Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach [Note: Link to PDF version added at the end]
At the suggestion of a commenter on my last post, I’m taking a look at a very destructive and pointless piece of proposed legislation. This is the “Energy Innovation and Carbon Dividend Act“, which is subtitled “The Market-Based Climate Solution”. It’s proposed by Reps. Deutch (D), Rooney (R), Delaney (D), Fitzpatrick (R), and Crist (D).
The text of the proposed legislation is here, and the Press Release is here.
Their plan, from above:
Purpose of This Policy
• To encourage market-driven innovation in clean energy technologies.
• To create efficient markets, encourage competition, and promote our national interests.
• To create a healthier, more stable, more prosperous nation for future generations.
Projected Benefits
• Creates 2.1 million net new jobs by the 10th year.
• Deploys private capital and American innovation to advance clean energy technologies.
• Reduces U.S. carbon emissions by 33% in 10 years, targets 90% reduction by 2050 (vs. 2015).
• Improves health, prevents 13,000 pollution-related U.S. deaths annually.
Major Policy Components
Carbon Fee – A gradually-rising upstream fee on the carbon content of fuels.
● Purpose: Creates market-driven demand for cleaner energy technologies. Corrects market distortions by reflecting externalities of pollution costs
● Details: Assessed once, upstream. Starts at $15 per metric ton of CO2e, increases $10 each year. Exemption for agricultural fuels and non-emissive uses. Rebate for CCS.
● HFCs: Fee also assessed at 10% of GWP of fluorinated gases.
Carbon Dividend – Rebates 100% of net revenues to the American people.
● Purpose: Protects consumers and the economy. Maintains revenue neutrality. Rebate offsets cost increases for most Americans.
● Details: Equal share to adults with SSN or TIN, half share to minors. Administered by Treasury. Admin costs not to exceed 2%. 1-month advance payment.
Gotta love NewSpeak. They say that the dividend “protects consumers” … but since it is “protecting” them from the tax that the authors of the proposed law are imposing, I fear that’s less than comforting …
Let me start by giving this tax its actual name. It is not a “carbon tax” or a “carbon fee” as the legislation claims. Nor is it a carbon dioxide tax. It is a tax on energy.
Curiously, the size of their energy tax is finely tuned. It actually varies directly with the energy content of the various fuels like gasoline, diesel, coal, and jet fuel. This is because for the hydrocarbons that we call “fossil fuels”, the energy content is in part proportional to the carbon content. The energy is released when the carbon is burned and turned into carbon dioxide. More energy from the carbon = more carbon dioxide.
It gets more curious. Their energy tax is based, not on carbon dioxide emissions, but on a measurement called “CO2 equivalents”. From the text of the law:
‘‘(b) CARBON DIOXIDE EQUIVALENT OR CO2-E.—
The term ‘carbon dioxide equivalent’ or ‘CO2-e’ means the number of metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions with the same global warming potential as one metric ton of another greenhouse gas.
So CO2 has a “global warming potential” (GWP) of one because it’s the standard of measure. Methane has a GWP of thirty, meaning they count one molecule of methane as equivalent to thirty CO2 molecules. And one molecule of nitrous oxide is said to be equivalent to 275 CO2 molecules … and this despite the fact that the atmosphere contains nitrogen and oxygen. The result of this is that ANY open-air flame will produce various compounds of nitrogen and oxygen, including nitrous oxide … and they plan to tax nitrous oxide at a rate 275 times the tax on CO2??? Oh, man, given that for the tax rate nitrous oxide the tax rate will be 275 times that on CO2, nitrous oxide emissions will be another center of insane arguments about what is and isn’t taxable. (For those interested, there’s more EPA info on the global warming potential in the endnotes.)
It gets worse …
So they plan to tax CO2e by an amount starting at $15/tonne (metric ton) and increasing by $10/tonne per year. How will the collection of this tax be achieved? In good bureaucratic fashion, it will be done in the most arcane, complicated, vague, and contentious manner imaginable. They will start with:
‘‘(1) the identification of an effective point in the production, distribution, or use of a covered fuel or fluorinated greenhouse gas for collecting such carbon fee or fluorinated greenhouse gas fee, in such a manner so as to minimize administrative burden and maximize the extent to which full fuel cycle greenhouse gas emissions from covered fuels or fluorinated greenhouse gases have the carbon fee or fluorinated greenhouse gas fee levied upon them,
I’ve underlined the “full fuel cycle greenhouse gas emissions” part. This is not just the greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the fuel. That would be far too simple to calculate. This is the sum of the actual CO2e of the GHGs in the substance, plus in their words, “that fuel’s upstream greenhouse gas emissions.” This means all greenhouse gases emitted by activities going back through the refining, the transportation, and all the way to the “wellhead” or the mine. In their words:
(t) UPSTREAM GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS.— The term ‘upstream greenhouse gas emissions’ means the quantity of greenhouse gases, expressed in metric tons of CO2-e, emitted to the atmosphere resulting from, non exclusively, the extraction, processing, transportation, financing, or other preparation of a covered [fossil] fuel for use.
Note the escape clause “non exclusively”, which means that they can add other things to the “upstream” emissions.
Of course this will lead to further endless arguments about things like whether corporate air travel to inspect pipelines or the cooking gases consumed by the worker’s kitchens or methane leakage from your competitors wells should be included as an “upstream” emission of GHGs or not … this is just more employment for tax accountants and lawyers, and more cost to the economy.
For an absurd example of their madness, they specifically say that you have to include the greenhouse gases emitted by obtaining financing … say what? Greenhouse gas emissions from financing? Here’s a notorious financial CO2 emitter … or perhaps just a source of excess methane mixed with hot air …
Did I happen to ask, just who thinks this is a good idea?
So energy is to be taxed at a rate including all the energy involved in bringing that energy to where you use the energy …
And at this point, we get to the messy and most important question—WHO GETS TAXED? Remember, above they said: “Details: Assessed once, upstream.” So the bureaucrats, having decided the most “effective point” in the production, distribution or use of fossil fuel, then take up the next question, where the rubber meets the road. This is the question of “who pays?”, or in their words:
‘‘(2) the identification of covered entities which shall be liable for the payment of the carbon fee or the fluorinated greenhouse gas fee,
YIKES! And who are these “covered entities” that are gonna get slammed?
(f) COVERED ENTITY.—The term ‘covered entity’ means—
(1) in the case of crude oil— ‘
(A) a refinery operating in the United States, and
(B) any importer of any petroleum or petroleum product into the United States,
(2) in the case of coal—
(A) any coal mining operation in the United States, and
(B) any importer of coal into the United States,
(3) in the case of natural gas—
(A) any entity entering pipeline quality natural gas into the natural gas transmission system, and
(B) any importer of natural gas into the United States,
(4) in the case of fluorinated gases any entity required to report the emission of a fluorinated gas under part 98 of title 40, Code of Federal Regulations, and
(5) any entity or class of entities which, as determined by the Secretary, is transporting, selling, or otherwise using a covered fuel in a manner which emits a greenhouse gas to the atmosphere and which has not been covered by the carbon fee, the fluorinated greenhouse gas fee, or the carbon border fee adjustment.
Now, as any experienced reader of such documents knows, the last clause is the escape clause. The Secretary can add any industry or even a single entity as he pleases to the list of those unfortunate businesses getting the sparkly new tax.
And there’s another sting in this tale. In addition to all of that, there is a whole set of border rules. When you import or export fuel itself, you either get taxed on imports or you receive (someday) a rebate for exports from your new best friend, the IRS. However, other importing and exporting businesses are taxed as well, for any “carbon-intensive products”. Of course, this really means “energy-intensive products”. As above, just what qualifies as an energy-intensive product is decided by the Secretary … but there’s a default list.
‘‘(2) until such time that the Secretary promulgates rules identifying carbon-intensive products, the following shall be considered carbon-intensive products: iron, steel, steel mill products (including pipe and tube), aluminum, cement, glass (including flat, container, and specialty glass and fiberglass), pulp, paper, chemicals, or industrial ceramics.
So the new energy taxes and potential energy tax rebates will fall on fuel importers and exporters, and also on the importers and exporters of metals, cement, industrial ceramics, glass, pulp, paper, and chemicals. And in every case, to determine the tax they will have to calculate “full fuel cycle greenhouse emissions”, meaning everything from the extraction of the raw materials from nature all the way through any manufacturing processes to their final ex-factory finished state … dear heavens, I’m sure y’all can see why I called this an insanely complicated system. Where do you draw the line as to what is a legit upstream emission? I mean, if financing has to be counted as an “upstream” source of greenhouse gas emissions … what is not counted?
So that is my first objection: the immensely complicated, arbitrary, and predictably contentious method for assessing and collecting the tax. However, thinking about it I finally understood what they meant when they said about their proposed law, that it:
Creates 2.1 million net new jobs by the 10th year.
If this mad law ever comes into effect, it will assuredly provide lifetime employment for easily that many accountants, lawyers, IRS agents, rent-seekers, tax advisers, emissions estimators, import-export analysts, and porkadelic bureaucrats and bureaucrettes of every stripe.
Now, this is a bizarre variant of tax called a “Pigovian Tax”. They are named after their inventor, the English economist Arthur Pigou (1877–1959). The most common example is the gas tax. They are designed to discourage behavior that the society disapproves of for some reason, by making it more expensive.
Here’s the bizarre part. According to this charming plan, they are going to first tax people … and then give the money back to the people paying the tax. Take their money only to give it back to them … it’s circular enough to make Ouroboros weep in envy.
Which brings me to my second objection: I don’t like hidden taxes. If I can see the tax on the price at the pump, then I can think about whether it is worth it. More to the point, I can add it up and see how much I’m paying in a year. But in this case, the consumer will never know how much this cockamamie energy tax is costing them.
My third objection is to the size of the tax. For gasoline, it starts at fourteen cents per gallon … next year it will be twenty-three cents per gallon, which is already larger than the entire current Federal gas tax of eighteen cents per gallon. And from there it rises such that in only ten years, in constant 2018 dollars, it’s already over a dollar a gallon. A dollar per gallon!
And of course, that’s just the start of the climb, it doesn’t stop rising. in twenty years the tax is two dollars a gallon. And it keeps on going. In thirty years it is over three dollars per gallon.
Who the heck thinks that’s a good idea? Paris is aflame from a twenty-five cent “climate change” energy tax, and these rocket scientists are proposing a three dollar tax?
Does it stop there? Nope. In this brilliant plan, the tax doesn’t stop increasing until greenhouse gas emissions for the entire US are down to 10% of the 2015 levels … down to TEN PERCENT of the 2015 value? That’s until the back side of forever, that will never happen! An infinitely increasing energy tax.
Who the heck thinks that’s a brilliant plan?
The same thing is true about the tax on electricity, which is based on the CO2 content of the fuel used to generate the electricity. Given the current US fuel mix, it will start at about a penny per kilowatt-hour (kWhr). The average cost of electricity in the US is about ten cents/kWhr.
But in ten years the tax will be five cents per kWhr In twenty years the tax will equal the cost of the electricity, ten cents per kWhr. In thirty years it will be 15 cents per kWhr, 50% more than the cost of the electricity itself. And just like the gas tax, it will continue increasing in perpetuity …
Finally, these are the minimum tax rates. That doesn’t include the “full fuel cycle greenhouse gas emissions”. I’ve only run the numbers on the direct CO2 emissions, not all the upstream emissions.
Obviously, this will hit the poorest people the hardest. The folks of the bloatocracy who will be making the law and enforcing the law won’t be bothered by the fuel prices doubling—they have government cars and gas allowances. But for the single mom who has to drive to work in an old car, a car that drinks gas faster than her useless ex-husband drank whiskey, doubling the gas price means her kids will give up something—food, clothing, medicine …
She can’t spend money twice, so something’s got to give. This tax will be EXTREMELY destructive to the poor. Look, if you want to fight CO2, I think you’re nuts … but if so, how about you don’t do it by taxing energy? A tax on energy is a hugely regressive tax that affects the poor more than anyone else. You’re not taxing the rich, you are taxing the poor.
Fourth Objection: Regarding taxes, as I mentioned above, the most important question is, who pays it. But the second most important question is, who gets the money? Cui bono?
In this case, in what appears equal but actually isn’t, they say that they will divide the money evenly (minus a mere 2% fee for their very valuable services) among everyone who has a Social Security Number … I can see the new market in fraudulent SSN cards forming as we speak …
And how much are we talking about? I did a rough calculation, using the tax per tonne times amount consumed annually of gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, coal, and natural gas. I came up with about seventy billion dollars per year …
And to round out the story, dividing that by the population means that every person with a social security number will get a check for $200.
Now this will lead to a curious situation. The more kids you have, the bigger your annual check will be. A couple with six children will get $1,000 … the law of unintended consequences …
And here’s the fifth objection. In addition to exporters having to figure out full fuel cycle GHG emissions, they want the importers and exporters of a host of primary materials like steel, aluminum, and glass to calculate the full fuel cycle greenhouse gas emissions of say a mix of steel sourced from a variety of mills in India … good fun. Or some exporter wants to get a rebate for exporting steel … but the steel comes from a producer who has gone out of business …
So who is going to do the months of research and travel to determine the greenhouse emissions just for that one product? Are you going to leave it up to the importer? Does it get done by the US Department of Useless Estimates? I foresee many more lawyers setting up shop to argue the toss.
Finally, the sixth objection: in order to hide the size of the tax from the consumer by avoiding having to post it on the gas pump, they are taxing “upstream”. But taxing “upstream” instead of taxing the final customer has a hidden effect.
Businesses want to make a reasonable return on the money that they have to spend to bring a product to market. Typically, that’s about a ten percent profit. So if the all-up cost of a product is, say, ten dollars, they’ll want to sell it for one dollar more, or eleven dollars. However, if the product costs a hundred dollars, they don’t sell it for one dollar more. That would only give them a one percent profit. Instead, they’ll sell it for a hundred and ten dollars to make their ten percent profit.
Now, consider the effect of taxing “upstream” rather than having the final customer paying the tax. If a gallon of gas costs a refiner two dollars, they may sell it for twenty cents more. BUT if in addition there is a two-dollar energy tax that the refiner has to pay, they now have four dollars per gallon in the gas, so they’ll sell it for forty cents more … no bueno.
In other words, taxing the product “upstream” will add about ten percent to the tax that is paid by the final customer … and as they say on TV, “But wait! There’s more!”
There’s another step in the process. The refiner originally sold his $2.00 gallon of gas for $2.20 … but that’s the price to the gas station. They add on their 10%, so now it sells to the customer for $2.42
But if the refiner has to sell $4.00 gallons for $4.40 to the gas station, they add their 10% for their profit, and now it is selling for $4.84. So the final tax cost to the consumer is now the tax, plus ten percent, plus ten percent on that ten percent …
IN SUMMARY:
• The system for collecting the taxes, including the decision as to who pays it, is insanely complicated, very vaguely defined, will lead to endless fighting about what can and can’t be taxed, and is easily subject to bureaucratic misuse.
• It is a hidden tax, where even though the eventual consumer is the one who will pay the tax, the cost is concealed from those consumers.
• The tax is far too large, and there is no upper limit on how big it can get. By 2050, the tax alone will be three dollars a gallon. It will screw the poor right to the floor, and cause a huge increase in energy poverty.
• In terms of payout, it is biased in favor of people with large numbers of children. So it will represent a money transfer from the single, the elderly, and the childless to those who have lots of kids.
• It includes an impossible requirement that businesses importing primary materials pay tax on unknowable activities in distant countries.
• Because the tax is applied “upstream”, the eventual consumer will pay at least an additional ten percent above the nominal amount of the tax, and probably more like eleven or twelve percent once all the dogs are hung.
THE REAL PROBLEM
Now, while those are more than enough reasons to reject this horrible energy tax, let me close by discussing my biggest reason for opposing this piece of bad legislation—there is no evidence that it will make any perceptible change in the global temperature. There’s a simple explanation for that. As CO2 emitters, we are being overtaken by the emissions of China, India, Brazil, and the developing world.
In 1965, US emissions were 30% of the global total. We were the big fish. However, by 2017, US emissions were only about 15% of global emissions. At current rates, by 2030 they’ll only be 11% of global emissions, and 7% by 2050. So a change in US emissions in the year 2050 won’t make much difference to the global outcome.
How much difference? Well, by 2050 if the global CO2 keeps growing at the current rate (about 1% per year), the atmospheric concentration will be about 502 ppmv.
And under the extremely unlikely possibility that the Deutch Energy Tax does everything it is claimed to do, if by 2050 it reduces our CO2 emissions all the way down to ten percent of their 2015 values, the atmospheric concentration in 2050 will be lowered by only three measly ppmv, down from 502 ppmv to 499 ppmv.. That’s about a half a percent less atmospheric CO2 than without the Deuch Energy Tax.
And again, under the minuscule possibility that the Deutch Energy Tax actually does everything it is supposed to do, and assuming for the sake of calculation the IPCC estimate of climate sensitivity of 3°C per doubling of CO2 (which may be high), the Deutch Energy Tax will only make a temperature difference of … wait for it …
Three-hundredths of one degree Celsius (which used to be called Centigrade, and if you call it that today, scientific grammar Nazis will point and laugh). That’s 0.03°C. That’s what they are calling their “Climate Solution” … riiight.
How small is 0.03°C? Air gets cooler as you go up in elevation. Three-hundredths of a degree is the difference in temperature between the top and the bottom of a flight of stairs. In other words, far, far too small to even be felt, far too small to measure with a weather thermometer. Meaningless.
All of these bureaucrats, all of this taxation, all of the emissions calculations, all the lawyers and hangers-on, all of the people audited and penalized, all of the wasted hours of working time, all the overseas trips to determine overseas emissions, all of the new government employees drawing obscene payments and pensions, all of the kids going without necessities so mom can get to work, all the people thrust into fuel poverty, all of that … to achieve the amount of cooling you get from going from the bottom to the top of a flight of stairs.
And that is the main reason why I oppose this nonsense … because it won’t make any measurable difference in the 2050 temperature. It is a huge investment of time and money and human deprivation and suffering which will make NO PERCEPTIBLE DIFFERENCE to the 2050 temperature.
I am ashamed that our legislators wouldn’t bother to have one of their underpaid serfs actually run the numbers and see just how little their grand gesture would accomplish, compared to the huge amount it would cost.
So many clowns … so few circuses …
My highest regards to everyone, even the careless legislators who dreamed up this demon-spawn of a piece of legislation,
w.
[UPDATE} For those who would like to send a copy of this to interested stakeholders and friends, I’ve made up a PDF version which is available here.]
PS: When you comment please quote the exact words that you are discussing, so that we can all understand your subject.
ENDNOTE: EPA discussion of Global Warming Potential
CO2, by definition, has a GWP of 1 regardless of the time period used, because it is the gas being used as the reference. CO2 remains in the climate system for a very long time: CO2 emissions cause increases in atmospheric concentrations of CO2 that will last thousands of years.
Methane (CH4) is estimated to have a GWP of 28–36 over 100 years (Learn why EPA’s U.S. Inventory of Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks uses a different value.). CH4 emitted today lasts about a decade on average, which is much less time than CO2. But CH4 also absorbs much more energy than CO2. The net effect of the shorter lifetime and higher energy absorption is reflected in the GWP. The CH4 GWP also accounts for some indirect effects, such as the fact that CH4 is a precursor to ozone, and ozone is itself a GHG.
Nitrous Oxide (N2O) has a GWP 265–298 times that of CO2 for a 100-year timescale. N2O emitted today remains in the atmosphere for more than 100 years, on average.
Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs), and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) are sometimes called high-GWP gases because, for a given amount of mass, they trap substantially more heat than CO2. (The GWPs for these gases can be in the thousands or tens of thousands.)
Another doomed attempt at a perpetual motion machine.
If anyone solves the CO2 emissions “problem” with cheap energy that has zero emissions, they will never be allowed to sell the product as it will result in millions of “job” loses. The “problem” can never be allowed to be solved.
Will St.Ponzi be imposed as green national holiday ?
If.
It gets worse. The carbon tax will force increasing use of renewable energy. That renewable energy will be more expensive and increasingly so as more of it is used and fossil fuel back-up becomes increasing inadequate. However, as consumers pay every more for their energy, less and less of it will be produced by fossil fuels. So, the consumer rebate will get smaller and smaller as energy prices get larger and larger.
Dont worry,
The money will never be given back to those who paid it or anyone else. It will be lost in the bureaucracy.
This whole scheme is a recipe for economic disaster.
Any Economic 101 student will be able to see the effect of taking money out of the economy by taxing the most key item that has made us wealthy.
Cheers
Roger
Actually, I have to say that this sounds like a Ponzi scheme.
Especially as I do not understand what they are doing, and I suspect neither do the promotors, this is a definite sign of a scheme that does not help the public.
Here is a video that might help explain, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6pxxS07PZn0
But I am still puzzled about who makes the money in this The Deutch Energy Tax scheme. Perhaps we will never know until parts of the government suddenly disappear without notice.
Cheers
Roger
Those proposing such taxes must also be in favor of measures disarming the populace, so as to avoid how the current Paris riots would be with an armed people.
Damn good point !
The law of unintended consequences seems to apply here.
With a CO2 tax on the upstream production costs, the cost of manufacture of an electric vehicle once this tax is paid will ensure that Nobody will be able to buy one.
CO2 emissions from just the battery manufacture of an electric car equate to some 7-9 years worth of emissions from the fuel to run an equivalent petrol car …… doesn’t take a genius to work out the upstream tax liability for an electric vehicle …….
Ha!
Now that’s an unintended consequence I can get behind 🙂
Hoho!
Politicians, especially Progressives, aren’t terribly bright, otherwise they would do something more useful.
The Gilet Jaunes achieved their aims, without guns.
Gilet Jaunes don’t have Sen. Eric ‘The Nuke’ Swawell coming after them.
The $200 per citizen is intended to prevent that. Ha! People are smarter than politicians and green profiteers.
We need yo’ money…
Who let these barbarians in the gate?
They got some money from someone who they’d rather not identify. Getting in bed with the devil is never a good idea, even if his promises seem attractive at the time.
” Who let these barbarians in the gate”
The dumb-ass, dumbed-down, MSM-propagandized morons that are the US citizenry. And they vote.
It’s going to be interesting to see where these idiots (i.e., Reps. Deutch (D), Rooney (R), Delaney (D), Fitzpatrick (R), and Crist (D)) go for employment after they leave ‘public service’. Talk about selling your soul to K-Street… The total stupidity of their proposal in overwhelming.
Lol, a dollar a gallon. Try Australia where petrol is at least $1.50 a litre!
Thank the runt cringing in his bulletproof vest while grabbing guns. He was the one who imposed a GST on top of already exorbitant excise instead of replacing it as he initially promised.
I think he is saying that the tax ends up at $1 a gallon which of course is then added to the cost of the fuel. By 2030 the tax amount per gallon is $3 which is much greater than the gallon of fuel costs. Gas (petrol) is currently about US$2.80 per gallon inclusive of $0.184cents Federal Tax (or 7%). I’m guessing the proposed Climate Tax will be added to the existing Fed Tax so at $1 per gallon CT the tax amount would be 45.26%. The Tax Excise in Australia is 36.2%.
Ha, ha and many ha’s! If the plan succeeds, everyone will be driving electrics and there will be no tax available for the $200 bribe.
Knowing the U.S. political landscape (having been there), this plan will join the proverbial snow ball.
In the UK petrol is £1.30 per litre and the latest tables available show that 63% of this is taxes.
Who are behind these guys? Someone other than these people dreamed this up. I’m pretty sure if you could ever follow the money here you would find the answer.
The Democratic Communist party who else?
“who are behind these guys?”
They surely must have been trained by the EU and the ECJ. They are the masters at this.
Yes, it’s the Deutsche Tax coming to everywhere.
Steyer.
Bloomberg.
Gore.
Soros.
Show of hands: Does anyone here really believe a penny of that tax will actually come back to the people who paid the tax once the money starts pouring into government coffers?
Oh, sure. A few checks will go out the first year or two accompanied by much fanfare and ballyhoo. Zelda Mae Fugglebaum and her 14 kids will be all over the news with her joyously receiving a huge check in front of dozens of YSM network cameras. Then the checks will get smaller and less frequent until all of the tax money is soaked up. I give it about 3-4 years.
Great post, Willis, though I found it lacked some much needed profanity appropriately aimed at the sponsors of the legislation. That minor oversight will probably be corrected in comments.
Thanks, H. R.
I plan to send a PDF copy to the NGOs supporting this nonsense along with other folks, so I figured I’d leave out the bad words …
w.
“Gotta love NewSpeak. They say that the dividend “protects consumers” … but since it is “protecting” them from the tax that they (the?) authors of the proposed law are imposing”
Thanks, Marcus, fixed.
w.
Willis, thanks for responding to my request for your analysis of the Deutch Energy Innovation bill recently introduced in the US House. The purpose of introducing it in the lame duck session was to get useful negative feedback, which you have provided admirably. Finally, thanks for sending your PDF to the NGOs and hopefully also to the House members who introduced the bill.
Two clarifications of the bill as proposed: (1) The 30% of Americans at the top of the income ladder would pay more in carbon fees than they would receive in dividends. The lower 70% would receive more dividends than they would pay in carbon fees. This type of fee and dividend has become popular where it has been enacted. (2) The bill as proposed would limit the 50% dividend checks to 2 children per family. That could change because conservatives don’t like Uncle Sam suggesting the “correct” family size.
Good points, Larry.
Of course I agree with Willis, and especially on the point that such a tax would disproportionately hit the poor. The top 30% won’t notice, as it is such a small proportion of their salaries, but it will definitely hurt the rest of us.
You say “this type of fee and dividend has become popular where it has been enacted”. Yes, we should take note of that. That is the infernal deceit of it. There will be grumbles at the gradually increasing cost of fuel and products, but it is gradual, is disguised by other inflationary pressures, and will likely be laid at the door of greedy capitalists as much as the government, whose socialist largesse will be much appreciated when that occasional but chunky cheque arrives as if from Santa Claus.
Don’t underestimate the capacity of the people to be hoodwinked- it has been done like this down the ages. I don’t think we can rule this sort of thing out. It might very well happen.
Mothcatcher: “The top 30% won’t notice, as it is such a small proportion of their salaries, but it will definitely hurt the rest of us.”
The top 30% is household income of about $75k.
I think families living on $75k (pretaxes) will definitely notice the tax.
If the top 30% will pay more than rebated, and the lower 70% receive more than paid in, how does this tax disproportionately harm the poor?
This sounds like a wealth transfer scheme coupled with a government jobs program. With amount of cash generated, you can be sure government will find a way to spend it, for the good of the people of course.
Please do not insult our intelligence by calling alleged rebates of tax money “dividends”.
Dividends” are what businesses pay to stockholders after paying taxes.his tax cripples America, hurts everyone except tax collectors and investors in wind power.
This scheme is so bad on so many levels.
No wonder its promoters have to use deceit to sell it.
Energy needs to be cheap, plentiful and dependable.
Nothing the climate concerned community offers achieves that.
In fact the climate community achieved the opposite.
And does nothing to mitigate “climate change”.
It is long past time to put a stop to the destruction and expense big climate has imposed on the people of the world.
I’m going to send it to my congress critters and senators, too.
Thanks again, Willis.
Thanks, WB. There’s a PDF version here which is a bit less confrontational while still making the same points if you want to send that. I’ve added a link to the PDF in the head post as well.
w.
” Does anyone here really believe a penny of that tax will actually come back to the people who paid the tax once the money starts pouring into government coffers?”
Of course not.
“Carbon Dividend – Rebates 100% of net revenues to the American people.”
Notice the weasel word “net”. How do you reduce the net? You increase the admin costs.
They have no intention to give any money back.
I think they will give some of it back. They will come up with some camouflaged political test which eliminates most hard working conservatives, and pays only those whose vote can be bought or who otherwise would support the crazy lefties. After a few decades, this ever-growing pro-rata rebate could become the primary breadwinner for millions of households. Fat chance then of ever getting it repealed. No recipient would oppose it. No, it must be killed now before it can be enacted (over Trump’s veto).
If it’s tied to a Social Security Number, it’s a short step from sending out a check to crediting that person’s Social Security benefits upon retirement, with the money being spent today for earmarks.
Camel getting nose in tent.
**” Does anyone here really believe a penny of that tax will actually come back to the people who paid the tax once the money starts pouring into government coffers?”**
In Canada Trudeau is proposing to give some money back. I would say it is an election ploy as they are up in 2019.
Yes, they will give plenty of it back…for social and economic justice. Redistribution of wealth.
The rebate maxes out at 2 adults 2 children per family.
Oh, don’t forget the mountain of paperwork and analysis that they’d have to do which increases their overhead. Have to include the paper, employees, and energy required to fill out all the forms and their carbon related costs. Then there’s the cost of the massive bureaucracy that would be needed to monitor all of this. And think of all those ex-congressmen and women that would be hired by the lobbyist firms.
Oh yes, and don’t forget the already existing “upstream” costs associated with taxation on income of folks digging a material out of the ground, taxation on the refining facilities and personnel, taxation on the fabrication facilities and personnel, and so on. Each step already has an “upstream” taxation.
Minor quibble, but gas stations make a far smaller profit than 10% on gas.
Rooney and Fitzpatrick must be pretty lonely, I believe they are the ONLY two survivors of the Republican Climate Group. Hopefully we can send them home in 2020.
Well put Willis. The secret reason for the Deutch Energy Tax is to increase taxes by Taxing Everything – because every commercial activity uses energy. US taxing energy clears the way to for the One World Government taxing everything in every country. Meanwhile in that amazing concentration of freedom and entrepreneurship:
China coal power building boom sparks climate warning
Thus every supposed CO2 reduction in US would be rapidly swamped by rapidly increasing coal CO2 by China – making products for the rest of the world – and exporting back to the US.
Talk about having your “carbon cake” and eating it too!
The “guv” will tax imports based on their supposed equivalent carbon content. More “taxes” to pay, which will further reduce the value of your $200.
It’s even worse than that “there is no evidence that it will make any perceptible change in the global temperature”; there is as yet no evidence that increases in CO2 cause increases in temperature on Earth or cause all the other galaxy of horrible things that are ascribed to CO2.
Roger Pielke Jr eloquently explains the political development from global warming to universal taxation in his Tweet on the gilets jaunes (YellowJackets)
as detailed in his presentation:
Scientific Authority and Political Myth
He’s also recently called attention to conflicts of interest of climate “scientists.”
http://westernwire.net/cu-researcher-raises-questions-surrounding-conflicts-of-interest-in-climate-research/
And he still thinks CO2 needs to be aggressively mitigated. He seems to be conflicted.
Mitigation has been a complete failure and waste of resources.
It is long past time to stop the madness of the climate consensus.
Sadly, Roger ignored the words of wisdom from one of the US’s brightest physics mind:
“Science is a belief in the ignorance of the experts”
-Richard Feynman, Nobel Laureate in Physics
Where’s The Evidence!
Have you ever seen actual evidence that man’s CO2 is causing serious global warming?
Before you answer, please read this:
Evidence of warming IS NOT evidence that man’s CO2 is the cause.
–Warming is NOT evidence of its cause
–Unusual weather occurrences are not evidence of its cause
–Correlation is not causation
–An expert’s assertion is not evidence.
–Majority belief is not evidence
–Government assertions are not evidence.
–Polls are not evidence
–Climate models are not evidence
–“What else could it be” is not evidence
Fine comment on the proposed tax.
However the ever present wet dream of a Kleptocrat is to Tax the Air.
This attempt to impose a “carbon tax” is essentially a tax on everything.
I am moved by the response of the French, to their version of this nonsense,however I feel the parasites deserve every thing they are attracting.
It is nice to see these politicians come right out and admit their thieving ways..always nice to see honesty in politics.
There apparently is some confusion over the wording regarding pro-rata shares eligible for payment under section 9512 (c)(3)(B) PRO-RATA SHARE. The copy I found online states:
“A carbon dividend payment is one pro-rata share for each adult and half a pro-rata share for each child under 19 years old of amounts available for the month in the Carbon Dividend Trust Fund.”
This is in line with what Willis states.
However, in an article regarding this bill posted by John Kartch, Americans for Tax Reform, and re-posted in WUWT here
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/12/02/details-of-the-horrible-carbon-tax-bill/
by charles the moderator, the section is quoted as reading thus:
“A carbon dividend payment is one pro-rata share for each adult and half a pro-rata share for each child under 19 years old, with a limit of 2 children per household, of amounts available for the month in the Carbon Dividend Trust Fund.”
Perhaps Mr. Kartch saw a draft copy of the bill before its official printing. A small but significant change.
The irony of calling a direct attempt at interfering with the market “market driven” is overwhelming.
Are you sure it’s not a parody?
The market will be driven all right, straight off shore. As will the first half of the population. The second half will be too broke to move anywhere but into a caravan.
Time for the vests.
Taxes distort markets and make them inefficient. This language is propaganda to fool the gullible who don’t understand markets.
Energy drives Economy
Actuary Gail Tverberg shows our economy is 99% correlated with energy use. Ruinously taxing fossil fuels without cheaper dispatchable sustainable fuels would cause the US economy to rapidly collapse.
See How the Economy Works as It Reaches Energy Limits — An Introduction for Actuaries and Others
The two RINO’s who need getting “primaried” in 2020:
– Thomas Joseph Rooney, Florida’s CD16, centered on Sarasota (just south of Tampa Bay).
– Brian Kevin Fitzpatrick, Pennsylvania, currently CD8, with population centers Scranton and Wilkes-Barr. In the next Congress (2019) RINO Fitzpatrick will be congressperson for the newly redrawn CD01, centered on Bucks county north of Philly.
Both these RINOs need to get a clue on carbon taxes or get primaried in 2020. And if they don’t get primaried, the GOP voters in their districts should hold their nose and vote for the socialist Democrat facing them. At least then you’ll know what your representative stands for.
The GOP needs to include a plank at their next convention that speaks to their opposition to all carbon taxes.
Yellow vests, one size fits all.
w.
Fortunately the guillotine always comes tax free.
The point about methane is a lie. The supposed CO2 equivalent comes from water vapor (ie H2O) see here https://cementafriend.wordpress.com/2011/10/ If one allows H2O to be CO2 equivalent then the worst fuel is actually Hydrogen (H2 which burns to H2O) and pure carbon or anthracite is one of the best fuels.
It has been shown by studies of Spain’s energy sector and consequences that each job in renewables actually costs the country a loss of about 6 jobs.
I do not know the cost to the economy for each public service job but it should be obvious that having over sixty percent being paid by government (public servants, unemployment benefits etc) is a drain on the economy and that a country can not exist if 100% of working age are unproductive.
The cost of this scheme will be the death of millions of seniors on fixed incomes.
The UN’s Agenda 21 does not value the old, and the number of souls on the planet, must be reduced to around one billion for sustainability purposes….apparently.
Who do you think they are going to target first, to get to that?
“and this despite the fact that the atmosphere contains nitrogen and oxygen. The result of this is that ANY open-air flame will produce various compounds of nitrogen and oxygen, including nitrous oxide”
Nitrous oxide is indeed a GHG, and is fairly stable in the atmosphere, so the fact that it eventually breaks down into N2 and O2 doesn’t help. However, vehicle exhaust (or other flame processes) is not a major source. N2O is unstable to heat, and is not one of the troublesome NOx emissions.
Thanks Nick for those points
Open air flames can produce NO if there is N in the fuel. All NO from an open flame starts as N in the fuel. If the NO is held in the combustion area above 820 C for 250 milliseconds, it burns to N2 and O2. I have data from experiments conducted to prove this to myself. It is common knowledge in industry.
Open flames will not produce NO2 except by happenstance, occasionally.
NO2 is produce at high temperature – which is not what one finds in an open flame. NO3 requires compression such as in an engine. None is produced by an open flame.
We must tackle the obliteration of all lightening bolts around the globe, as they are one of the major sources of NOx gasses.
Lightning does not produce N2O.
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/JD089iD01p01411
Nick, thanks for quoting the part where I did NOT say that flame was a “major source”. I said it was a source. It is. Here’s a look at the nitrous from various processes in India:
SOURCE
See the second one on the list? Only about 10% of the total so not a “major source” … but it is indeed from open-air flames as I stated.
My main point was that when you have such natural sources and you give the Government an open-ended ability to tax the “full fuel cycle GHG emissions”, there is nothing stopping the government from counting and taxing say the nitrous oxide generated by the cowshit of the cows that the workers ate as hamburgers …
Finally, note that the total nitrous oxide emitted by India just in the course of everyday life is 250 million metric tonnes … and the GWP is 275. At $15 per tonne of CO2e, that would get taxed an amount of ONE TRILLION DOLLARS …
Like I said, with those crazy parameters, it’s just declaring open season for rapacious bureaucrats and lawyers …
w.
“CO2 remains in the climate system for a very long time: CO2 emissions cause increases in atmospheric concentrations of CO2 that will last thousands of years. ”
This is one of the bigger lies of climate science.
Around 100 different scientific papers have shown that the lifetime is around 4 or 5 years. The atmosphere doesnt know the difference between manmade co2 with isotope C13 and nature CO2 with isotope C13.
Sure. If we stopped emissions now, the atmospheric portion would immediately drop. That means ‘CO2 emissions cause increases in atmospheric concentrations of CO2 that will last thousands of years’ is not true. The *current* emissions would disappear half the speed they were emitted. This year’s emissions in two years.
If it were ’caused’ then would have been right.
N2O is laughing gas which is completely safe for humans. It is not a significant absorber of radiation. Nor is there a measurable amount in the atmosphere. NO is the main gas produced in high temperature combustion. According to the Chemical Engineering Handbook the emissivity of NO in the temperature range upto 270C is 0.0046 so it can not be classified as a radiation absorbing gas. NO can be oxidised to NO2 (which is a toxic brown gas) by ozone.
There is much misinformation and even lies about so-called greenhouse gases. The only significant greenhouse gas is water vapor (which form into clouds and precipitation) but the IPCC and IEA do not classify it as a greenhouse gas. Clouds filter radiation both to and from the earths surface. While precipitation is provides the water necessary for plant growth.
I am wondering if people are confabulating different N-containing species.
Comprehensive explanation of the formation of these molecules:
http://fluid.wme.pwr.wroc.pl/~spalanie/dydaktyka/combustion_en/NOx/NOx_formation.pdf
It is not likely that much N2O forms in agricultural waste flames as it is too cool in the flame. N2O is mainly formed in fluidised bed combustors in a catalytic reaction with the bed materials (char and limestone).
Fuel-sourced NO can be reduced (literally) by holding it above 820 for 250 ms. That is not difficult even in a small combustor.
I agree about the apparent confusion (not understanding the meaning of NO).
I think the Ag waste may be a special case. The classic way of making N2O is heating ammonium nitrate (carefully), or anything with ammonium and nitrate present – fertilizers?
“(The GWPs for these gases can be in the thousands or tens of thousands.)”
I will not repeat how these “thousands” numbers are dreamed up, but it is hilarious if you read it. It is nothing like what you would expect. They are arrived at by dividing a small uncertain number by an extremely small uncertain number. Have a look.
Well my X-mas gift list is settled. Yellow safety vests for all.
Both in Canada and the US we should start yellow vest branch offices of the European one. Canada’s carbon tax set to start in 3 weeks.
499 ppmv, ISS currently is at 5,300 ppmv – this appears to be a stealth VAT and while they claim to be giving the money back it will cost everyone far more than they will ever receive while giving the politicians another source of funds to steal from.
I suspect that such a tax would create lots of jobs for the manufacturers of yellow vests.
I have a yellow vest.
Mine is ready and waiting.
Enough economic illiterate madness in the name of climate.
The climatariat needs to go.
Deutsch is just a wordier economic moron than most of the climate obsessed.
Screw a yellow vest; I have a number of firearms.
Willis – You assert that:
“If this mad law ever comes into effect, it will assuredly provide lifetime employment for easily that many accountants, lawyers, IRS agents, rent-seekers, tax advisers, emissions estimators, import-export analysts, and porkadelic bureaucrats and bureaucrettes of every stripe.”
As these schemes are usually structured, the projected new jobs will be primarily as seasonal construction workers in solar installation, i.e., glorified roofers. The real jobs lost will be highly-paid geologists, engineers and technicians who now produce those dreaded fossil fuels.
The French public at least are showing the cojones to stand up to Macron’s energy tax, which has taken the wind out of the sails of the climate conference delegates in Poland:
http://notrickszone.com/2018/12/09/global-warming-activists-speechless-in-katowice-as-yellow-vests-protests-spread-europe-wide-with-unexpected-intensity/
Deutch could very well have just handed Trump his second term on a plate.
I cry a little when I read articles like this, just simply because I find quotes like in the US they are currently paying 10c kwh. Down here in Australia, looking at my latest bill, 28c kWh!! guess that is what you get when you live in a country that is energy rich but has stupid energy policies.
But could be worse, our ‘green’ state, South Australia, average electricity rate is just under 43c kWh….
I would say 10c per kwh is a rare occurrence in the US.
MOD I AM SHOUTING AT YOU BECAUSE I AM ANGRY. YOU WILL NOT LET US SKEPTICS ORGANIZE PROTESTS AGAINST AGW AND CARBON TAXES. WE NEED TO TO BE ABLE TO EXCHANGE EMAILS OR TELEPHONE NUMBERS.
“Tax will only make a temperature difference of … wait for it …” “Three-hundredths of one degree Celsius”
That’s the all else continues as usual scenario; there is another. What if energy is one of the major drivers of the economy? Which it is. Discourage energy use and the economy will suffer, discourage it too much and there could be tipping points and negative feedbacks and catastrophic emergent effects. Imagine if there were no fossil fuels available starting immediately. Could be like Mad Max. Could be worse. That won’t happen, yet it marks the endpoint of the possible lines drawn between now and what some would wish for.
Not to mention that even with zero fossil fuel use, the climate may not care at all, despite those models.
“Not to mention that even with zero fossil fuel use, the climate may not care at all, despite those models.”
There is no “may” about it.
There are only two sources of tax :-
You or Me !
That’s it !
I vote for you.
That’s the problem !
This will never pass the Senate, & Trump will veto it! Much like any other Democratic stupidity in the House. DOA = Dead On Arrival!
Where’s the tax on water vapour?
It’s coming.
`’the atmospheric concentration in 2050 will be lowered by only three measly ppmv, down from 502 ppmv to 499 ppmv.”
Our main radiation absorbing (greenhouse) gas is water vapor, H2O, outnumbering the number of CO2 molecules by far. And a very variable gas as well, depending in quantity and behavior on ANY factor that influences a rise in temperature: a change in the oceans, some less clouds, another quantity or position of high pressure areas, some change in wind etc.
What are Deutch c.s. proposing to control the MAIN absorbing gas, water vapor, H2O?”
All tax is paid by the consumer.
As for the 2.1 million jobs the system claims it will create, this will never happen as overall millions of jobs will be lost thanks to the overheads imposed by the tax, in other words it will kill the economy.
IF, adding gases like CO2 to the atmosphere is really the danger they claim the answer is to employ nuclear technologies to generate the electricity. As this solution is constantly resisted the danger clearly is inflated.
CO2 or carbon in the air is not the problem. CO2/carbon taxes are the problem….
I believe ORANGE is the most common safety vest used in the USA, although I really like a bright BLUE color.
I also see color combinations.
Here is one: Blue White star logo
As with the French yellow vests, can we get prepared by agreeing on a color and style and having such be required of all those with a SS# or driver’s license or either color blind or not color blind.
I am willing to help start a yellow vest movement here. The GILET JAUNE movement will go worldwide and is the best chance yet of stopping this global warming scam. We need a web site to start it here in North America.
Count me in:
https://www.amazon.com/Construction-Visibility-Upper-Midland-Products/dp/B07CR97NYL/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?ie=UTF8&qid=1544504825&sr=8-1-spons&keywords=yellow+safety+vests&psc=1
Don’t worry folks.
Leftists are becoming increasingly desperate to urgently implement insanely expensive, meaningless and complicated Carbon taxes before inevitable global cooling trends start from: a strong 2020/21 La Niña event, a 50-year Grand Solar Minimum from 2020, and when the PDO/AMO/NAO are all in their respective 30-year cool cycles from the early 2020’s…
As we’re already seeing from the Paris, Brussels and Amsterdam demonstrations, taxpayers are not willing to have Leftist governments steal $122 trillion (2018 UN estimate) to fix the fictitious CAGW scam…
The US has already pulled out the Paris Agreement, China and India are already excempt from doing anything until 2030 (except receive $billions in Western CO2 taxes), and Brazil, Canada, Australia, South Korea and Italy are having serious doubts on the efficacy of CAGW. It’s all falling apart.
Willis is correct. Once intelligent people realize the insane and astronomical carbon taxes would only decrease global temps 0.03C by 2050 (assuming CAGW’s wildly-high and fictitious CO2 forcing effect), cannot be rationally or economically justified…
Leftists think CAGW virtue posturing is “cool”, but when they realize this meaningless feel-good virtue posturing will inevitably impoverish them and cost them their jobs, they will eventually be out tipping over and burning cars like they are in Paris.
I know Willis will think it unscientific for me to say this (and rightfully so)..but.. the US is already experiencing its worst winter in 60 years (in an El Niño year) and given the aforementioned coming cooling phenomena, I seriously think significant global cooling is already starting.
We’ll see soon enough.
Great article up to your usual level Captain Eschenbach.
A couple of questions.
Who wrote this piece of proposed legislation?
Presumably none of the gangster politicians named would be able to compose it. So it is either someone paid for by, say, Bloomberg, Steyn or Soreass. If it was written by someone employed by the EPA for instance then your President really should put some really big snowballs in hell if he has aspirations for 2020.
Now the real reason for this little rant is when you mention fuel (gas) prices.
Here in the little pretend country of Scotland, I pay £1-30 a LITRE for diesel.
According to my weak maths that would be over $6 per U.S. gallon.
Now here comes the real kick. It is taxed at 80% and then we pay Value Added Tax ???? At 20% on the tax!
So if there are any spare Jilet Jaune vests in France or the USA please find my address with the mods.
A happy Christmas to you and your readers.
“Great article up to your usual level Captain Eschenbach.
A couple of questions.
Who wrote this piece of proposed legislation?”
Apparently you didn’t read it. The authors of the legislation are right there in the first paragraph.
Jeff-san:
Willis’ question is valid…
Legislators NEVER, and I mean NEVER, write (and seldom read) any bills they submit to the floor…
This piece of crap was pieced together by a bunch Leftist hacks at think tanks, lobbyists, lawyers of wealthy donors, Leftist NGOs, layers of rent-seekers, etc.,
Senator Rand Paul actually tried to pass a bill requiring all Senators to verify they’ve read every single word of any new bill being proposed, but was laughed off the floor….
Legistorors’ staffs do the grunt work of reading and proposed legislation and prepare brief executive summaries with the basics to prevent their legislators from looking like complete idiots when discussing any legislation with reporters or presenting the bill to the floor for debate..
Most legislators “don’t have the time”:to actually do their real jobs… Their “actual” job involves securing campaign contributions from rent-seekers and running for relection..
Patrick,
Mark Steyn is the good guy.
I believe you were thinking of Thomas Steyer.
Thanks John and others, I am a great fan of Mark (the good guy).
Thank you Samuri, it is just as I suspect, your legislators are just as useless as ours.
Over here they are as welcome as a fart in a space/survival suit.
Patrick, $6/gal. in the U.S. would lead to revolution. Well, maybe a huge turnover of Congressional Representatives at the next 2-year election.
What will the banks charge for handling the money?
Their take usually seems to be about 3% so how will the admin costs be kept to 2%?
That obscure reference to a carbon tax on financing surely refers to the energy used for Bitcoin mining.
Is there any reference to suchTales from the Crypt (currency)?
This turns out to be a tax that will hurt the poor the most. In taking away peoples money and giving it back to them a fairly high percentage will be taken out to support the bureaucrats. The only way such a tax will serve to actually reduce CO2 emissions is to show down the economy which will hurt the poor the most. It turns out to be all a scam.
There is plenty of scientific rationale to support the idea that the climate sensitivity of CO2 is zero. So even if this tax on the poor could serve to reduce CO2 emissions, it would have no effect on climate. It is all a matter of science.
The additional tax on fuels will cause most businesses to raise prices that will be hardest on the poor. The rich are in a good position to shield themselves from the effects of inflation but not the poor. Why are the democrats out to hurt the poor?
And then of course there is the tax to be paid by solar manufacturers and wind turbinr meanufacturers.
😂🤣😂🤣😅😂😂😂🤣😂🤣
😉
lolol ROTFALMFAO
“Taxes paid by solar and wind”
Where do you think this tax is going to be spent?
This is the “make Tom Steyer a trillionaire” bill.
It has NOTHING to do with climate.
Like the recent faux climate report, this law was probably conveniently written by Steyer it Bloomberg.
However, thinking about it I finally understood what they meant when they said about their proposed law, that it:
First chuckle of the day.
My Dad was a communist. One of Stalin’s useful idiots. He prophesied that one day the greedy capitalists would find a way to sell the people the air we breathe. Well he died in 1956 not seeing the fulfilment of his prophesy. Just as well because if he did he would be shocked to discover that it was not capitalism but his beloved socialist/communist comrades who were hell bent on implementing the very thing he feared so much.
I am heartened to know that you can think for yourself.
To Reps. Deutch (D), Rooney (R), Delaney (D), Fitzpatrick (R), and Crist (D), interns ,aids or anybody in the service of our federal and state governments who maybe reading this blog: No new hidden tax system. Let the sun shine in.
The advancement of The Frankfurt School’s vision of Cultural Marxism. via “The long march through the institutions” is now organised and focused. The founders always knew it was a multi generation project, and we are seeing its impact now.
The modern day evangelists for this left thinking, is Common Purpose. They have secured government funding via direct grants, and by state funded faux social enlightenment courses, or engagement courses, or, any and many other propaganda courses they dream up of zero actual value. These no value courses, have become compulsory in all Public Sector areas of employment. Their purpose, is to tap into the public purse to fund the Common Purpose activists
The overall objective of the Greens a junior but growing segment of the anti capitalist movement, described as useful idiots by hard left communists, is the destruction of consumerism.
We must all be educated into recognising the benefit of collective poverty,…apparently
Remember this, the flip side of the capitalist coin, is energy. If you can destroy the availability of energy and peoples easy access to energy, then you will destroy capitalism.
Now is it clear what is going on via the UN’s IPCC and its focus on AGW?
The UN is destroying capitalism by design, via its false climate change alarmism.
We have to educate the people.
We all must seek the truth.
I think it is called scientific study and investigation.
Please tell Al.
The CO2 consensus, like other social obsessions, spreads like a cancer damaging every other area of society. I guess we will get more and more if this sort of damaging ideas until the CO2 consensus is crushed.
It took WW2 to finally crush eugenics and there are still defenders of it today.
Trying to eliminate gasoline consumption by taxation is perhap the most illogical part of the plan. Anyone who can read sales data can see that electric cars (the ONLY kind of cars that China will allow)
are technologcially to the point where they are clearly superior to gas powered vehicles in every respect – acceleration, maintenance costs, fuel costs, reliability, lifespan, etc – so that we only require somewhat cheaper batteries to make gas powered vehicles totally obsolete (including tractor trailers).
Even driving ranges and battery recharge times are acceptble – 250 to 350 driving ranges, and recharge rates by cars lke the upcoming Jaguar I Pace are at 350KW rates – recharge for 250 miles in 10 to 15 minutes at fast DC public CCS chargers. As for lower power station emissions, why not simply wait a few years and start replacing power stations with advanced molten salt nuclear reactors, which can produce power cheaper than any other technology and can function as baeload, or peak load gnerator? China and India are rushing conventional but also developing molten salt reactors. In other words, sit back and wait for the inevitable MARKET DRIVEN solutions to come of age. Govt subsidies to hasten development by U.S. molten salt companies would make sense and cost practically nothing.
Kent, “… we only require somewhat cheaper batteries to make gas powered vehicles totally obsolete …” says it all.
My ICE vehicle has a range of 700 miles. 350 just won’t do.
If (big if) you want to encourage a particular kind of economic behavior, in this case reducing consumption of fossil fuels, then a revenue neutral tax is an appropriate way to go about it. If a $5 per gallon tax were levied on gasoline, and the tax is rebated on a per capital basis, then if you continue to consume the same amount of gasoline, the economic impact on you is not that much. There is however a transfer of wealth from non-consumers of gasoline to the consumers of gasoline. This gives people motivation to change behavior. I’m not advocating for this, I’m just saying it’s the proper way to implement public policy for the purpose of modifying economic behavior.
Tom, not to be harsh, but your statement is nonsensical. Please reread it.
I reread it; it says exactly what I wanted to say.
A rebate on a “per capital basis” just rebates the US average carbon tax. It will not rebate the actual taxes collected from individuals.
This tax scheme will transfer wealth and create legions of government and lawyer jobs. It will never be revenue neutral or accomplish anything beneficial; but it will crash the economy of the USA.
… proposed legislation founded on BS.
Great. Another indicator of how we are going down the toilet.
Now that every WUWT reader is informed on this, all should send this to newspapers, Congressmen and Senators. They are obviously the ones who need to be educated. And while you are at it, also send todays Notrickszone’s report on the many new papers on the v. small effect if any , of co2.
Thanks, E. I’ve made up a PDF version so you can do just that, and added a link to the PDF in the head post.
w.
I suppose it is one step up from levying a CO2e tax at the individual consumption level but first things first and you have to create those boundless job opportunities with the pool of unemployed created by the upstream taxing. Something to do with digging holes and filling them in again with picks and shovels but if you want fuller employment issue forks and spoons.
“There is no evidence that it will make any perceptible change in the global temperature.”
I have asked a number of politicians how much ‘climate change’ will be averted by a carbon tax or the Paris Accord. I have posed the same question to many other people who are concerned about “climate.” None have been able to answer those fundamental questions. And, certainly, the MSM never goes there.
From the article: “Purpose of This Policy
• To encourage market-driven innovation in clean energy technologies.”
That’s a novel way of describing government subsidies.
Ka-ching!
“To encourage market-driven innovation in clean energy technologies.
To create efficient markets, encourage competition, and promote our national interests.
To create a healthier, more stable, more prosperous nation for future generations.”
Adding a tax is government driven, not market-driven.
Adding a tax does not create efficient markets, it hampers them seriously through loss of capital.
More prosperous nation when you are taxed to death? Yeah, right.
Definitely newspeak. Ingsoc would be proud.
Smacks forehead! Forks and spoons means CO2e as do nail clippers so fingers and fingernails it is for Utopia.
The main travesty in this is the scientifically incorrect assumption that carbon dioxide causes global warming. It doesn’t, and for a very simple reason. All the infrared radiation absorbed by atmospheric CO2 comes from Earth’s radiative output, and thus it has no independent source of heating. Consequently, the weak emissions from CO2 back-radiation are incapable of increasing the vibrations of the molecular bonds in Earth’s surface that produced the radiation absorbed by CO2 in the first place. Objects can’t heat themselves with their own radiation, consequently none of the weak back-radiation from CO2 and other so-called “greenhouse gases” is absorbed, but all of it is simply scattered, reflected, or transmitted by Earth’s surface.
(I don’t monitor this, so please send any comments to davidlaing (at) aol (dot) com.)
The best way to handle this ingenious proposal is to remember its bipartisan authors: Congressman Ted Deutch (D-FL-22), Congressman Francis Rooney (R-FL-19), Congressman John K. Delaney (D-MD-06), Congressman Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA-08), and Congressman Charlie Crist (D-FL-13)
I ordered my yellow vest today.
How can we pressure the mods to let us organize this yellow vest movement. We need a web site.
I picked mine up at Home Depot today, just under $10.
If you like your health plan you can keep it and shovel-ready stimulus to fix your roads (only to be downgraded by Party leaders after winning the marketing edge). Also, the claim of job benefits from renewables is code for high-cost solutions even within the renewables sector in a nod to the small business, rooftop solar lobby.
Lets break all our windows and create millions more jobs!
We have to pass the bill to find out what’s in it.
‘To encourage market-driven innovation in clean energy technologies.’
Crush the market place with onerous taxes, then call the response “market-driven.”
Reaction to government interference cannot be “market-driven.”
Lets start at the beginning and see where this takes us:
Purpose of this policy:
– To encourage market-driven innovation in clean energy technologies.
What if clean energy technologies can’t compete in the market? (We already know they can’t)
So lets adjust the Purpose to reflect reality.
– To impose centrally driven innovation in clean energy technologies.
Yup, much better. Words matter.
Let Canadians pay for the Global Warming 100 Years War. They like it.
This idea should be implemented in the districts of those representatives that think it is a good idea. I am sure your constituents will be thrilled with this program, and your re-election will be guaranteed.
If not, than the rest of us will promise not to laugh (too hard).
In fact I propose a new piece of legislation that will prevent many “steaming piles” of legislation. I will call it the “Cupbearer and Food Tester” Stupid Policy Prevention Program.
The key concept is to try it on your own constituents, before you recommend FORCING IT ON THE ONES THAT DIDN’T VOTE FOR YOU!!! If they survive your stupidity, then we will listen to your plans. Until then we don’t want to waste our time debating untested speculation.
Willis, sorry, but this proposed bill, while totally destructive, it is not pointless.
There is no meaning of pointless when considering pure evil, and this is pure evil.
If you were wondering about the perfect WMS (Weapon of M Self-destruction), this is it,
You have finally seen it…for real.
Thank for exposing this to the public…it is not a joke, very serious though.
I can go on and on to try and explain it as per my understanding, how pure evil this is, but got to be poked, as I can not afford wasting time, talking to me self.
These guys better have no any dirt or skeletons in their cupboards.
Even the self-destruction, in terms of political national and economical and cultural structures, happening in these socialist countries of 20th century, happen due to far less insanity than what proposed by this guys and their bill…far less evil.
From my point, either these guys are really silly, crazy and stupid enough to try and propose such a evil thing, in the prospect that it is so mad and bad that will not have any chance in heaven or hell to pass, or these guys supporting pure evil and expecting that in some way this will fly through.
In the second count, in my book, that is clearly within the boundary of high treason, clearly intended as such…against the nation, the people, and their own interest, as per such.
Begs for a serious deep investigation, concerning these guys, regardless who they are.
These attempt by these guys, makes Stalin look like a benevolent beautiful angel or look like better than Mahatma Gandhi.
Any way, the main point is simple, what proposed is actually a WMS for the USA, like you as a nation are proposed to take a pill, which is not in the context of whether it being red or blue, but more like it, the pill offered, is simply a plain cyanide one.
Not really sorry at all for any one that may feel offended, even in the slightest, by this comment of mine…
and for what it may be worth…the bounty is up…as you read this.
cheers
Cracking idea wallace !
just extrapolate that . . . . the more C02 emitted the more the tax, so heavy breathers/top atheletes should pay more in tax than those slow breathers and the knitting circles . top sport should be categorized by Carbon emissions
Chess would therefore be at the bottom of the rankings and weightlifting at the top, sponsors could choose the brackets they wish to sponsor in and athletes could decide to move up or down the carbon rules or not (with a suitably constrained army of auditors and checkers.
the games could be called the Carbon games or the `C` games
Seems we all had it better under King George III. Can we reverse the revolution? Oh wait, things are no better in the UK these days. Maybe the yellow vests in France will save us.
Probably they used the insane “social cost of carbon” to calculate the tax https://www.camecon.com/blog/time-kill-social-cost-carbon/
“And to round out the story, dividing that by the population means that every person with a social security number will get a check for $200.
Now this will lead to a curious situation. The more kids you have, the bigger your annual check will be. A couple with six children will get $1,000”
Willis, is the math right? A couple with 6 kids (assuming all have SS numbers) is 8 people. At $200 per SSN, I would expect that to be 8 x $200 = $1600.
The House version of the Energy Innovation bill includes a full dividend for each adult and a half dividend for each child with a limit of two half-dividends per family.
A Senate version was introduced this week: text available at
https://www.coons.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/PAT18187.pdf
Larry
Obama was a gifted speaker, he could convince tv audience as well as university halls.
To his and our regrets: he had no topic. Like Angela Merkel.
The world economic crisis came in handy for him.
Timothy Geithner swiped the problem and asked Obama, “Mr. President, a second term you will not need me anymore, otherwise my former colleagues will not know me anymore.”
Obama had no topic again: then it occurred to him what about the CAGW thing, everyone likes and everyone can have a say.
and so he rode into the sunset and was happy ever after.