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National Academy of Science Urges Carbon Tax
eldavojohn writes "Moving for the first time from a cautious message to a message of urgency, the National Academy of Science has advised the United States government to either adopt a carbon tax or cap and trade legislation. This follows a comprehensive study in three parts released today from the National Academies that, for the first time, urges required action from the government to curb climate change."
In today's political climate, there's far far too much controversy surrounding the individual issues of taxes and energy, alone (much less combined), to permit any real legislation to succeed.
A sane society would tax things like gasoline, diesel fuel, fuel oil, etc., highly enough to discourage its profligate consumption and apply the funds to develop practical implementations of an array of alternative renewable energy sources (fusion, solar, biofuels, etc.).
But in the USA, if you proposed adding another $2/gallon tax on gasoline, it would be political suicide. (Hell, just suggesting it on /. risks karma suicide.) In the meantime, many of us still drive gas guzzling hummers and SUVs, and pride ourselves on it.
We need to break the loop somewhere. As long as that behavior is affordable, it will continue to be popular; as long as that behavior is popular it will continue to be affordable.
And eventually, when scarcity will inevitably drive up the cost of this fuel, it will be the energy corporations who will make the profits on the higher prices, not the governments... perpetuating another problem of too much corporate money influencing government policy. The smart thing to do is drive the price up now, via taxes, and use the revenue to do something more useful than line the pockets of corporate executives and stockholders.
I can see the fnords!
The only way to sell it to the masses would be to promote it as the elimination of Income Taxes. Set a date (20 years?) by which point income taxes will be eliminated, and slowly ramp up the Carbon (GHG) tax while reducing income tax over the same period of time.
What? You're opposed to eliminating Income Tax?
Reality has a liberal bias
How the CO2 concentration in our atmosphere during the Cambrian was 7000ppm and the average global temperature was 20C, and during the Jurassic the CO2 concentration was 2000ppm and the average temperature was still 20C? Shouldn't the temperature have been much, much higher during these periods? And shouldn't the temperature of the Cambrian be much higher than the Jurassic?
I also have religious beliefs, like you. I believe in pink unicorns and fairies.
There's a lot of both economic theory and empirical data backing up that cap and trade systems are more efficient. See for example this study showing that cap and trade would very well for handling levels of sulfur dioxide pollution in the US http://www.jstor.org/pss/2647033.
This is why it needs to be a revenue neutral carbon tax, where revenues are redistributed equally to everyone. So if the average person uses 500 gallons of gasoline in a year and the tax is $.20 per gallon, then everyone would receive back $100 every year whether they used 500 gallons or not. No impoverishment necessary.
Any sufficiently unpopular but cohesive argument is indistinguishable from trolling.
CO2 has been *linked* to global warming, there is still debate if CO2 is the main cause, and there is a *lot* of disagreement over the effects in years to come. There is no accurate model of what will happen and especially the upper bound is very uncertain (varying from return to normal temperature, stability at higher temperature, or even a runaway greenhouse effect like Venus), and if all details about the role of CO2 in the atmosphere were known they could predict the temperature changes for the next century with at least some precision.
Please understand me, I think there is some warming and I think CO2 plays a part in that... But if you blindly accept the CO2 as the only culprit you are not really looking for a solution but settling for one handed to you. Leaving some questions unanswered (or discarding them outright) only feeds the paranoia of some, and the hopeless feeling that other scientists experience because of the perceived demise of the scientific method(s). Until now the best success against these 'crackpot' opponents has been to refute their false statements (like the volcano's etc.), so this is the way to go, answer any and all arguments with good science and facts that can be checked.
As to your question 'what incentive do climate scientists have': funding, which can be quite a lot. The scientific community has commercialized, there is no denying that. I think 'mislead' might even be a big word, but it is understandable they won't say "we're not sure about the cause, we need to study more" and instead say "this is the likely cause, we need to study this more" which becomes a hyperbole 'fact' when competing for the funds. It's not exclusive to global warming, scientists are also trying to sell their services and any salesman can tell you that to sell it helps to exaggerate a little... This is no conspiracy on a massive scale, just some typical human behavior. These people are no saints here to save us, they're just another working guy making their living with this stuff...
Although people like Al Gore are plain opportunists. Sorry but it has to be said, if he had any altruistic goals he sure as hell would not have capitalized on it personally... fucking hypocrite.