this all roughly according to Lynne Kiesling (she is awesome) and her studies promoting cap and trade as the best alternative in an attempt to make Air into a property.
This is all true but an argument that has not been addressed by academics in the grand battle existing between carbon tax vs. cap and trade is that the act if seeking tradable quotas is a zero sum game. All revenues delegated to seeking and purchasing quotas are locked out of any competitive industry and hurtled into the public sector. Specifically what they intend to do with those collected revenues is another can of worms. More importantly is the fact that those revenues are not set to creating the most real value within a competitive enterprise. Some may say that they could be delegated by the federal government to fund research projects in energy efficient technology. To which I would respond--in accordance with previous posts--that is a load of crock! Innovation comes out of competition and the private sector can innovate two dollars on every dollar created by the public sector any day.
Bigger question being do we need a policy and I think we do... Air is a commons, commons need to be owned before they are respected. Granted there is no easy way to do that. Lynne Kiesling mentioned in a debate published in Reason Magazine that if we could put a bubble above everyones head and call it owned air this would be easy... but we can't.
I'm interested to see where this debate goes.
Here's a list of fun some fun plays-on-words relating to the topic:
-Cap and burn
-More like "Carbon 'Jack" us out of our money.
-Crap and trade
got any ideas, let me know.
2 comments:
Slap and fade.
Because the government makes a big, painful, sudden decision across the face (slap) and then fades into the background as everyone does their thing (trade).
What do you think of the argument that cap and trade also legitimizes a negative externality (pollution) and turns it into a right. Once you have your little caps (I prefer berets, personally) that you can trade, you have a property right in them and you can pollute your little arse off. Maybe it is a little lefty of me, but that part makes me nervous. (though, I think it ties into your points)
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