. I could reduce my emissions to nothing and I won't see a difference. If everybody else pitched in, I could personally do nothing and the climate would still be saved. Either way, the outcome is the same whether I help or not, so my incentive is to do nothing.
That's why your friends haven't reduced their personal emissions, but probably support policy changes that would incentivize mass changes in behavior. It's the same reason we can't rely on voluntary donations to build the roads, but people support taxes for them.
- marcus_holmes 7y agoI get that, but these are "green" people who demonstrate at rallies for climate change, etc. Of all the people I would expect to "be the change they want in the world", it would be these, at least according to their FB posts. I wasn't popular for pointing out the irony when at least a few of them drove to a demonstration against a new refinery. <edited for grammar>
- triceratops 7y ago> I wasn't popular for pointing out the irony when at least a few of them drove to a demonstration against a new refinery. So...they should've walked or biked to protests instead? What if (as refineries often are) it was 100 miles away in a rural area with no public transportation? What about disabled people? People without enough free time to bike 100 (or maybe even 10) miles? People with children? Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. Would it be better to have no rallies at all, rather than rallies that people drive to? These people spent their free time going to rallies instead of motorboating on lakes or flying on a jet to go skiing. They have skin in the game.