3 ms·

> most importantly it gives the government more money to spend. Most popular carbon tax proposals are revenue neutral. Whatever the government collects in car

by Aunche 3y ago

> most importantly it gives the government more money to spend. Most popular carbon tax proposals are revenue neutral. Whatever the government collects in carbon taxes would be redistributed to everyone as a check. You're correct that this will be painful though, especially for regular people. A lot of people believe that just because it's revenue neutral it won't be painful. Every tax causes a deadweight loss, regardless of how that money is spent. Climate change may, in fact, be a bigger deadweight loss, but the problem is that people don't perceive it as such because even if a carbon tax prevents a hurricane, nobody would ever know. Also, the benefits of the carbon tax would be distributed for everyone in the world, but the costs would be concentrated only on citizens of countries with a carbon tax.

iinnPP 3y ago
Canada has a "revenue neutral" model. It is in quotes because it simply doesn't work as advertised. There's cost increases everywhere. Our homeless population has exploded. Then there is interest. Money today is better than money tomorrow and certainly better than money in a year. This is especially true for the poor. Then there's what happens when you give an average poor person a check (This isn't an insult. It's perfectly understandable that a person being beat down by life would be interested in spending money on something or someone instead of food.) Our healthcare costs also need to be considered. The solution for people to handle inflation caused partially by the carbon tax is to eat less expensive food. This means cutting out fresh fruit and veggies, meats, fish, and other nutrient dense food. Carbon tax is solving nothing at an extraordinary cost. We still have people driving to the corner store, tossing out two full ass garbage bags every week with recycling bins mismatched and full of food crusted paper, unrecyclable materials, food itself, and much more. Other problems exist too. Think about the average IQ in North America. It's reported in some places as 93-95. Many people simply are not capable of doing this without significant help. Discussion of climate change on HN is quite the experience. Suggestions outside of the approved methods get downvote love. While having the view that a tax will solve anything is applauded. We will get precisely nowhere on climate change because every damn person thinks it will cost them nothing. Nobody(ish) will do anything before they are told to either. Anything unpopular will never be brought up as a rule. Put more simply: We're living in our mess and will do so until the mess falls over and we get stuck underneath without a soul to call for help. --edit-- I don't use garbage collection. I don't recycle, I reduce and reuse. I don't drive.

by Aunche 3y ago

iinnPP 3y ago

Canada has a "revenue neutral" model. It is in quotes because it simply doesn't work as advertised. There's cost increases everywhere. Our homeless population has exploded. Then there is interest. Money today is better than money tomorrow and certainly better than money in a year. This is especially true for the poor. Then there's what happens when you give an average poor person a check (This isn't an insult. It's perfectly understandable that a person being beat down by life would be interested in spending money on something or someone instead of food.) Our healthcare costs also need to be considered. The solution for people to handle inflation caused partially by the carbon tax is to eat less expensive food. This means cutting out fresh fruit and veggies, meats, fish, and other nutrient dense food. Carbon tax is solving nothing at an extraordinary cost. We still have people driving to the corner store, tossing out two full ass garbage bags every week with recycling bins mismatched and full of food crusted paper, unrecyclable materials, food itself, and much more. Other problems exist too. Think about the average IQ in North America. It's reported in some places as 93-95. Many people simply are not capable of doing this without significant help. Discussion of climate change on HN is quite the experience. Suggestions outside of the approved methods get downvote love. While having the view that a tax will solve anything is applauded. We will get precisely nowhere on climate change because every damn person thinks it will cost them nothing. Nobody(ish) will do anything before they are told to either. Anything unpopular will never be brought up as a rule. Put more simply: We're living in our mess and will do so until the mess falls over and we get stuck underneath without a soul to call for help. --edit-- I don't use garbage collection. I don't recycle, I reduce and reuse. I don't drive.