Anthropocentric climate change is a problem. The question is, what kind of problem is it?
Many people claim that it is an environmental problem. Some claim that it is a technological, scientific, or even moral problem. Others vigorously contend that is it not a “problem” at all. I believe that, first and foremost, anthropocentric climate change is a political problem. And political problems require that we choose a solution from a range of political options.
Although it may not exhaust the range of possibilities, I believe that the basic listing of positions and options on climate change can be derived from combination of three categories:
Category A
1. The earth's climate is being significantly affected by human activities.
2. The earth's climate is not being significantly affected by human activities.
Category B
1. The long-term effects will be catastrophic.
2. The long-term effects will not be significant.Category C
1. There is nothing we (can/need to) do about it.
2. We can avert disaster if we act now.
3. We may be able to avert disaster if we act at a future time.
These options can be arranged in twelve possible permutations (1,1,1 | 1,1,2 | 1,1,3 | 1,2,1 | 1,2,2 | 1,2,3 | 2, 1, 1 | 2, 1, 2 | 2, 1, 3 | 2, 2, 1 | 2, 2, 2 | 2, 2, 3). Seven are based on absurd combinations (1, 2, 2| 1, 2, 3 | 2, 1, 1| 2, 1, 2| 2, 1, 3| 2, 2, 2| 2, 2, 3) and can be ignored. The remaining five options can be labeled as:
1,1,1 – The Hopeless Pessimist
1,1,2 – The Act-Now Optimist
1,1,3 – The Act-Later Optimist
1,2,1 – The Do-Nothing Optimist
2,2,1 – The Skeptical Optimist
Of the remaining five only one combination using A-2 remains – 2,2,1, The Skeptical Optimist. There are at least two problems that the optimistic skeptic faces. The first is that if she is wrong, we will either be worse off than if we chose any other option or no better off than if we had been a Hopeless Pessimist or an Act-Later Optimist. The second problem is that this option is currently not politically viable.
For better or worse, a critical mass of scientists, politicians, and other policy makers have already rejected this option. Although it may be a valid personal position to hold—perhaps even the correct position—as a policy opinion, it is currently a loser. In time, as new evidence is presented, this may change. But if we have to make a rational policy choice, the optimum strategy is to concede the claims for global warming and choose from the remaining options.
Much the same could be said about the positions of the Hopeless Pessimist (too pessimistic) and the Do-Nothing Optimist (too panglossian). That leaves us with only two politically viable options: either we enact policies to combat anthropogenic climate change today or we wait for some future date when we will have either a technological solution or the political will to enact effective policies.
The problem with acting now is that even if we could agree on what action would be most effective, we couldn’t force the international community to commit to such action. No matter what policies we adopt in the U.S., if China and India refuse to make the same changes the effect will be minimal. Since they refuse to make sacrifices today for a potential benefit that may not accrue for another century, anything we do is moot.
By default, we are left with the Act-Later option. The hope is that we will either have found a technological solution to anthropocentric climate change or we will have acquired the political will to act decisively. The danger, of course, is that we will have waited until it’s too late. But delaying taking direct action on global warming does not mean that we cannot take action at all.
In fact, I would argue that the most pragmatic approach is to adopt a “yak shaving” strategy. Yak shaving is a term that originated in an episode of the cartoon Ren & Stimpy and was later adopted by the MIT AI Lab to describe any “seemingly pointless activity which is actually necessary to solve a problem which solves a problem which, several levels of recursion later, solves the real problem you're working on.” In other words, by taking actions that may solve a smaller problem you may inadvertently solve or alleviate the larger problem that had originally needed a solution.
Consider, for example, the claim that global warming will lead to an increase in the frequency and severity of hurricanes. If true we are likely to face future disasters on the scale of Hurricane Katrina. But while we may not be able to solve the global warming problem, we could work on a problem that made Katrina especially deadly: poverty.
Because they were unable to evacuate the city, Katrina had a disproportionate impact on the poverty-stricken residents of New Orleans. Many people died needlessly because they lacked the financial means to escape the area. Alleviating poverty would not have prevented the hurricane from hitting Louisiana, but it could have lessened the impact and the loss of life. Similarly, reducing poverty will not prevent global warming from increasing the number or severity of future hurricanes. It would, however, make it considerably easier to live with such natural disasters.
Convincing people to take such an indirect approach to the problem will not be easy. You can’t get the idea across in an Oscar-winning documentary and it’s not likely to appeal to people who prefer to take action by holding “consciousness raising” benefit concerts. What it will do, though, is allow us to focus our attention and resources on solvable problems. Because attention and resources are always limited, we should, out of common sense and moral necessity, focus on those problems that have a chance of being solved. That means that a currently insolvable “problem” like climate change should be at the bottom of the list.
Rather than attempt to argue this point, I’ll leave you with this video by statistician and political scientist Bjorn Lomborg which explains why prioritizing problems like climate change isn't as important prioritizing solutions:
[Note: While the video is lengthy (17 minutes) it is quite engaging and well worth the time it takes to watch it in its entirety.]
(HT: Acton Institute PowerBlog)
Consider, for example, the claim that global warming will lead to an increase in the frequency and severity of hurricanes. If true we are likely to face future disasters on the scale of Hurricane Katrina. But while we may not be able to solve the global warming problem, we could work on a problem that made Katrina especially deadly: poverty.
Joe, you seem to have bought in to the myth that Katrina was an especially severe hurricane, but it really wasn't. The devastation wrought by Katrina was a function of where it hit, not that the storm was unusually strong; and the reason the storm had such an impact on New Orleans was because of decades of neglect by city officials (state and federal probably had a role as well), not because the storm was abnormally strong.
Joe, the problem with your assessment is that there is a pretty big disconnect between what people say the believe about "global warming" and what they would be willing to do to mitigate it. If you were to ask people what they think, I'm guessing that most people would fall somewhere between your first and second classifications, but if you were to present them with some options for mitigating it, you'd probably find them falling between your 4th and 5th classifications. When I am talking about options, I don't mean Kyoto, which would have a statistically insignificant impact on "global warming", I am talking about things that might have a real impact, like European-level taxes on gas, big taxes on meat and other animal products (to reduce methane, another significant "global warming" contributor), removing the child tax credits/exemptions on 2nd and beyond children (mores kids = bigger carbon footprint), or even imposing a "carbon tax" on having more than one child, etc. Does anybody think there is the political will to enact measures that even approach some of my suggestions?
ucfengr,
It wasn't too many years ago that the US libs proposed taxes on fuel to get it to the current prices with the intent of slowing travel, thus cutting CO2 emissions. The only differenc between what they wanted and the current situation is the pocket -- who gets the money. Now they're all up in arms because they can't have it -- those evil rich oil companies have it. I do wonder how raising taxes stops CO2. There's a disconnect. All it will do is cause inflation and the Lefties get more money.
Collin
I would be astonished to hear, just one time, a leftish solution to a problem - any problem - that did not involve government spending.
I'm not sure what the difference between this approach and the 2-2-1 approach is. Or is that the point? This is trying to tell people that, since we can't treat the disease (global warming) we should try to relieve the symptoms (poverty, etc) -- which just happen to be the same things we'd want to do if there was no global warming.
A comment on Joe's remark:
"...a critical mass of scientists, politicians, and other policy makers have already rejected [2-2-1].... In time, as new evidence is presented, this may change. But if we have to make a rational policy choice, the optimum strategy is to concede the claims for global warming and choose from the remaining options."
I fear this approach would doom us to forever fight global warming whether it exists or not. It is already verboten to say there is no global warming, and heaven help the dissenters. The longer it goes, the more we invest in it, the more there will be an entrenched establishment whose goal is to continue its own existence -- which requires continued action on global warming. These folks would never admit that global warming is either fixed or ficticious for the same reason Jesse Jackson would never declare the end of racism.
I like it! The answer to poverty is free markets!!! The reason people are so poor in New Orleans is because of a large and persistent redistributive government.
We stop encouraging dependency and save the planet at the same time.
Now, if we can just make sure people understand this, instead of trying to spend massive amounts of government money on pointless programs...
Joe:
No matter what policies we adopt in the U.S., if China and India refuse to make the same changes the effect will be minimal.
This is simply false. As the United States is currently the #1 producer of greenhouse gases, it makes no sense to argue that any change we effect will be "minimal" or negligible. If we cut our production by 25%, that's substantial, even on the global scale.
But setting aside global warming for a moment, there are good political reasons for doing what's needed to combat global warming anyway. A shift toward renewables (wind, solar, wave, hydro, etc.) would give us a long-term competitive advantage at a time when competition for fossil fuel resources is heating up because of pressures from China and India. A move toward more efficient vehicles, and alternatively-fueled vehicles, reduces demand for middle-eastern oil, which in turn reduces the funds available to known sponsors of terror such as the House of Saud.
D: do nothing and wait for Jesus to return
Much the same could be said about the positions of the Hopeless Pessimist (too pessimistic) and the Do-Nothing Optimist (too panglossian). That leaves us with only two politically viable options: either we enact policies to combat anthropogenic climate change today or we wait for some future date when we will have either a technological solution or the political will to enact effective policies.
A problem I have with the 'wait for some future date' is that it too is rather Panglossian. Why would we assume in 30 years we would magically have an easy way to generate large amounts of CO2 free energy? Sure we make great advances all the time but someone in 1970 could have reasonably assumed in 30 years it would be possible to book a vacation on the moon! Now Bush is telling us we would need to spend hundreds of billions just to get do what was pretty common in the early 1970's!
In short, not acting now means that acting in the future is likely to be much harder...possibly impossible. By starting to act now, the incentives will be set for the R&D that will make it more likely that acting in the future will be easier.
No matter what policies we adopt in the U.S., if China and India refuse to make the same changes the effect will be minimal. Since they refuse to make sacrifices today for a potential benefit that may not accrue for another century, anything we do is moot.
This is only an excuse for not acting. Yes China will continue to industrialize but it will skip over many steps that the US and UK took on their march toward modernization. Today, for example, many developing nations are going straight to cell phone based networks rather than building miles and miles of land lines that the US had originally. By opting for inaction today you are making a decision for inaction (or impotent action) tomorrow.
[Also don't be so sure there are no sticks to prod China with. Much of China and India's economy is dependant on exporting products to developed nations. A policy that restricted or taxed goods based on how much CO2 they generated (regardless of where they were manufactured) instituted in rich countries would be a powerful motivator for Chinese & Indian companies to get on board. If a Chinese company builds an expensive factory to make CO2-lite goods for the US is it really going to build a second CO2-heavy factory for producing domestic goods or will it try to produce for both customers from the same plant?]
Consider, for example, the claim that global warming will lead to an increase in the frequency and severity of hurricanes. If true we are likely to face future disasters on the scale of Hurricane Katrina. But while we may not be able to solve the global warming problem, we could work on a problem that made Katrina especially deadly: poverty.
This is laughable Joe. The spirt of Yak Shaving is to do something easy and rather obvious. There is no obvious solution to poverty other than economic growth, which everyone already is banging their heads to get as much of as possible. There are, however, a lot of easy ways to cut CO2 and other greenhouse gasses because right now there is little or no market incentive to cut them. Even a very modest tax on greenhouse gasses would motivate a relatively large cut as people pick the 'low hanging fruit'. This would:
1. Buy us a little more time during which we could hope that:
a. We would have a little less poverty due to economic growth.
b. We would have more data upon which could help us evaluate how bad global warming really is.
c. We may stumble upon an easy but dramatically effective innovation (desktop fusion?)
2. If it turns out global warming isn't much of a problem we could stop trying to stop it with very little sunk cost relatively speaking.
3. If it turns out it is a big problem we could ratchet up the efforts proportionately, treating this initial effort as a down payment.
George
I would be astonished to hear, just one time, a leftish solution to a problem - any problem - that did not involve government spending.
OK,
1. Tax CO2 (fuel)
2. Reduce some other tax by an equilivant amount. (For example, abolishing all payroll and income taxes on the first $12,000 earned in a year).
Another solution would be tradeable emmissions credits which doesn't really involve much gov't spending at all.
i like that, it would make driving excessively 'sin tax'
The main assumption by Joe here is that global warming is a bad thing. That is not the case. The Earth's temperature has fluctuated throughout history. There is no "ideal" average Earth temperature. I find it assuming that people listen to scientists rambling on about the dangers of a warmer planet 50 yrs from now, while at the same time they are unable to predict accurately the weather two weeks from now. And they say Christians have blind faith.
' No matter what policies we adopt in the U.S., if China and India refuse to make the same changes the effect will be minimal. Since they refuse to make sacrifices today for a potential benefit that may not accrue for another century, anything we do is moot. '
for these two countries this is true, but the rest of the world has already moved on towrds the solution (see: Kyote treaty). The US, and evengelicals, have the chance to shoow themselves as world leaders because we have the resources to begin to enact real technology. and, does anyone really want to keep begging the Saudis for oil?
This is simply false. As the United States is currently the #1 producer of greenhouse gases, it makes no sense to argue that any change we effect will be "minimal" or negligible. If we cut our production by 25%, that's substantial, even on the global scale.
Currently, the US produces something like 25% of greenhouse gases. If we were to cut our production by 25%, that means would be cutting greenhouse gases from man-made sources by about 6%. That doesn't sound too substantial to me. But wait, we are also assuming that other countries, who typically produce more greenhouse gases per unit of production than we do, won't pick up the slack, causing our 6% cut to be a net wash or even a gain in total greenhouse gas production.
But setting aside global warming for a moment, there are good political reasons for doing what's needed to combat global warming anyway. A shift toward renewables (wind, solar, wave, hydro, etc.) would give us a long-term competitive advantage at a time when competition for fossil fuel resources is heating up because of pressures from China and India.
Of course, there are also economic, technical, and political reasons not to. Looking at the economics, if solar or wind could compete with fossil based fuels, then we would already be making the transition. The reality is that solar and wind power are quite a bit more expensive than fossil fuel. Another problem with all 4 is that the optimal places to generate wind, solar, or hydroelectric power is not always close to where the power is needed, so you need to ship the power a long way to make use of it. This creates a problem because a pretty significant portion of power generated is lost as heat through the transmission lines. Pumping the power over a longer distance means bigger losses due to heat (contributing to global warming?), which means even more capacity is needed to supply the power. This highlights another problem, solar and wind plants require more space to generate power than a fossil fuel powered plant. A typical coal plant generates about 500MW of power and needs about 4 acres of land. To replace that power with a wind plant would require nearly 400 acres of land. Replacing it with a solar plant would require over 3000 acres of land (from National Renewable Energy Lab, nrel.gov).
A move toward more efficient vehicles, and alternatively-fueled vehicles, reduces demand for middle-eastern oil,
Not really. Remember, we don't just get gasoline from oil, we also get plastics, lubricants, fertilizers, pesticides, asphalt, etc. Even if it were possible to switch from petroleum powered transportation, it is not at all certain that we could dramatically reduce our reliance on Middle Eastern oil. It is important to keep in mind, that the Middle East is the low cost producer of petroleum, so even if we did significantly reduce our reliance on petroleum, the Middle East would still be the prime producer. The countries that would be hurt are the ones with higher production costs, like the US and Canada.
1. Tax CO2 (fuel)
2. Reduce some other tax by an equilivant amount. (For example, abolishing all payroll and income taxes on the first $12,000 earned in a year).
Boonton, I really don't see how this will reduce carbon emissions. If you tell a person that you are going to raise his energy costs by $50/week, but in the same breathe tell him you are going to give him $50/week more in his paycheck, how does that incentivize him to reduce energy use. It would be like me trying to incentivize my daughter not to hit her baby brother by sending her to her room.....with an ice cream cone.
Boonton:
You obviously don't pay taxes yet. In 2003, the top quartile of taxpayers paid almost 85% of all federal income tax revenue. If you include payroll taxes as well, the top quintile paid almost 70%. People making 12K or less, assuming they pay income tax at all, pay a vanishingly small amount. So what you are suggesting is a HUGE tax increase. It just seems natural to you, doesn't it?
Thinking a bit further, note that much energy demand is inelastic. Yes, poor people will skip a trip to gramdma's or the municipal park if gasoline is expensive, or grandpa will turn the heat down a bit. But if one needs to commute to the janitorial job, or grandpa needs to avoid the flu, energy demand becomes very inelastic. So you've just designed a punishingly regressive tax. Of course, Al Gore can still heat his mansion and poolhouse, and fly around giving global come-to-Jesus meetings because he buys carbon indulgences from.... Al Gore.
But, hey! We can make sure that grandpa's energy needs are subsidized and mama's janitorial commuting needs are subsidized. But we also need to make sure that the system doesn't get gamed, so we hire government workers to look over grandpa's energy subsidy application every year or so, as well as mama's. Gotta have bureaucrats for that, right? Pretty soon we have an agency. What was that about no net government spending? And how about that tax windfall? If Exxon shareholders get a windfall, that's bad, bad, bad. If Ted Kennedy gets a tax windfall to help him put the kibosh on windmills off Martha's Vineyard beaches, that's all good, good, good!
For the left, it's all money all the time.
I love global warming. I won't be happy until palm trees are growing in Tennessee. I want to live in USDA zone 10 without moving.
The main assumption by Joe here is that global warming is a bad thing. That is not the case. The Earth's temperature has fluctuated throughout history. There is no "ideal" average Earth temperature.
Actually Joe accounts for this if you bothered to read carefully when he puts forth that one possibility is that global warming is real but its impact will not be very serious in the long run. I agree with you that there is uncertainity here. Global warming might be very nice, mildly nice, mildly bad or very bad. We don't know but prudence would dictate that we should play it safe and try to make our footprint as modest as possible.
If you had a glass filled with some unknown chemical solution what would you do with it? Drink it because it might be harmless and maybe will taste very good?
Currently, the US produces something like 25% of greenhouse gases. If we were to cut our production by 25%, that means would be cutting greenhouse gases from man-made sources by about 6%. That doesn't sound too substantial to me. But wait, we are also assuming that other countries, who typically produce more greenhouse gases per unit of production than we do, won't pick up the slack, causing our 6% cut to be a net wash or even a gain in total greenhouse gas production.
Why is it a reasonable to assume that the rest of the world would not adopt our production technologies? They have historically.
Another problem with all 4 is that the optimal places to generate wind, solar, or hydroelectric power is not always close to where the power is needed, so you need to ship the power a long way to make use of it. This creates a problem because a pretty significant portion of power generated is lost as heat through the transmission lines.
Actually I think solar has an advantage in transmission costs since you can put it on your roof. Do one wants a coal or gas fired plant in their backyard.
This highlights another problem, solar and wind plants require more space to generate power than a fossil fuel powered plant. A typical coal plant generates about 500MW of power and needs about 4 acres of land. To replace that power with a wind plant would require nearly 400 acres of land. Replacing it with a solar plant would require over 3000 acres of land (from National Renewable Energy Lab, nrel.gov).
Net, net space is pretty cheap. Even in a very compact state like NJ there are huge areas of basically empty land. Wind plants have very little impact on the land so they can easily co-exist with forests, grasslands etc.
Not really. Remember, we don't just get gasoline from oil, we also get plastics, lubricants, fertilizers, pesticides, asphalt, etc. Even if it were possible to switch from petroleum powered transportation, it is not at all certain that we could dramatically reduce our reliance on Middle Eastern oil. It is important to keep in mind, that the Middle East is the low cost producer of petroleum, so even if we did significantly reduce our reliance on petroleum, the Middle East would still be the prime producer. The countries that would be hurt are the ones with higher production costs, like the US and Canada.
I agree dreams of so-called 'energy independence' are little more than economic ignorance. However, a switch away from oil would still be a good thing in most situtations. Yes, Saudi wells would continue to pump but their economic leverage would be diminished. Higher cost US producers would be 'hurt' but this is another way of saying that US consumers would be saving. US producers of oil are doing well when US consumers are shelling out big time for cheap Saudi oil.
ucfengr:
But wait, we are also assuming that other countries, who typically produce more greenhouse gases per unit of production than we do, won't pick up the slack
That's overly pessimistic. Other countries aren't going to "pick up the slack" because we reduce our consumption, unless we're simply off-shoring production, in which case we're not really "cutting" at all. What you need to compare is the total picture if we do cut CO2 production against the total picture if we don't -- it makes no sense to argue that the difference between one and the other would be "insignificant," especially when you consider that a 25% reduction should be compared not just against current production, but also against what we would be doing if we made no changes.
Finally, as Boonton points out, we've got an awful lot of economic clout, and there are ways we could incent India and China to also reduce their production (assuming we're able to step away from the "unrestricted trade uber alles" path we've been undertaking for the past decade and a half or so...).
Looking at the economics, if solar or wind could compete with fossil based fuels, then we would already be making the transition. The reality is that solar and wind power are quite a bit more expensive than fossil fuel.
This is an excellent example of the type of thing free-market economics is really, really bad at. Fossil fuels beat solar and wind because they're cheaper right now. But when you factor in long-term costs (including and especially externalities) this ceases to be the case. The market simply ignores the future costs, concerning itself only with the "here and now."
In a similar way, gasoline prices in the US do not properly reflect current cost, never mind future cost. Our government engages in all sorts of extremely expensive foreign policy ventures (to say nothing of our current war) with an eye on keeping oil cheap and accessible, and those costs simply aren't reflected at the pump. The bottom line is, if the prices consumers paid reflected the true costs of carbon-based fuels, renewables become considerably more competitive.
Another problem with all 4 is that the optimal places to generate wind, solar, or hydroelectric power is not always close to where the power is needed, so you need to ship the power a long way to make use of it.
True enough, and nobody is arguing that there's a silver bullet solution. But that doesn't mean we should sit around and do nothing. No, those solutions won't totally replace fossil fuel use, but used in combination, they can make a substantial dent (and improve air quality, to boot).
The Southwest already gets more than 25% of its power from hydroelectric. Add in more wind and solar (both abundantly available there), and you're talking a real difference. And considering how much of the US population lives within 100 miles of a coast (whether it be the great lakes or one of the oceans), widespread use of wave power and offshore wind could drastically reduce fossil fuel use for electricity generation. I'd bet that if you could get over the political hurdles currently blocking offshore wind and wave bunkers and engage in a concerted effort to build out that type of infrastructure, you could replace better than half of our current fossil fuel electricity generation.
Why is it a reasonable to assume that the rest of the world would not adopt our production technologies? They have historically.
Have they? I have been to China, India, and Malaysia and while they have adopted some of technologies, there are many they have not. Their farming methods for example are still pretty primitive and their factories are still incredibly dirty. They may choose to adopt them over the long term, or they may not.
Actually I think solar has an advantage in transmission costs since you can put it on your roof. Do one wants a coal or gas fired plant in their backyard.
If roof mounted solar panels were a cost effective way of powering a home, don't you think we would see more of them? Where I live, most of the new construction is in the $400,000+ price range, it would be pretty easy to hide solar panels in that price if they made sense.
Net, net space is pretty cheap. Even in a very compact state like NJ there are huge areas of basically empty land. Wind plants have very little impact on the land so they can easily co-exist with forests, grasslands etc.
So you think you will be able to convince the environmental groups to allow you to cover all the "empty space" with solar panels and wind turbines? Color me skeptical. Plus that doesn't get around the transmission problem.
This is an excellent example of the type of thing free-market economics is really, really bad at.
Tom, I would be surprised if you thought free-market economics was any good at anything.
Fossil fuels beat solar and wind because they're cheaper right now. But when you factor in long-term costs (including and especially externalities) this ceases to be the case.
The problem is the "long-term costs" are speculative and a very long way off. The costs of complying with Kyoto would be several hundred billion dollars a year, and I haven't heard anybody say that this will have more than a statiscally insignificant impact to global warming (less than 0.1 C over several decades). So what would be the immediate costs of reducing carbon emissions enough to have a significant impact on global warming? An order of magnitude more than Kyoto? More than that? I would argue that the long term costs of reducing emissions enough to be significant would be more (probably a lot more) than the costs of mitigating any problems caused by global warming as they arise.
The Southwest already gets more than 25% of its power from hydroelectric.
The problem with getting additional power from hydroelectric sources is that most of the good places have already been tapped. How much more power could the Southwest get from hydroelectric?
Add in more wind and solar (both abundantly available there), and you're talking a real difference.
There are a heck of a lot of problems with relying on either wind or solar. First they only generate power intermittently. Windmills are only operational about a third of the time, so to replace a 1000 MW coal or nuclear plant, you would need 3000 MW of wind capacity, plus storage capacity (i.e. freakin' huge ass batteries) for when wind is not blowing. Solar is even worse. Another problem is a lack of surge capacity, you can't cause the wind to blow harder or the sun to shine brighter if you need more power. All this is not to say that we shouldn't explore wind or solar power, but that we need to be realistic about how much of our energy requirements we are going to be able to replace. We may be able to get 10%, but it ain't going to be cheap. If you want a realistic, clean alternative to fossil fuel power generation, you need to look at nuclear.
George
You obviously don't pay taxes yet. In 2003, the top quartile of taxpayers paid almost 85% of all federal income tax revenue. If you include payroll taxes as well, the top quintile paid almost 70%. People making 12K or less, assuming they pay income tax at all, pay a vanishingly small amount. So what you are suggesting is a HUGE tax increase. It just seems natural to you, doesn't it?
You obviously don't read very well. I said make the first $12K or so exempt from all taxes. Yes that would help those who make $12K or less but it would also help everyone who makes more than $12K.
Thinking a bit further, note that much energy demand is inelastic. Yes, poor people will skip a trip to gramdma's or the municipal park if gasoline is expensive, or grandpa will turn the heat down a bit. But if one needs to commute to the janitorial job, or grandpa needs to avoid the flu, energy demand becomes very inelastic.
You are equating carbon emmission with energy demand. Your error is that you are assuming the production of energy is optimized to minimize CO2, it isn't because there is no direct cost to emmitting CO2.
CO2 emmissions are, IMO, probably very elastic. I've done this exercise before but let's do it again. Take a person who lives 20 miles from work. If he moves 10 miles closer then his commuting CO2 is cut by 50%. We haven't even begun to talk about fuel cell cars, ethanol, or any other cutting edge tech. Sure lots of people won't do that. But say a person telecommutes 1 day a week. There's a 20% cut. This is what I meant by 'low hanging fruit'.
So you've just designed a punishingly regressive tax. Of course, Al Gore can still heat his mansion and poolhouse, and fly around giving global come-to-Jesus meetings because he buys carbon indulgences from.... Al Gore.
Yes, if Al Gore wants to heat his mansion he will have that much less money to spend on other things. Likewise of Joe Blow happens to have a very lite CO2 lifestyle he will have all the more money. As for the tax being regressive, Social Security taxes alone are 6.2% so toss in unemployment, disability etc. and I would estimate the $12K per year worker would see a boost in spendable income of about 10%. Those who make more than $12K would probably have a less dramatic boost but a larger absolute savings considering that they would also be saving Federal Income taxes (based on their tax bracket).
No I cannot guarantee to you that there won't be a poorer person who may end up making a net loss and a richer, hyper-environmental type who won't have a net gain. If, however, such extreme class warefare is your style of evaluating public policies you are going to have to look much further left than Gore to find someone to your political taste.
But, hey! We can make sure that grandpa's energy needs are subsidized and mama's janitorial commuting needs are subsidized. But we also need to make sure that the system doesn't get gamed, so we hire government workers to look over grandpa's energy subsidy application every year or so, as well as mama's. Gotta have bureaucrats for that, right?
I don't see how grandpa's energy needs would be subsidized. You just accused me of wanting to tax them! MAke up your mind man. In reality grandpas energy would neither be subsidized or taxed but CO2 emmissions would. Who would actually pay is a very complicated question (for example, to the degree that OPEC acts as a monopoly gas/oil taxes are actually paid by OPEC in the form of reduced taxes rather than consumers at the pump).
tgisch
That's overly pessimistic. Other countries aren't going to "pick up the slack" because we reduce our consumption, unless we're simply off-shoring production, in which case we're not really "cutting" at all.
Good point. Other countries do create more pollution 'per unit of production' but they are also producing fewer units than we do. As production increases they seek out better, more efficient methods that often will decrease the 'per unit of production' metric. For example, because the electric grid is unreliable many businesses in China have diesal powered generators. In terms of CO2 per unit of electricity this is probably the worst thing you could do. A huge, modern coal fired plant, while not as pretty as a windfarm, yields much lower emmissions per unit of power generated. Often development will mean a period of decreasing emmissions as modern methods are adopted and replace inferior ones.
This is an excellent example of the type of thing free-market economics is really, really bad at. Fossil fuels beat solar and wind because they're cheaper right now. But when you factor in long-term costs (including and especially externalities) this ceases to be the case. The market simply ignores the future costs, concerning itself only with the "here and now."
His error here is that it is impossible to predict how a free market will respond to a price change. If the cost of certain types of energy (like gas) increased people would respond by asking themselves "What should I do?" They might try to achieve the same lifestyle by finding a solar powered car but more likely they will make lots of tiny decisions in a range of different areas. They might drive less but then again they might drive the same but be more thrifty in shopping. In that case the economic pressure falls on production of consumer goods. Or they may follow all that advice the owners manual gives you to get the best mileage. Or they may shift their commuting patterns slightly.
There's a thousand little decisions here that neither of us could make from the top but individuals make from the bottom every day. If you try to force things from the top down (say by mandating ethanol as the solution) then you are losing out on all these mico-opportunities that could easily add up to a serious cut that is quite pain free.
There's a thousand little decisions here that neither of us could make from the top but individuals make from the bottom every day.
But here's the problem isn't it? If, as Al Gore says in his movie, global warming means the end of the world as we know it and we only have a limited to act before the problem is irreversible, then we are going to need a top down approach. We are going to need someone to ration energy and make hard decisions about shutting down plants, rationing transportation, etc. It's all well and good to try to switch over to solar or wind power, but the reality (at least according to Al Gore) is that we are going to need the type of Draconian cuts that only a dictator could implement if we are going to do anything to stop global warming. We are not going to stop global warming by switching to CFL lighting and driving hybrids, we are going to have a rationing regime even more stringent than that of WW2. That's what I see as a real disconnect between what global warming proponents say they believe and what they are willing to do about it.
Perhaps the dictator could begin by restricting your production of straw men?
Boonton, if "global warming" means the "end of the world", as Al Gore and his supporters would have us believe, then we need to take drastic and immediate action, the kind of actions that you wouldn't be able to garner political support for. If it doesn't then why does it make sense to take any immediate action? A wait and see approach, while making small, gradual changes (changing to CFL or LED lighting, transitioning to hybrid vehicles, adding solar/wind power to the power grid, etc.) is probably the most reasonable approach. But you can't have it both ways, if "global warming" means the end of the world, then changing to CFL lighting or hybrid vehicles isn't enough, we need to make rapid, drastic changes. So which is it, does "global warming" mean the "end of life as we know it" or doesn't it?
ucfengr,
Imagine some natural disaster destroyed 25% of the world's oil and coal supplies. The optimum response would not be a dictator deciding which cars to produce but still the price mechanism of the market.
The more extreme the situation you want to imagine the more the need for using the price mechanism rather than a 'top down' approach.
Many states have 'profiteering' laws against people who 'take advantage' of natural disasters...say by coming into an area and selling bottled water for $5 or generators for $5000 that normally sell for $1000. These laws are very counter productive since they discourage people from actually rushing needed supplies to disaster zones. I can't think of any more extreme situation than that.
A tax or 'cap & trade' system can be as light or as heavy as you wish. Since we are unsure how bad global warming will be (no Gore doesn't say it will be the end of the world but he does argue it will carry extreme costs) it makes sense to me grab the low hanging fruit now and then increase the pressure in the future as things pan out.
Boonton, here is what Al Gore says in his movie:
You see that pale, blue dot? That's us. Everything that has ever happened in all of human history, has happened on that pixel. All the triumphs and all the tragedies, all the wars all the famines, all the major advances.....it's our only home. And that is what is at stake, our ability to live on planet Earth, to have a future as a civilization. I believe this is a moral issue, it is your time to cease this issue, it is our time to rise again to secure our future.
I think "the end of the world" is a pretty fair description of what Al is trying to communicate and that's what you refuse to face. If the problem is as Al Gore describes it, then minor market based changes over decades are not going to solve the problem, we need drastic action now.
it makes sense to me grab the low hanging fruit now and then increase the pressure in the future as things pan out.
The problem is that even the "low hanging fruit" is going to be either very expensive or technically challenging, or maybe both. If the "low hanging fruit" was cheap and easy, it would have already been done. That it hasn't should tell you something.
The funny thing is if you look at Joe's classifications, we both seem to fall into categories he dismissed as absurd. I see you as a 1-2-2 (human cause, slight problem, act now) and me as a 1-2-3 (minimal human cause, slight problem, act later).
Its likely that we have done more in the past to alter the global temperatrue than we are yet to do. I don't mean the last 150 years of industrialization, but the last few millenia of agriculturization. Take away the trees, silt in a few harbors, add irrigation and you end up where we are now. In spite of all that effort it seems that mother nature still has the upper hand. The ice caps have grown and shrunk, deserts have come and gone. Things outside of our control have more influence than that which is under our control.
Are we having some influence? Probably. Is it worth destroying what we have built in order to revert back to our past? Definitely not. But here is a thought. Global warming isn't the only game in town. We still need to control our pollution, and most things we can do to help that will help with our carbon surplus.
Just because we have an ability to consume more and more doesn't mean we have an obligation to. Living within our means and having a surplus left over to help our neighbors would go a long way to reducing our waste while also making the world a better place.
Is that a little like Yak shaving?
The problem is that even the "low hanging fruit" is going to be either very expensive or technically challenging, or maybe both. If the "low hanging fruit" was cheap and easy, it would have already been done. That it hasn't should tell you something.
There is no price associated directly with the CO2 emissions. Given this undeniable fact why would you assume the market has already optimized production to minimize CO2?
Look at it like this, imagine an old Soviet era military base or hospital that got fuel oil for free. The institution would almost certainly be very wasteful with oil since there was no cost in using it. Now think about the offices you know about. Since they have to pay for the input they take steps minimize waste and be as economical as possible.
This does not require them to invent novel new technologies like fusion or anti-matter reactors.
Right now there is no cost to emmitting CO2. It is treated as a 'free good' and if you believe in market economics even a little bit you should know that free goods are terribly wasted. Even it being a little bit less free would dramatically change patterns.
Another example I can think of is pizza parties I've attended. When people walk into a room with a half dozen pies I usually see something that can be described as a frenzy. Even personally I notice a change in my behavior, consuming lots of slices of the 'unlimited pizza'. Charge even a quarter, though, per slice and people will act very different and not because the cost is breaking them.
The funny thing is if you look at Joe's classifications, we both seem to fall into categories he dismissed as absurd. I see you as a 1-2-2 (human cause, slight problem, act now) and me as a 1-2-3 (minimal human cause, slight problem, act later).
I'm sorry to Joe but his classification scheme was too complicated for me to study in detail. It's better, IMO, to try to talk in terms of risk and probability. Probable human cause, probably a minor short term problem but potentially a massive long term one hence act a little bit now and adjust as new information becomes available. I'm not sure why this seemingly sensible stance causes you such discomfort.
There is no price associated directly with the CO2 emissions. Given this undeniable fact why would you assume the market has already optimized production to minimize CO2?
That's because there is no way to determine the cost. Does "global warming" mean the "end of civilization"? If it does, then the cost should be infinite (i.e. everybody better get real good at holding their breathe). OTOH, does "global warming" mean slightly higher sea levels and longer, more productive growing seasons? If that's the case maybe we should be paying people to produce carbon. Until we have a better picture of the magnitude of the problem, it doesn't make sense to do much of anything other than that which makes sense even in the absence of "global warming" (e.g. improving efficiency, incorporating alternative power sources, etc). Right now all we have are some computer models without a lot of hard data to back it up. Now I am a big believer in using computer modeling, but computer modeling has to match up to real world data. When Boeing was developing their 787, they did most of the wind tunnel work with computer simulations, but before they relied on the data, they matched up their simulation with real wind tunnel data and made sure the results matched up. As of yet, we have not been able to do that with "global warming" simulations. I think it is pretty thin gruel to base making dramatic changes in the way the our and the world's economy functions. Plus, all this focus on carbon ignores other gases that may have more impact on "global warming", like methane for instance. This is the real problem I have with the Church of Global Climate Change, that the focus on carbon makes it easy to blame the US for the problem and ignore other countries that may be making a significant contribution to "global warming" through extensive use of animals in agriculture, etc.
A little something on scientific consensus. Twenty years ago, the scientific consensus was that stomach ulcers were caused by stress and the treatment was to treat the symptoms using expensive H-2 agonists like Prilosec, Zantac, and Tagamet. Then, 15 or so years ago, a couple of Aussie doctors theorized that you ulcers were caused by the H. Pylor bacteria and that they could be cured with a 2 week regimen of Tetracycline and Pepto Bismal (costing about $10.00). They were dismissed as quacks. Then a few years later, coincidentally after the patents had run out on Tagamet, Zantac, and Prilosec had expired, they were proven right. Why is this important, you ask? Well in the ulcer situation, you had a lot of people making a lot of money making, proscribing, and selling these H-2 agonists, therefore they had a lot of incentive to not believe these 2 renegade Aussies. I am not saying there was some grand conspiracy to suppress the information, only that a lot of folks had a lot of reason to be dismissive. The same can be said for "global warming". A lot of people are making a lot of money researching global warming, so there is a lot of incentive to be dismissive of anybody who may derail the gravy train. Is that what's happening? I honestly don't know, but the parallel is there and it would be prudent to note it.
So on a personal note my mother-in-law had a heart attack last week. Before this point she was not a very good with health. She at sweets, ice-cream, cake and so on even though she was very overweight and also diabetic.
When I visited her in the hospital I asked her what the doctors said. She said not very good, they told her there was no cure...that this would kill her and when she asked if she should start making her final arrangements they said yes. Pretty depressing stuff there. Later on, though, I learned from her daughter-in-law that was not quite what they said. They said all that bad stuff would happen IF she didn't start doing various things like take the tests they wanted her to take and eat better.
Her irrationalism reminds me of ucfengr's. First it was "there's no need for me to do those things". Now it is "it's too late, I'm doomed anyway". The only common theme here is the unspoken "I'm not doing anything besides looking for half-baked reasons not to do anything".
That's because there is no way to determine the cost. Does "global warming" mean the "end of civilization"? If it does, then the cost should be infinite (i.e. everybody better get real good at holding their breathe).
Well that hardly makes the cost zero now doesn't it? I see now why you are so attracted to Gore's more dramatic language. Infinities are great places to committ some really bad economic analysis.
Anyway, there are some ways you can put some price on it. Leave aside the melodramatic "the world will explode" routine. Take the possible implications of global warming and assing payoffs to them. For example, use the 1950-1990 period as a baseline for hurricanes. If 2020-2030 has 25% more hurricanes then the gov't will pay for the damage. If NYC is swamped then let the gov't guaranttee the cost of building barriers or buying out everyone who lives in NYC.
Step 2, to finance this the gov't will simply purchase insurance. For the right premium, the market will underwrite the risk of, say 25% of hurrican damage in the next 10 years.
Step 3, now that you have the cost you have the proper tax to set. The market will weigh each new piece of hard data, simulation or whatnot adjusting the premiums up and down to yield the best possible estimate.
Boonton, my condolences on your mother-in-law. I hope she finds a reason to do the things required to improve her life.
Her irrationalism reminds me of ucfengr's.
I am deeply saddened to see you sink so low, Boonton. You've run out of rational argument, so you have to resort to personal attacks and half-baked analogies (the US as old, overweight, diabetic woman with a bad ticker, priceless).
I see now why you are so attracted to Gore's more dramatic language. Infinities are great places to committ some really bad economic analysis.
Well, Gore is the most prominent (or at least near the top) global warming proponent. He's also a former US Vice President and was nearly President, and his movie is being shown in schools and libraries (my own local library is screening it this week) around the country. If you disagree with Al Gore's assessment, then "good on yah", but that doesn't change the fact that he is the public face of the "global warming" movement.
Take the possible implications of global warming and assing payoffs to them. For example, use the 1950-1990 period as a baseline for hurricanes. If 2020-2030 has 25% more hurricanes then the gov't will pay for the damage. If NYC is swamped then let the gov't guaranttee the cost of building barriers or buying out everyone who lives in NYC.
According to research done by the NOAA (www.nhc.noaa.gov/gifs/table6.gif), "Table 6, which lists hurricanes by decades since 1851, shows that during the forty year period 1961-2000 both the number and intensity of landfalling U.S. hurricanes decreased sharply! Based on 1901-1960 statistics, the expected number of hurricanes and major hurricanes during the period 1961-2000 was 75 and 28, respectively. But, in fact, only 55 (or 74%) of the expected number of hurricanes struck the U.S. with only 20 major hurricanes or 71% of that expected number. Even the very active late 1990s showed below average landfall frequencies. It could be noted that of the most recent four decades, only the 70's and 80's were significantly below normal in terms of overall tropical cyclone activity."
So during a period of increased carbon output, the number and intensity of hurricanes hitting the US decreased. Maybe we should be paying people to output carbon.
FYI--The website for the quote is (www.nhc.noaa.gov/Deadliest_Costliest.shtml). The url in the prior post is to the table referenced in the quote.
Great post, Joe. In fact you inspired me to write a post of my own in response. See yak shaving if only for the cool 3-D graphs.
Great post, Joe. In fact you inspired me to write a post of my own in response. See yak shaving if only for the cool 3-D graphs.
Boonton, my condolences on your mother-in-law. I hope she finds a reason to do the things required to improve her life.
Thanks for your support. It looks like we are getting two good things from her experience. While she has not agreed to do everything her doctors have asked she has made an effort, upon returning home, to eat correctly and avoid grossly unhealthy foods. How long will this last? Knowing human nature and the nature of my family in particular I would be surprised if it extends more than a few months before she will start to slip up again.
Nevertheless, she can help us see a point here. While she isn't doing everything she is supposed to by doing what she is doing now she is making the situtation better. It might just give her another few years if she keeps at it.
I am deeply saddened to see you sink so low, Boonton. You've run out of rational argument, so you have to resort to personal attacks and half-baked analogies (the US as old, overweight, diabetic woman with a bad ticker, priceless).
I didn't mean for you to take it so personally. I'm just noting the common theme here. The debate about global warming seems to oscillate between the extreme of 'there is no problem' or the other extreme of 'it's too late to do anything about it'.
Even if you take Gore's hyperbolic language so literally (I haven't seen his movie, but I imagine that he is not arguing that global warming will cause the extinction of the human species), there is still a continunium here. If you reduced emmissions by 20% then you will do some good. If there happens to be a 'tipping point' where global warming escallates into catastrophic consquences then even a minor cut in emmissions may be just what's needed to keep you on the other side of that point.
So during a period of increased carbon output, the number and intensity of hurricanes hitting the US decreased. Maybe we should be paying people to output carbon.
This, then would make any insurance premium for excessive hurricane impact cheap which would make the 'cost of carbon' low. So what's the problem then?
Even if you take Gore's hyperbolic language so literally (I haven't seen his movie, but I imagine that he is not arguing that global warming will cause the extinction of the human species)
Whether or not I take it literally is irrelevant, Gore clearly means it to be taken literally. BTW--unless you are just a glutton for punishment, I suggest you avoid the movie, it is essentially Gore giving a 2 hour Power Point presentation. Even if you agree with his premise, it is incredibly boring.
there is still a continunium here. If you reduced emmissions by 20% then you will do some good. If there happens to be a 'tipping point' where global warming escallates into catastrophic consquences then even a minor cut in emmissions may be just what's needed to keep you on the other side of that point.
I don't think the evidence is at all clear that reducing carbon emissions is necessarily good. The only thing that is clear is that it will be expensive.
Now who is dodging the point ucfengr? The relationship between emissions and global warming is not likely to be linear. While linear relationships are easy to work with they are very rare in the real world. In that case a 'tipping point' is likely to exist where at a certain point, a small bit of emmissions would make a large difference.
In other words, think about the straw that broke the camel's back. Wouldn't the camel owner have been much better off if he had done with a load that was just a little bit lighter?
The relationship between emissions and global warming is not likely to be linear. While linear relationships are easy to work with they are very rare in the real world.
Actually, linear relationships are not at all uncommon in the "real world". Physics and chemistry abound with them.
In that case a 'tipping point' is likely to exist where at a certain point, a small bit of emmissions would make a large difference.
The problem is that we don't know if there is a "tipping point", we don't know what it is (assuming one), we don't know how close we are to it, and we don't know the cost of exceeding it. Essentially what you are doing is giving me a problem, W + X + Y = Z, solve for W, X, Y, and Z. It's impossible. You are working under the assumption that there is a tipping point, that we are close to it, and that the cost of exceeding it approaches infinity; I don't accept your assumptions.
Actually, linear relationships are not at all uncommon in the "real world". Physics and chemistry abound with them.
Physics and chemistry textbooks are abound with them. Since we have very good mathematical tools to work with and discover linear relationships we tend to find a lot of them. They are, however, the minority of relationships out there.
The problem is that we don't know if there is a "tipping point", we don't know what it is (assuming one), we don't know how close we are to it, and we don't know the cost of exceeding it. Essentially what you are doing is giving me a problem, W + X + Y = Z, solve for W, X, Y, and Z. It's impossible.
The problem here is that I'm pointing out even a modest decrease in emissions might be a positive difference. Since we don't know we should treat this cost as an insurance premium. One one extreme, let's say we have Gore who is telling us we have to cut emissions by 50% to avoid disaster. On the other hand let's say we could cut them by 10% relatively cheaply.
Your argument has essentially been 10% is nowhere near 50% so what good is it? We should just wait until we have better tech and better knowledge and then cut 50% IF we really have too.
But what if it turns out a 10% cut will avoid a disaster but still leave some manageable problems that would have been avoided by the 50% cut? Then it would have been foolish to have listened to you. If it turns out that Gore was right it would still be easier to find ways to cut the other 40% after taking down the 10%. If it turns out that everyone was wrong and there's no problem at all then treat the cost of the 10% cut as an insurance premium.
On the other hand let's say we could cut them by 10% relatively cheaply.
But we can't cut them relatively cheaply, we couldn't even freeze them at current levels at a relatively cheap cost. You want to assume that cutting carbon emissions is cheap and easy, if it was we wouldn't be arguing about it, it would already be done. If you want to worry about a tipping point, here's one that should concern you; what is the tipping point in cost that will force companies like GM and Ford to transfer their production to places like India and China where they can admit carbon, among other things even more polluting, with virtually no restriction.
But what if it turns out a 10% cut will avoid a disaster
But there is no basis for making that assumption.
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