Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

mleverything.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 150 posts

Re: Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

#21

Post by h8liu »

h8liu wrote: post #6

This is like asking if one would pay more taxes, where it is unclear how the tax will be used to improve common good. I bet if you ask people if they are willing to pay $1000 dollars (financed as $40/m in 25 months) to secure a spaceship ticket to escape the failing earth climate (assuming the spaceship already exists), many people will happily pay it.

and the spaceship tech owner can just use that money to build and implement clean energy solutions to revert climate change, and never really need to build the actual spaceships..

Re: Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

#22

Post by jlawson »

ineiti wrote: post #13

In Switzerland there was a vote 2 weeks ago about whether we want to support a law to reduce CO2 output by our population. The law was very clear how the money would be spent: improve heating, direct pay to poor citizens, and many others. Cost: - 50 cents per gallon of gas (our gas is about 6$ per gallon) - 20$ to 100$ for a plane ticket The law was refused by 51% of Swiss citizen. What really killed me was that the…

>improve heating, direct pay to poor citizens, and many others.

What does "improve heating" mean?

How does "direct pay to poor citizens" help climate change?

Perhaps the law wasn't really about climate change, but was another one of those times where policy someone wanted anyway was being pushed with climate change as an excuse.

In any case I can't form an opinion on this vote result without knowing what was actually being voted on.

Re: Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

#24

Post by falcolas »

ineiti wrote: post #13

In Switzerland there was a vote 2 weeks ago about whether we want to support a law to reduce CO2 output by our population. The law was very clear how the money would be spent: improve heating, direct pay to poor citizens, and many others. Cost: - 50 cents per gallon of gas (our gas is about 6$ per gallon) - 20$ to 100$ for a plane ticket The law was refused by 51% of Swiss citizen. What really killed me was that the…

The youngest voting population will also be the least wealthy segment of the population, and also the ones most hit by the additional costs.

That aside, I don't see from the spend breakdown how it reduces CO2 output. Or, more importantly, how it reduces industrial CO2 output.

Re: Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

#25

Post by briantakita »

The world should pay me trillions to solve climate change. I'll do whatever it takes to make climate change a thing of the past. What's that? You don't want to pay me Trillions to solve your problem that I say you have? Well, that makes you a climate change denier and worse of all, a Science denier. You are literally dooming humanity because you are selfish & greedy & don't want to pay me Trillions. How dare you! You should feel shame.

Re: Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

#26

Post by Lammy »

ineiti wrote: post #13

In Switzerland there was a vote 2 weeks ago about whether we want to support a law to reduce CO2 output by our population. The law was very clear how the money would be spent: improve heating, direct pay to poor citizens, and many others. Cost: - 50 cents per gallon of gas (our gas is about 6$ per gallon) - 20$ to 100$ for a plane ticket The law was refused by 51% of Swiss citizen. What really killed me was that the…

> What really killed me was that the youngest part of the population, the ones who will be the most impacted by the climate crisis, voted the strongest against it. Switzerland being one of the richest countries, I cannot understand how an increase of 10% on luxury items (plane tickets) can have this impact.

Young people by definition have had the least opportunity to accumulate any wealth. Why is it surprising that people with the least money are the hardest hit by price increases?

Re: Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

#27

Post by ceilingcorner »

ineiti wrote: post #13

In Switzerland there was a vote 2 weeks ago about whether we want to support a law to reduce CO2 output by our population. The law was very clear how the money would be spent: improve heating, direct pay to poor citizens, and many others. Cost: - 50 cents per gallon of gas (our gas is about 6$ per gallon) - 20$ to 100$ for a plane ticket The law was refused by 51% of Swiss citizen. What really killed me was that the…

The Yellow Vest protests were pretty much caused by increased fuel prices affecting the working class, so it’s not surprising that Switzerland voted to avoid a similar situation.

Re: Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

#28

Post by falcolas »

bko wrote: post #7
Lammy wrote: post #2

What a shitty post. I guess I don't believe in climate change after all unless I also believe in public losses for privatized gains. Corporations raked in billions while wrecking the environment and I'm sure they all love framing this as an individual responsibility that we're all "failing" to do.

> In February 2019, the center-right American Action Forum, estimated that the plan could cost between $51–$93 trillion over the next decade [0] Take the low estimate of $51 trillion over a decade so $5 trillion per year. > The top 1% of Americans have a combined net worth of $34.2 trillion, according to Federal Reserve data last updated Oct. 19, 2020 So if you seize all the wealth of the top 1% you'll pay for ~7 yea…

> seize all the wealth

How do you propose doing that legally? Or how should the US government survive the wealthy citizen's legal assault if they were to find a loophole?

Re: Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

#29

Post by bko »

falcolas wrote: post #28
bko wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In February 2019, the center-right American Action Forum, estimated that the plan could cost between $51–$93 trillion over the next decade [0] Take the low estimate of $51 trillion over a decade so $5 trillion per year. > The top 1% of Americans have a combined net worth of $34.2 trillion, according to Federal Reserve data last updated Oct. 19, 2020 So if you seize all the wealth of the top 1% you'll pay for ~7 yea…

> seize all the wealth How do you propose doing that legally? Or how should the US government survive the wealthy citizen's legal assault if they were to find a loophole?

I'm not. I'm just pointing out that a massive effort requires a broad tax base. I understand everyone wants the wealthy to pay for everything, but there is quite literally not enough wealthy people in the world to begin to tackle a large problem. Everyone has to contribute

Re: Americans aren't willing to pay to stop climate change

#30

Post by Aperocky »

einarfd wrote: post #19

For these numbers to say anything about lack of interest in combating climate change. We would also need to know what people would answer if you switched out climate change with some other worthwhile cause. How many would want to pay 40$ for better firefighters, solve structural racism, water security in western states, or military veterans? Without something to compare it with, there is no context to say if the numb…

There. The federal government has been blowing billions in Afghanistan, I'm sure they can try to use it on something else instead of levying more taxes from me and my coworkers.
Post reply on HN