By David Roberts on October 18, 2016
http://www.vox.com/2016/10/18/13012394/i-732-carbon-tax-washington
My comments:
“When Bauman told Mankiw that liberals are the primary hindrance to climate action, he was simply wrong. The key obstacle to climate policy in the U.S. is the Republican Party…”
Well then this statement seems to leave something of paramount importance out in the cold. Neither the two parties nor any other entities – left vs. right, liberals vs. conservatives, regulated marketers vs. free marketers, democracy fighters vs. freedom fighters alike is the key obstacle if capital says go ahead to deny climate science and to offer lockstep opposition to anti-climate-change action. And the Old Scratch is none other than the Almighty capital and its hegemony. The Democratic/Republican party duopoly is a capital’s political stooge pretending to be at the public service but doing capital’s bidding. It’s simply foolish to plead with the duopoly to support, without the consent of capital, the anti-climate-change cause.
Capital is not necessarily the diehard opponent to the cause but capital won’t support it under the current situation because, while the renewable energy is unprofitable for electricity generation when compared with fossil fuels, the government does not offer lucrative subsidies, tax breaks and many other gainful benefits; all comes down to one thing – the bottom line – profit. In view of the failure of the short-sighted, opportunist and futile carbon cap-and-trade extravaganza pushed by orthodox economists due to not only capital’s strong objection but also intrinsic flaw - to incentivize capital, the non-incentivizable hegemonic power, and one should give a serious thought to sober and realistic approaches.
As there is no time to lose, carbon emission reduction scheme is both a non sequitur and a non-starter. The most likely outcome of the quagmire will be state takeover of the energy and energy production industries so as to by-pass capital and its walk-out on the greatest earth-rescue project. This project seems to have only a very remote chance to move forward, but all depends on the anti-establishment movement on a world scale, which makes the politically impossible policies ineluctable.
Mark Wain https://www.facebook.com/andrew.colesville/
From: pen-l at mail.csuchico.edu [mailto:pen-l at mail.csuchico.edu] On Behalf Of Ron Baiman Sent: Wednesday, October 26, 2016 2:50 PM To: Pen-L Economics; CPEG Mailing List Cc: robinhahnel at comcast.net; dormanp at gmail.com Subject: [pen-l] Re: Washington State Carbon Tax Initiative?
For those interested in this issue, a respondent has referred me to this link:
David Roberts on Vox.
http://www.vox.com/2016/10/18/13012394/i-732-carbon-tax-washington
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From: Ron Baiman <baiman at sbcglobal.net> To: Pen-L Economics <pen-l at mail.csuchico.edu> Cc: "robinhahnel at comcast.net" <robinhahnel at comcast.net>; "dormanp at gmail.com" <dormanp at gmail.com> Sent: Wednesday, October 26, 2016 12:44 PM Subject: Re: Washington State Carbon Tax Initiative?
Seemed like I should pose this to pen-l list as well! Anyone who knows something about this, please chime in!
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From: Ron Baiman <baiman at sbcglobal.net> To: CPEG Mailing List <mailinglist at cpegonline.org> Cc: "robinhahnel at comcast.net" <robinhahnel at comcast.net>; "dormanp at gmail.com" <dormanp at gmail.com> Sent: Wednesday, October 26, 2016 12:17 PM Subject: Washington State Carbon Tax Initiative?
Peter and Robin,
As, I know both of you have been very involved in this and one of you is in Washington State, I'm wondering what your take is on the the state level carbon tax initiative (I-732) that is being critiqued by many environmental groups (just heard an environmental activist from Oakland CA critique it on Hartmann)?
Apparently it was initiated by an economist/comedian Yoram Bauman from Washington state?
Thanks!
Ron
PS - I've cc'd this to CPEG list as I believe your response(s) would be of interest to others but feel free to reply to me personally if you don't want your post to go on the CPEG list.
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