Posted by
BLOGASSAULT on Wednesday, December 30, 2009 7:43:45 PM
Sometimes you can tell when someone has seen the error of their ways and have decided that they need to step back, just for a moment. It would seem
reading this article that James Hansen has done just that. His arguements are grounded and reasonable, based more on sensibility than panic.
He writes that the failure in Copenhagen was actually a good thing. He argues that now we can drop the idea of giving money to poor countries so rich countries can polute.
The centrepiece of the old approach was a "cap-and-trade" scheme, festooned with offsets and bribes - bribes that purportedly, but hardly, reduced carbon emissions. It was analogous to the indulgences scheme of the Middle Ages, whereby sinners paid the Church for forgiveness. Kind of like the Godfather movies...
At least he admits that the IPCC, oil for food, organization is exactly that...corrupt. He is still wrong on many issues, and his ideas are rough and quite far from actionable. But at least he has come down to Earth.
Some economists prefer a payroll tax deduction over a dividend, because taxes depress the economy. The problem is that about half of the public are not on payrolls, because of retirement or involuntary unemployment. I suggest that at most 50% of the collected carbon fee should be used for payroll tax deduction.
He does have the right ideas on taxes. Of course, spending money on something that has still yet to be proven is still nothing but wasting money. He goes on clearing a path for a fee and dividend system were we pay a sort of tax on fossil fuels but each year that meny gets returned to you.
Fee-and-dividend, in contrast, is a non-tax - on average it is revenue-neutral. The public will probably accept a rise in the carbon fee rate, because their monthly dividend will increase correspondingly. As fee-and-dividend causes fossil fuel energy prices to rise, a series of points will be reached at which various carbon-free energies and carbon-saving technologies are cheaper than fossil fuels plus the fee. The market place will choose the best technology. As time goes on, fossil fuel use will collapse, coal will be left in the ground, and we will have arrived at a clean energy future. A rising carbon fee is essential for a climate solution.
Anyway you look at it - energy will cost us more. The rush to solve climate change will ultimately depress worldwide economies, at least the ones that have money.
Yet, I give him credit for at least coming up with ideas that don't require the general public to be wholly punished for something that they didn't do, and we are not even talking about whether or not climate change is real.