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One popular approach is to add a massive tax/duty on e.g. CO2 emissions, but redistribute the revenue equally to all citizens. If everyone were consuming the s

One popular approach is to add a massive tax/duty on e.g. CO2 emissions, but redistribute the revenue equally to all citizens. If everyone were consuming the same amount/causing the same amount of emissions, this would be a no-op. However, since the rich tend to consume more, this will be a net positive for poorer people, and at the same time it will make decisions about activity that causes emissions more meaningful. It's also much more palatable than bans or rationing, reasonably easy to implement, and avoids the trap of populist "ban highly visible thing of the day" approaches that tend to lower quality of life without addressing the real issue.

b9a2cab5 5y ago
> since the rich tend to consume more Yes, billionaires with private jets tend to consume more but your average multimillionaire is probably working remote from a cushy white collar job while poor people need to commute to and from work (often long distances because rent is expensive). CO2 taxes are regressive however you try to sell them.
- jonas21 5y ago
  First, that's not actually true. Have a look at figures 3 and 4 of this paper [1]. CO2 emissions increase with income, and that holds both globally and within particular countries they studied (US, UK, China, India). Second, even if it were true, you'd still have control over how you redistribute the revenue, and as a result, you can make the net effect as progressive as you want. [1] https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10546/582545/tb-carbon-emissions-inequality-methodology-021215-en.pdf;jsessionid=26FF7FB70E0C49951A85554EF47B3882?sequence=2 https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10...
  - b9a2cab5 5y ago
    If you were going to redistribute nonuniformly why wouldn't you just tax people and give it to the poor and skip the hide-tax-behind-a-fancy-name exercise? In practice billionaires wouldn't care how much you tax them unless you taxed a substantial portion of income, they'd still consume what they wanted. In order to materially change even middle class peoples' behavior prices need to change by double digit percentage points, and when you factor in that people don't spend all they earn, that's a lot of tax.
    - tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
      One of the reasons to tax CO2 specifically instead of some other tax (e.g. income tax) is that it pushes alternatives. If there is a CO2-heavy option that's 10% cheaper than the "green" option, introducing the tax will suddenly make the "green" option the cheaper one. This could be using an electric truck to get food to the store, it could be using a heat pump instead of an oil furnace, it could be the locally grown potatoes instead of potatoes that were trucked over a long distance from a place with cheaper labor, etc. Most of the savings won't happen because the millionaire flies less, they will be made because someone, somewhere along the supply chain makes a different decision because the environmentally friendlier thing is now cheaper. That's the beauty of it - it's about fixing the emissions where the best effect can be achieved with the smallest investment, not about taking away people's ability to consume and live an enjoyable life.
      - b9a2cab5 5y ago
        The question is, how do you determine what the CO2 consumption of something is? Do you include only direct emissions? What about emissions incurred during manufacturing (e.g. for lithium batteries for electric trucks)? The idea seems cool but the execution seems impossible. If you tax only direct emissions you motivate companies to amortize emissions by concentrating them during manufacture. If you tax everything, how do you even begin to count everything that goes into a tomato or loaf of bread?
        Karrot_Kream 5y ago
        Tax the source. Apply the tax to every coal mine, oil well, managed forest, or any other material that has embodied carbon. These companies will do what they always do, raise prices and pass them on. This trickle down effect should ideally work their way through the economy and incentivize using fewer carbon-emitting sources. Of course there is the question about people that simply _store_ carbon, e.g. what if there's a coal mine where the buyers of the coal don't actually use the coal for its energy purposes but instead for, say, makeup creation, or wood for building? We would probably have to work out special licensing for non-usage purposes and that's where it would probably get tricky.
  - WalterBright 5y ago
    Aviation is very very much driven by the price of fuel. Pretty much the whole drive towards modernizing airliners is reducing the fuel cost. Adding a tax on the carbon content of fuels will push that even harder.

b9a2cab5 5y ago

> since the rich tend to consume more Yes, billionaires with private jets tend to consume more but your average multimillionaire is probably working remote from a cushy white collar job while poor people need to commute to and from work (often long distances because rent is expensive). CO2 taxes are regressive however you try to sell them.

jonas21 5y ago
First, that's not actually true. Have a look at figures 3 and 4 of this paper [1]. CO2 emissions increase with income, and that holds both globally and within particular countries they studied (US, UK, China, India). Second, even if it were true, you'd still have control over how you redistribute the revenue, and as a result, you can make the net effect as progressive as you want. [1] https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10546/582545/tb-carbon-emissions-inequality-methodology-021215-en.pdf;jsessionid=26FF7FB70E0C49951A85554EF47B3882?sequence=2 https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10...
- b9a2cab5 5y ago
  If you were going to redistribute nonuniformly why wouldn't you just tax people and give it to the poor and skip the hide-tax-behind-a-fancy-name exercise? In practice billionaires wouldn't care how much you tax them unless you taxed a substantial portion of income, they'd still consume what they wanted. In order to materially change even middle class peoples' behavior prices need to change by double digit percentage points, and when you factor in that people don't spend all they earn, that's a lot of tax.
  - tgsovlerkhgsel 5y ago
    One of the reasons to tax CO2 specifically instead of some other tax (e.g. income tax) is that it pushes alternatives. If there is a CO2-heavy option that's 10% cheaper than the "green" option, introducing the tax will suddenly make the "green" option the cheaper one. This could be using an electric truck to get food to the store, it could be using a heat pump instead of an oil furnace, it could be the locally grown potatoes instead of potatoes that were trucked over a long distance from a place with cheaper labor, etc. Most of the savings won't happen because the millionaire flies less, they will be made because someone, somewhere along the supply chain makes a different decision because the environmentally friendlier thing is now cheaper. That's the beauty of it - it's about fixing the emissions where the best effect can be achieved with the smallest investment, not about taking away people's ability to consume and live an enjoyable life.
    - b9a2cab5 5y ago
      The question is, how do you determine what the CO2 consumption of something is? Do you include only direct emissions? What about emissions incurred during manufacturing (e.g. for lithium batteries for electric trucks)? The idea seems cool but the execution seems impossible. If you tax only direct emissions you motivate companies to amortize emissions by concentrating them during manufacture. If you tax everything, how do you even begin to count everything that goes into a tomato or loaf of bread?
      - Karrot_Kream 5y ago
        Tax the source. Apply the tax to every coal mine, oil well, managed forest, or any other material that has embodied carbon. These companies will do what they always do, raise prices and pass them on. This trickle down effect should ideally work their way through the economy and incentivize using fewer carbon-emitting sources. Of course there is the question about people that simply _store_ carbon, e.g. what if there's a coal mine where the buyers of the coal don't actually use the coal for its energy purposes but instead for, say, makeup creation, or wood for building? We would probably have to work out special licensing for non-usage purposes and that's where it would probably get tricky.
- WalterBright 5y ago
  Aviation is very very much driven by the price of fuel. Pretty much the whole drive towards modernizing airliners is reducing the fuel cost. Adding a tax on the carbon content of fuels will push that even harder.