5 ms·

Right. Prices, not arbitrary bans, are the correct way to incorporate externalities in the costs of a product. People are far too happy to promote ad-hoc bans o

Right. Prices, not arbitrary bans, are the correct way to incorporate externalities in the costs of a product. People are far too happy to promote ad-hoc bans of all sorts of arbitrary things without creating any kind of general incentive structure that would automatically optimize the metrics of interest. The result is malinvestment, economic inefficiency, and global poverty. The problem is that the externality is set arbitrarily by people who think beef in particular is bad --- it's a sin tax. If you're being honest about pricing emissions, you internalize externalities universally, uniformly, and transparently. An across-the-board carbon tax is defensible; such a tax would likely affect beef. A fee on beef by itself --- that's just disingenuous and moralistic nonsense.

voldacar 5y ago
What bothers me most isn't the malinvestment (though that sucks) or a faliure to calculate costs and benefits, but the fact that they're moralizing zealots. A zealot can justify anything in the name of The Common Good (naturally, they are the ones who decide what The Common Good is)
- quotemstr 5y ago
  Time to bring out the old CS Lewis quip: "Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." A big problem is that the moral busybodies who propose laws banning random things are the same moral busybodies who censor internet discussion.
- fighterpilot 5y ago
  Taxing and stopping externalities has nothing to do with the common good. It's very much about individual rights. You have no right to pollute in my backyard (including the air I breathe), just as you have no right to punch me in the face or give me brain damage with lead petrol usage. It's a justified use of government force to stop you if for some reason you think you are entitled to violate my rights. "moralizing zealots" But I agree there's an elitism and power game aspect to it that I find revolting. Emotionally, I really want to put my middle finger up and take the compete opposite position just to spite the virtue signalling snobs. Rationally, though, it seems to be a real problem that we need to solve as a species, irrespective of how self-righteous and smug some of the activists are.
crucialfelix 5y ago
OTOH 50% of emissions are due to the richest 1%. [1] They are price insensitive for the most part. Their yachts and personal airplanes don't make a dent in their billions of assets. I still support carbon taxes as a source of investment for sustainable transition. https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/carbon-emissions-richest-1-percent-more-double-emissions-poorest-half-humanity https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/carbon-emissions-ric...
- amanaplanacanal 5y ago
  I bet most of the folks reading this are in the richest 1%. I don’t know about you, but I am definitely price sensitive.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- kilotaras 5y ago
  > To make it into the richest 1 percent globally, all you need is an income of around $34,000 [0] That group is still pretty price sensitive. Maybe not enough to drop beef completely, but enough to at least partially move to pork or chicken. [0] https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/02/27/were-all-the-1-percent/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/02/27/were-all-the-1-percent/
  - crucialfelix 5y ago
    Yes, good point. And we aren't going to finger-point our way out of this. Oxfam press release: > In 2015, around half the emissions of the richest 10 percent - people with net income over $38,000 - are linked to citizens in the US and the EU and around a fifth with citizens of China and India. Over a third of the emissions of the richest one percent – people with net income over $109,000 - are linked to citizens in the US, with the next biggest contributions from citizens of the Middle East and China. Net incomes are based on income thresholds for 2015 and represented in $ 2011 PPP (purchasing power parity). From the paper they are linking to: > The richest 10% of the world’s population (c.630 million people) were responsible for 52% of the cumulative carbon emissions – depleting the global carbon budget by nearly a third (31%) in those 25 years alone (see Figure 1); > The richest 1% (c.63 million people) alone were responsible for 15% of cumulative emissions, and 9% of the carbon budget – twice as much as the poorest half of the world’s population (see Figure 1); https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10546/621052/mb-confronting-carbon-inequality-210920-en.pdf https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10... Additional data point: I don't have a yacht.

voldacar 5y ago

What bothers me most isn't the malinvestment (though that sucks) or a faliure to calculate costs and benefits, but the fact that they're moralizing zealots. A zealot can justify anything in the name of The Common Good (naturally, they are the ones who decide what The Common Good is)

quotemstr 5y ago
Time to bring out the old CS Lewis quip: "Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." A big problem is that the moral busybodies who propose laws banning random things are the same moral busybodies who censor internet discussion.
fighterpilot 5y ago
Taxing and stopping externalities has nothing to do with the common good. It's very much about individual rights. You have no right to pollute in my backyard (including the air I breathe), just as you have no right to punch me in the face or give me brain damage with lead petrol usage. It's a justified use of government force to stop you if for some reason you think you are entitled to violate my rights. "moralizing zealots" But I agree there's an elitism and power game aspect to it that I find revolting. Emotionally, I really want to put my middle finger up and take the compete opposite position just to spite the virtue signalling snobs. Rationally, though, it seems to be a real problem that we need to solve as a species, irrespective of how self-righteous and smug some of the activists are.

crucialfelix 5y ago

OTOH 50% of emissions are due to the richest 1%. [1] They are price insensitive for the most part. Their yachts and personal airplanes don't make a dent in their billions of assets. I still support carbon taxes as a source of investment for sustainable transition. https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/carbon-emissions-richest-1-percent-more-double-emissions-poorest-half-humanity https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/carbon-emissions-ric...

amanaplanacanal 5y ago
I bet most of the folks reading this are in the richest 1%. I don’t know about you, but I am definitely price sensitive.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
kilotaras 5y ago
> To make it into the richest 1 percent globally, all you need is an income of around $34,000 [0] That group is still pretty price sensitive. Maybe not enough to drop beef completely, but enough to at least partially move to pork or chicken. [0] https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/02/27/were-all-the-1-percent/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/02/27/were-all-the-1-percent/
- crucialfelix 5y ago
  Yes, good point. And we aren't going to finger-point our way out of this. Oxfam press release: > In 2015, around half the emissions of the richest 10 percent - people with net income over $38,000 - are linked to citizens in the US and the EU and around a fifth with citizens of China and India. Over a third of the emissions of the richest one percent – people with net income over $109,000 - are linked to citizens in the US, with the next biggest contributions from citizens of the Middle East and China. Net incomes are based on income thresholds for 2015 and represented in $ 2011 PPP (purchasing power parity). From the paper they are linking to: > The richest 10% of the world’s population (c.630 million people) were responsible for 52% of the cumulative carbon emissions – depleting the global carbon budget by nearly a third (31%) in those 25 years alone (see Figure 1); > The richest 1% (c.63 million people) alone were responsible for 15% of cumulative emissions, and 9% of the carbon budget – twice as much as the poorest half of the world’s population (see Figure 1); https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10546/621052/mb-confronting-carbon-inequality-210920-en.pdf https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10... Additional data point: I don't have a yacht.