5 ms·

I'm most hopeful about the carbon border tariff. People, and by extension political communities are more willing to take action when they feel able to pass cost

I'm most hopeful about the carbon border tariff. People, and by extension political communities are more willing to take action when they feel able to pass costs onto others vs. feeling like they have to bear it themselves. If leading markets can create bubbles where carbon is accurately accounted for, the free-rider problem can be substantially alleviated and we might be able to finally make some progress on climate. I'm less hopeful about new fuel taxes. We've seen how that's gone in France, and even Switzerland.

mantas 5y ago
Looking at sanctions on Russia and their effectiveness... I can't wait to see mental gymnastics to skip those tariffs on some goods :)
- nerbert 5y ago
  What data point have you that tells you that sanctions are not effective?
  - ghostwriter 5y ago
    Russia is self-sufficient in energy and military power, existing sanctions against the country as a whole act as a catalyst of local development of alternatives to foreign goods and services. The process is far from being painless and efficient, but that is a common challenge of bootstrapping everything new in any other region/domain, and it doesn't indicate efficacy of any of the existing sanctions. Certain individuals might be at inconvenience or even net loss of course, depending on their reliance on relations with EU and US (visas, international business opportunities, exchange programs etc)
  - mantas 5y ago
    Russia is „sanctioned“, yet NordStream 2 is being built. Russia-Western Europe trade quickly recovered. Nowadays it's just sanctions in the name to keep Eastern europe silent, while Western europe gets to trade thanks to loopholes.
solidangle 5y ago
Hopefully the border tariff includes the CO2 cost of shipping. If the tariff is high enough then this might actually encourage local production, instead of shipping partially finished products 10 times around the world.
- pitaj 5y ago
  Shipping is highly efficient per product. I can't imagine this would have much of an effect.
  - alkonaut 5y ago
    Shipping widgets or coffee by ship is efficient. Flying fresh fish to Japan from Norway isn’t expensive enough.
  - actually_a_dog 5y ago
    I don't care how efficient per product it is to ship stuff. What I care is that the global shipping industry contributes 1 billion tons of greenhouse gasses per year to the problem, and, that if it were its own country, it would be the 5th largest polluter in the world. [0] In other words, it's not marginal numbers that matter, it's absolute numbers, and something absolutely has to be done about those numbers. -- [0]: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/10/shipping-industry-carbon-emissions-climate-change-environment-ocean/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/10/shipping-industry-car...
    - MperorM 5y ago
      no, it is absolutely the marginal numbers that matter. All else equal, starting anywhere but the place with the most pollution per $ produced is a sub-optimal place to start. In a world that has climate change under control, there's for sure going to be a reduction in pollution produced by global shipping, but in the world we live in there's much better places to start than by limiting global shipping.
      - adrianN 5y ago
yodelshady 5y ago
> I'm most hopeful about the carbon border tariff Me too, but I've seen multiple businesses go to the wall after spending seven figures on mandated protections - worthwhile protections - that competitors in you-already-know-where didn't. The second best time is now I suppose, but that has had consequences. Also, reminder that this is proposed to *not* apply to the single most polluting form of transport: https://gript.ie/eu-plans-carbon-tax-for-most-flights-except-private-jets/ https://gript.ie/eu-plans-carbon-tax-for-most-flights-except...
908B64B197 5y ago
> I'm less hopeful about new fuel taxes. We've seen how that's gone in France, and even Switzerland. The problem with fuel taxes is that it's hard to tell whether the money is spent toward making everyone less reliant on fuel... or simply funding pensions for underperforming bureaucrats! Collecting an extra tax on a single mother of two won't suddenly make her able to afford a Tesla.

mantas 5y ago

Looking at sanctions on Russia and their effectiveness... I can't wait to see mental gymnastics to skip those tariffs on some goods :)

nerbert 5y ago
What data point have you that tells you that sanctions are not effective?
- ghostwriter 5y ago
  Russia is self-sufficient in energy and military power, existing sanctions against the country as a whole act as a catalyst of local development of alternatives to foreign goods and services. The process is far from being painless and efficient, but that is a common challenge of bootstrapping everything new in any other region/domain, and it doesn't indicate efficacy of any of the existing sanctions. Certain individuals might be at inconvenience or even net loss of course, depending on their reliance on relations with EU and US (visas, international business opportunities, exchange programs etc)
- mantas 5y ago
  Russia is „sanctioned“, yet NordStream 2 is being built. Russia-Western Europe trade quickly recovered. Nowadays it's just sanctions in the name to keep Eastern europe silent, while Western europe gets to trade thanks to loopholes.

solidangle 5y ago

Hopefully the border tariff includes the CO2 cost of shipping. If the tariff is high enough then this might actually encourage local production, instead of shipping partially finished products 10 times around the world.

pitaj 5y ago
Shipping is highly efficient per product. I can't imagine this would have much of an effect.
- alkonaut 5y ago
  Shipping widgets or coffee by ship is efficient. Flying fresh fish to Japan from Norway isn’t expensive enough.
- actually_a_dog 5y ago
  I don't care how efficient per product it is to ship stuff. What I care is that the global shipping industry contributes 1 billion tons of greenhouse gasses per year to the problem, and, that if it were its own country, it would be the 5th largest polluter in the world. [0] In other words, it's not marginal numbers that matter, it's absolute numbers, and something absolutely has to be done about those numbers. -- [0]: https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/10/shipping-industry-carbon-emissions-climate-change-environment-ocean/ https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/10/shipping-industry-car...
  - MperorM 5y ago
    no, it is absolutely the marginal numbers that matter. All else equal, starting anywhere but the place with the most pollution per $ produced is a sub-optimal place to start. In a world that has climate change under control, there's for sure going to be a reduction in pollution produced by global shipping, but in the world we live in there's much better places to start than by limiting global shipping.
    - adrianN 5y ago

yodelshady 5y ago

> I'm most hopeful about the carbon border tariff Me too, but I've seen multiple businesses go to the wall after spending seven figures on mandated protections - worthwhile protections - that competitors in you-already-know-where didn't. The second best time is now I suppose, but that has had consequences. Also, reminder that this is proposed to *not* apply to the single most polluting form of transport: https://gript.ie/eu-plans-carbon-tax-for-most-flights-except-private-jets/ https://gript.ie/eu-plans-carbon-tax-for-most-flights-except...

908B64B197 5y ago

> I'm less hopeful about new fuel taxes. We've seen how that's gone in France, and even Switzerland. The problem with fuel taxes is that it's hard to tell whether the money is spent toward making everyone less reliant on fuel... or simply funding pensions for underperforming bureaucrats! Collecting an extra tax on a single mother of two won't suddenly make her able to afford a Tesla.