Phatscotty wrote:Dukasaur wrote:Maybe "climate change" will help people sleep at night while the world cooks off, just as "operational exhaustion" lets them ignore the shell-shocked guy panhandling on the corner who will never be the same again.
Thanks. So are you of the opinion that a new class of taxes need to be implemented, and moreso that that money will actually make an impact on climate change?
I would say "No", although with addenda.
First, I don't trust governments to solve problems. Although there are some exceptions, in general governments tend to exacerbate problems rather than solve them.
Second, I'm mistrustful of anyone who says, "the first step in solving the problem is to give me more money." That sound like a scam to me, regardless of whether it's a government or a private scammer.
Third, I think the obvious tax routes are going to harm the people who can least afford it while having little overall impact. Let's say you hike gasoline taxes in the name of reducing emissions. The guy at the bottom of the economic pyramid, the machinist chugging along to work in his '74 LeMans because he can't afford anything newer, that guy may be forced off the road and on to the unemployment line. The fat cat yuppie racing along the 407 in his Escalade, he won't change his ways. He'll bitch and whine every day about how much the gas is costing him, but even if the price of gas doubles it still won't change his ways, because bottom line is he can afford it, and while high prices may annoy him, they can't really hurt him.
You can say the same thing about any other fossil fuel. Jack up the price of home heat through consumption taxes, and you may cause devastating damage to the people at the bottom who can barely pay their heating bills, but the wealthy majority are not going to give up their comfort just because it costs a little more this year. So you'll devastate some people while having really trivial reductions in emissions overall.
Now, I do believe it's
hypothetically possible to craft an intelligent fossil-fuel tax that would help reduce carbon emissions. For instance, while it's difficult to modify the habits of individual commuters, who think about comfort first and expense second, it might be a lot easier to modify the habits of shipper/receivers, who think about expense first. A per-tonne-mile tax on bulk goods shipment, which would be rebated according to the mode of transportation, could do a lot. So, if you taxed all bulk good shipments at ten cents per tonne-mile, but refunded 8 cents for every tonne mile that went by ship and 4 cents for every tonne-mile that went by train, you could do a lot to push cargo off the highways and back onto more fuel-efficient modes of transport.
But while I can see such a tax working hypothetically, I still don't trust the government to enact it without using it as a tool of corruption. I can foresee it being twisted in such a way that companies in "safe" districts pay more, while there are inexplicable deductions for the company in a town that's in danger of changing sides next election.
So, that's my addendum. I think some useful moves are hypothetically possible, but I don't trust the parasites in power to enact them without twisting them out of recognition.
Furthermore, even if we were to solve all these problems for one country, it still wouldn't mean shit without solving them for all the other countries. So, bottom line is, we're probably fucked. One of those scenarios game theory teaches us about, where nobody will do the right thing until the other guy does, and therefore nobody will do the right thing ever.
btw I do know some people who think we have it all figured out. To the point that newspapers and magazines and television media currently have made it their official policy to ban or printing or say or letting anyone challenge their ideas or policies in response to global warming.
Skepticism is healthy. Unfortunately, some of the people calling themselves skeptics are telling flat-out lies. I wouldn't let them work for my newspaper, either.
Just curious, what % would you say humans have to take responsibility for the climate changing? All things considered.
That question is too vague to be meaningful. But even if you narrowed it down, I'd tell you it's too soon to be sure...
