Lets start with your assumption that it’s fine that a country with .87% of the global population being anywhere near 2% of greenhouse gasses is ok. Especially when first world countries like ours are responsible for the historical majority of them. But also by reducing our emissions we enter the ability to negotiate with other countries to reduce theirs and we have incentives to develop more ecological technology that we can then sell to other countries as China has famously been doing with solar panels and electric vehicles. But significantly, all we can impact outside treaties is our own countries, so when we demand carbon reduction at home it’s because the alternatives are giving up or I suppose you could attempt to take back India and China.
Carbon taxes are more like vice taxes than say revenue taxes. The goal isn’t to raise money to offset emissions, but to make more externally costly decisions less appealing. That way you don’t fly instead of take the train in order to save a bit of time.
And yeah, I can’t speak much for the UK, but in the US I associate the Reagan era with the severance of businesses from their responsibility and value to society. The rot that’s killing my country both financially and socially was fostered and promoted by the Reagan era. We sold off our manufacturing capacity in the form of offshoring and created the conditions of the crack epidemic, government ignoring as more Americans died of aids than in the Vietnam War, and the formation of the religious right who would go on to cause a lot of today’s problems. My part of my country is called the rust belt, and it was decimated by the consequencesof the 80s.
Also I’m pretty sure the UK had great benefits from EU membership. At least considering how bad leaving it has gone for yall.
Lets start with your assumption that it’s fine that a country with .87% of the global population being anywhere near 2% of greenhouse gasses is ok. Especially when first world countries like ours are responsible for the historical majority of them. But also by reducing our emissions we enter the ability to negotiate with other countries to reduce theirs and we have incentives to develop more ecological technology that we can then sell to other countries as China has famously been doing with solar panels and electric vehicles. But significantly, all we can impact outside treaties is our own countries, so when we demand carbon reduction at home it’s because the alternatives are giving up or I suppose you could attempt to take back India and China.
Carbon taxes are more like vice taxes than say revenue taxes. The goal isn’t to raise money to offset emissions, but to make more externally costly decisions less appealing. That way you don’t fly instead of take the train in order to save a bit of time.
And yeah, I can’t speak much for the UK, but in the US I associate the Reagan era with the severance of businesses from their responsibility and value to society. The rot that’s killing my country both financially and socially was fostered and promoted by the Reagan era. We sold off our manufacturing capacity in the form of offshoring and created the conditions of the crack epidemic, government ignoring as more Americans died of aids than in the Vietnam War, and the formation of the religious right who would go on to cause a lot of today’s problems. My part of my country is called the rust belt, and it was decimated by the consequencesof the 80s.
Also I’m pretty sure the UK had great benefits from EU membership. At least considering how bad leaving it has gone for yall.