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Your #2 reminds me of something Bjorn Lomborg (yeah yeah, I'm not a fan either - nor a hater, in fact, I just don't know enough about the nuances of the issues
by mtts 13y ago
Your #2 reminds me of something Bjorn Lomborg (yeah yeah, I'm not a fan either - nor a hater, in fact, I just don't know enough about the nuances of the issues involved to have an opinion that's well thought out enough to defend) said in an interview on Dutch television years ago.
He said the money spent on implementing Kyoto was much better spent combating the direct effects of global warming, for example by building dikes in areas that were too poor to build them themselves and that were likely to be affected by rising sea levels, like Bangladesh.
To my layman's ears, that sounded quite reasonable.
It still does, in fact.
- scarmig 13y agoHow do you fairly raise those revenues that'd fund the trillions of dollars worth of mitigation efforts? People who disproportionately generate CO2 emissions are disproportionately responsible for the need for mitigation efforts. So Lomborg's argument isn't so much against putting a Pigouvian tax on carbon emissions, as it is earmarking the revenues derived from those emissions for mitigation efforts instead of using it to pay down deficits or pay for other services. Which is certainly something I can agree with, but it seems politically implausible. First lets get a carbon tax.
- mtts 13y agoLearned something today. Thanks. Didn't know what a "Pigouvian tax" was. Somewhat more on topic: in the interview I saw Lomborg didn't talk about earmarking or anything like that, he merely said the money would be better spent elsewhere. Maybe a carbon tax would indeed be the best way to go about collecting the money, come to think of it. "Want to pollute? Fine. Just pay up for the 'Dikes for Bangladesh' fund first."