>Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
>> [WS:] By why on earth would you want subsidize
> > consumption of energy?
>
>Because a couple of billion people don't have access to household
>electricity, Wojtek, and it would be *great* from the standpoint of
>public health, gender equity, economic development and other merit goods
>if they did.
>
>Meanwhile, global energy apartheid allows people like you and me
>(especially) to way overconsume our fair share.
_____________
Nevertheless, it would be counter-productive to subsidise energy consumption as such.
The idea is to discourage use of CO2 producing energy. So tax that, heavily, to the point where other forms of energy are competitive or can become competitive over time as more development is put into them. A good idea would be a planned gradual increase in the carbon tax, over a period of years.
The tax revenue generated can simply be given to consumers in compensation via an income supplement paid directly by government. The objective being that nobody be any worse off, but of course they would be free to spend the money on something other than energy if they think that something else is better value than heating and cooling their house etc. (Buy a woolen jumper or an extra blanket instead.)
And utilities would find it competitive to generate electricity by other means as well.
Its still a market based system really. But one that is a bit more realistic and humane than a trade system where prices will still go up and the windfall profits will be reaped by big corporations, at the expense of consumers who get no compensation except what they can gouge out of their employers through industrial action.
Bill Bartlett Bracknell tas