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France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

reuters.com

281–290 of 578 posts

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#281
post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it is us who are actually performing the "consumerism". It is us who buys tons of garbage and then throw it out. It is us who continue to buy gas guzzlers and wanting to live grossly inefficient lifestyles via living in suburbia, combined with us voting against mass transit. It is also us who vote in people who do not care about climate change. Ultimately, we are the ones who are willingly giving money to these c…

> But it is us who are actually performing the "consumerism". It is us who buys tons of garbage and then throw it out. If only we could collectively incentivize more efficient lifestyles.

It is us who collectively decide not to collectively incentivize more efficient lifestyles.

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#282
post #243
post #192

The UK already taxes flights in a similar way. Whilst this does feel like progress, it would be much better to tax the fuel instead of the passengers. Virtually all other fuel is taxed, so it's strange that jet fuel is exempt. The problem with taxing passengers instead of fuel include: - it doesn't encourage improving the efficiency of planes - airlines can't fill their planes with really cheap seats, and empty seats…

> Virtually all other fuel is taxed, so it's strange that jet fuel is exempt. "Without any international agreement on taxing fuel, it is highly likely that moves to impose duty on international flights, either at a domestic or European level, would encourage ‘tankering’: carriers filling their aircraft as full as possible whenever they landed outside the EU to avoid paying tax. Clearly this would be entirely counterp…

You can tax fuel burned inside european airspace instead of fuel at rest once arrived at the airport.

Also :

>EU countries can end the decades-long exemption and tax kerosene on flights between them, according to legal experts. This could either be done at EU level through a series of bilateral agreements or by agreement between individual countries, the independent legal analysis for green NGO federation Transport & Environment (T&E) finds. The old argument that foreign carriers’ operating within the EU – de facto a small number of flights – can’t be taxed can be overcome by introducing a de minimis threshold below which fuel burn would not be taxed.

https://www.transportenvironment.org/publications/taxing-avi...

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#283
post #259
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Immigrants cant train to algeria

If there is sufficient demmand, it would be obvious to build a tunnel across the Gibraltar strait. This would reasonably connect the north-west of Africa with Spain.

The border between Morocco and Algeria is closed. So, even with that tunnel, travel from Europe to Algeria would only be possible by air or ferry.

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#284
post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't think we are using the same logic, but if people want to argue that Europe and Africa are not physically connected by land, then I'm going to start claiming that England and Scotland aren't either, given the distance between Carlisle and Newcastle is less than from Port Said to Suez.

Oh wait, for some reason I was under the impression that the Bering Strait would still dry up or freeze during some parts of the year allowing to reach America going east without taking a boat or a plane. My bad. But even taking this into account, I'm not sure I understand your latest comment (the one I'm replying to right now). EDIT: ok, after reading your comment for the umpteenth time I understood. I just have to…

I hope I got you to look at a map. Maps are great. As a prize for admitting how bad you are at geography, here's a political map in Waterman's butterfly projection. - https://www.jasondavies.com/maps/waterman-butterfly/full.png

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#285
post #192

The UK already taxes flights in a similar way. Whilst this does feel like progress, it would be much better to tax the fuel instead of the passengers. Virtually all other fuel is taxed, so it's strange that jet fuel is exempt. The problem with taxing passengers instead of fuel include: - it doesn't encourage improving the efficiency of planes - airlines can't fill their planes with really cheap seats, and empty seats…

Good points. Just another tax that will be passed straight down to the consumer. Wonder why no wage growth for 10+ years? Will do nothing for the enviroment. "Better not go on that holiday because of the enviroment "

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#286

> Want to do something about climate change? Start with yourself I really dislike this line of thinking. I don’t manufacture millions of tons of concrete or millions of single-use plastic shampoo bottles. Our current path is irreversible if drastic shifts in disposable consumerism don’t occur soon.

[deleted]

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#287
post #243
post #192

The UK already taxes flights in a similar way. Whilst this does feel like progress, it would be much better to tax the fuel instead of the passengers. Virtually all other fuel is taxed, so it's strange that jet fuel is exempt. The problem with taxing passengers instead of fuel include: - it doesn't encourage improving the efficiency of planes - airlines can't fill their planes with really cheap seats, and empty seats…

> Virtually all other fuel is taxed, so it's strange that jet fuel is exempt. "Without any international agreement on taxing fuel, it is highly likely that moves to impose duty on international flights, either at a domestic or European level, would encourage ‘tankering’: carriers filling their aircraft as full as possible whenever they landed outside the EU to avoid paying tax. Clearly this would be entirely counterp…

It seems like regulators could just tax planes based on how much fuel they leave with, regardless of the source?

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#288
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Immigrants cant train to algeria

Given that you can get from France to Algeria by land and there are extensive rail networks across all the connecting regions, including extensive rail networks in Algeria itself, built originally by the French, I would be amused to know how you came up with this conclusion.

> Given that you can get from France to Algeria by land.

The border between Morocco and Algeria is closed, and Libya has been off-limits to ordinary travelers for some years now. So, no, there is no overland travel to Algeria, only plane or ferry.

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Business travel is killing our planet. All the family vacations in the world can't compete with giant companies constantly shuttling thousands of employees all around the globe to attend meetings and conferences.

Yuppies hunting for “experiences” is killing the planet. Leisure travel dwarfs business travel: https://www.statista.com/statistics/207103/forecasted-number... .

You're using US statistics for some reason. Yes, Americans fly a lot. They have to visit family in a giant country with terrible rail travel options. That's why "the holidays" are far and away the busiest travel months in the US. Those trips aren't for whatever yuppie experiences you seem to look down on, but mostly to visit mom and dad.

I'd like to know how many air miles are used globally for business versus leisure. But the larger point is that business travel is mostly pointless. You can attend a meeting remotely. You can't hug your mother remotely, or sit on the beaches of Tulum remotely.

Re: France to tax flights from its airports, airline shares fall

#290
post #50

I don't really understand what the purpose of this tax is. There's no alternative to burning fuel by energy density on an airline, so why go after flights? What do they expect them to do? If you're taxing petrol cars you'd expect electric cars to become more economically viable. Either way I disagree with carbon taxes. They're regressive, and ignore the fact that regular people are being badly hurt by them whereas th…

Do you agree carbon emissions (among others) contribute significantly to warming? If not, conversation is indeed over and baseless. If yes, what alternative do we have help reduce carbon emissions in the atmosphere? (because this is something to do, and fast now)

A pittance of a tax won't reduce carbon emissions. Depending on where it goes, it might maybe make other means of transportation a bit nicer.

To actively reduce carbon emissions, you'd have to actually make the cost of a short flight much more expensive.

Also, since not all flights can be replaced with lower emission travels (long, intercontinental flights), you'd have to tax them out to the point that people simply stop coming to Europe.

You might maybe get a half of a percentage of global CO2 emissions cut that way. Maybe. In either case, the current growth rate of emissions far eclipses that, so it is at best virtue signalling. At worst, you are punishing poor people for being too poor to afford the high rates, while at the same time bringing in less tax revenue because only a few rich people are flying.

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