| Jumpin said: 1. Carbon taxation isn't going to work in itself without incentives to switch to energy efficient technology. If the US isn't already doing this, they should be, other countries have been doing this for quite some time. As well, carbon tax funds can be returned to the population, so the poor who don't consume much energy anyway actually benefit from it, while the wealthy pay into the fund. The US has been talking about UBI, a stiff carbon tax is a good way to fund it. Other things the US needs to do is end incentives for burning fuels, and increase incentives for non-pollution emissions. Nuclear power is one method for certain locations, but technology in other sectors is rapidly increasing, and even some third world countries have more sophisticated green energy generations than the US, which is kind of sad. But I'm in favour of a carbon tax, because even if we do get the world on 100% green energy, many industrial processes still use a tremendous volume of fossil fuels. While things are improving drastically, countries like China and the US don't seem to want to budge on updating their manufacturing processes - they have to. |
The idea that carbon pricing would somehow price out smaller competitors doesn't really seem to reflect reality. First of all, carbon taxes are usually designed to begin after a certain point, meaning many smaller competitors wouldn't be faced with any tax. Beyond that, the benefits of switching to more energy efficient technologies often outweigh the costs of implementing them. For example, in supermarkets, utilizing technologies to reduce the energy usage of the refrigerated sections can have a payback period of less than two years, however, if you go to almost any supermarket in the country, you won't see these technologies being utilized, because energy savings is currently not a high priority. As such, even without additional incentives, the changes that may take place to respond to carbon pricing may save money for many businesses over time.
Note: I quoted you because you already said most of what I wanted to say and I just wanted to add on to it, not because I wanted to argue with what you were saying.
