Also, the demand for gasoline is very inelastic. Very little driving done today is for pleasure, so the cost would have to be raised so much that people are reducing driving out of necessity/looking for alternatives.
Finally, consumption taxes on necessities act regressively (ie the poor are taxed proportionally more than the rich).
[1] https://www.gatesnotes.com/Energy/My-plan-for-fighting-clima...
A form of cap-and-trade in which the carbon credits are auctioned off to emitters (and retail fuel sellers) and the profits are distributed equally to all residents would likely be progressive, since wealthy people are likely to have a higher carbon footprint.
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The biggest problem with any sort of carbon tax is that at some point it incentivizes evasion more than conservation. e.g. importing finished goods and electricity rather than raw materials and fuel just moves the emissions to another country.
However, if EVs become the norm, that relationship breaks down and it becomes trickier to fund roads with taxes that link very directly to usage--assuming you believe privacy is a good thing and worth protecting.
It seems we are past the luxury of looking for incentives to reduce CO2 emissions. It's about reducing CO2 emissions right now, no proxy allowed, no IFTTT schemes.
There might be a bare minimum amount of CO2 allowed, it's fixed. We could monetize that but it doesn't matter. We can't go beyond that amount.
I'm not sure I understand, are you suggesting an individual "carbon-quota" as a more radical way of slashing emissions than the "incentives" of a carbon tax? Depending on the tax rate, a carbon tax could produce reasonably expeditious results.
So the YC question is: What can be done outside of American politics?
In the absence of a world governing body with teeth (e.g. space aliens with a death ray), you can't enforce a carbon tax.
Uhm, is there some data backing up your claim that we are honest and that China and India are dishonest. I mean, we really should think twice about accusing other countries of dishonesty after our whole weapons of mass destruction invasion debacle, various wars, regime changes, our "intelligence" services, rendition, Vietnam...
For all the instances you reference, you think India or China don't have an equivalent moral failing? Cultural revolution? Great leap forward? Tienanmen square? Great firewall?
As for India, go look up "most polluted city in the world." The top 5 are located in India and 9 of the top 10 are in India. Do you expect them to implement carbon taxes when they can't even clean up their own air?
The whole point of this thread is that we need a technology solution with the underlying reasoning that political solutions have been and will remain untenable.
But this is just about the least politically palatable policy imaginable. Democrats don't like it because it's a very regressive tax—the working poor across much of the country drive to work in older, less efficient cars. And besides being opposed to any "new taxes," the rural Republican base would be hit especially hard by this as well.