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Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

bbc.com

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Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#621

Post by habosa »

Just. Tax. It.

We have warmed the earth because we love comfort and money. We will never stop loving those things. So instead let's use the same systems to fix this (or at least slow things down).

As an individual my largest carbon impact is air travel. I like to go places, it's one of the main things I work to afford. Every single plane ticket I take should have a tax which is used to offset or capture the carbon emissions of my flight. I will pay it. Anyone not willing to pay it will have to fly less. Any airlines that can't operate under the tax will not operate.

Now do the same thing for corporate polluters, packaging waste, etc. If a country won't do this for domestic goods we can at least impose climate tariffs at borders.

The only other thing that could work is some fantastic new technological solution, but let's not wait for that.

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#622

Post by guilhas »

the_lonely_road wrote: post #452
headmelted wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. A 200% value-added tax on fossil fuels that rises by 10% every year would provide the capital. EDIT: To clarify, this is not a suggestion to raise capital from the tax as much as it's to raise capital from the use of fossil fuels. It's a suggestion for an increasingly punitive financial cost to force behavioural changes.

We have an infinite money printing machine. We don't need access to any capital. That's not what the carbon tax is about. We need to change behavior. We need everyone that uses carbon to pay for its use (including the externalities) so that they stop using it as much as they are. This is why poor people can't be exempt. This is why the rich can't just pay for it. We all need a massive increase in the cost of everythi…

Wow

That's exactly what carbon tax is. Some companies will be exempt, others will be issuing "carbox tax loans". Only regular people will suffer with this

Do you understand you're saying give even more money to the people that have been leading the world to its destruction, so they will make it better

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#623

Post by anyonecancode »

jsonne wrote: post #360

If there is anything covid has taught me its that collective action isn't something we can rely on and is a lot more wishful thinking about the state of humanity rather than a sober look at the reality. Governments need to tax CO2 emissions on the business side and pour the money into carbon capture technology in the private space through investment and perhaps some sort of bounty program (you get $x for each ton you…

> If there is anything covid has taught me its that collective action isn't something we can rely on and is a lot more wishful thinking about the state of humanity rather than a sober look at the reality.

If climate change plays out the way the pandemic has, I think we will have collective action, but it'll be uneven and fall short. We'll avoid the most dire outcomes, but blow right past acceptable outcomes. Many, many will die who could have been saved, the cost will be enormous, but we'll successfully avoid the absolute worst cases. I don't know if we call that a successful failure or a failed success.

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#624

Post by hpkuarg »

mempko wrote: post #575
jsonne wrote: post #360

If there is anything covid has taught me its that collective action isn't something we can rely on and is a lot more wishful thinking about the state of humanity rather than a sober look at the reality. Governments need to tax CO2 emissions on the business side and pour the money into carbon capture technology in the private space through investment and perhaps some sort of bounty program (you get $x for each ton you…

What did Musk or Bezos build? What did they invent? Nothing. Everything built and invented was by their workers. The success of Amazon and SpaceX/Tesla is a form of collective action. The collective action of employees, and the collective action of government policy which provided the playground that Bezos and Musk play in.

Good leaders make for good collective action.

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#625

Post by zug_zug »

Interestingly, if we add an offset tax to gasoline it'd only be 30 cents a gallon for inefficient capture (a lot, politically, but not harsher than living in your house for a year). With newer capture technologies it could be closer to 4 cents a gallon, which is less than the price difference between gas stations.

The second-order effects are that once you build thousands of these capture stations there's huge financial upside to making them even better.

Tax actually seems very feasible.

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#626

Post by blhack »

habosa wrote: post #621

Just. Tax. It. We have warmed the earth because we love comfort and money. We will never stop loving those things. So instead let's use the same systems to fix this (or at least slow things down). As an individual my largest carbon impact is air travel. I like to go places, it's one of the main things I work to afford. Every single plane ticket I take should have a tax which is used to offset or capture the carbon em…

How do you make the major polluters pay the tax?

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#629

Post by [deleted] »

habosa wrote: post #621

Just. Tax. It. We have warmed the earth because we love comfort and money. We will never stop loving those things. So instead let's use the same systems to fix this (or at least slow things down). As an individual my largest carbon impact is air travel. I like to go places, it's one of the main things I work to afford. Every single plane ticket I take should have a tax which is used to offset or capture the carbon em…

[deleted]

Re: Climate change: IPCC report is 'code red for humanity'

#630

Post by lotsofpulp »

criddell wrote: post #556
headmelted wrote: post #421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. A 200% value-added tax on fossil fuels that rises by 10% every year would provide the capital. EDIT: To clarify, this is not a suggestion to raise capital from the tax as much as it's to raise capital from the use of fossil fuels. It's a suggestion for an increasingly punitive financial cost to force behavioural changes.

The chance of the electorate asking their representatives to impose punitive taxes on them has no chance of happening in the US.

Hence absent a miracle technology that had all the benefits of fossil fuels and more but none of the drawbacks was the only solution. But since that has not yet happened, the situation is kind of bleak.
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