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> it should be exactly equal to the cost of carbon offset for the amount emitted If it's to fix an externality, then it specifically should be exactly equal to
by yellowapple 4y ago
> it should be exactly equal to the cost of carbon offset for the amount emitted
If it's to fix an externality, then it specifically should be exactly equal to the cost of that externality - that is, sufficient to compensate for all damages (and repairs for said damages) resulting from that externality. This should be right around the same as a carbon offset, but it's worth remembering why a carbon tax is necessary: not for the mere sake of punishing some dirty activity, but for the specific sake of compensating the victims of reckless negligence.
- dTal 4y agoWhich doesn't really work as a concept when there are things so terrible that no amount of money can compensate. What price would you put on human extinction?
- yellowapple 4y ago> Which doesn't really work as a concept when there are things so terrible that no amount of money can compensate. Well yeah, but surely some compensation is better than the current status quo of nothing at all. > What price would you put on human extinction? Well, if we want to get hyper-capitalist about it: whatever the resulting opportunity cost is from those humans no longer being able to produce value. Of course, seeing as how humans can produce other humans who then produce value and yet more humans and so on in perpetuity, that opportunity cost rather quickly approaches infinity.
- collegeburner 4y agoExactly, that's what I'm saying, the cost should be exactly equal to what it costs to fix it. The most efficient way to do that is allow anybody to get certified to fix that externality and require proof that the person who caused it also paid to get it fixed. This makes it easier than trying to determine what the current price of remediating is. Markets work really well at some things and this is one.