[spodek]

I think government will change slowly so I expect laws will follow social change.

People born today will have to face the environmental change that past generations heard would happen but they knew they'd die before the worst of it. As an increasing percent of the population cares, and can see the change, we'll see change anyway, maybe people will see SUVs and flying all the time like smoking.

I don't know politics, so I don't know how easy legislative change would be, but reducing subsidies to polluting industries would help. We spend billions on meat, dairy, and the corn to sustain it that pollute a lot. Also, accounting for externalities of pollution that private firms cause but the public has to deal with.

Personally, I'm more interested in helping change public views, seeing how it changed so much with smoking.

[enraged_camel]

The problem is that with climate change we need to be on an accelerated timeframe. We can't just wait for social change to happen naturally over the course of another generation or two.

[legutierr]

If you don't know politics, then maybe you should learn, because the solution you are looking for is entirely political. That is to say, the solution is the creation of economic incentives that can only be structured and imposed through government power.

Yes, people need to believe that the effects of climate change will affect their lives. Laws do follow social change, in that laws that go against entrenched special interests cannot be passed unless failing to pass them becomes entirely unacceptable to a significant majority of the voting population.

But you are tilting at windmills if you think that convincing people to change their behaviors unilaterally is going to make any difference in climate change. Let's say I'm one of those people who gets on a plane every week to meet with clients. I'm not going to stop doing that because I feel an ethical obligation to prevent climate change; if I did stop, I would just be giving up that business to my competition who doesn't have any of my ethical compunctions.

You are also asking too much from ordinary people if you expect them to modify their personal consumption decisions. Maybe you can get people (in the first world) to stop eating so many hamburgers because beef production is so carbon intensive. Maybe you can get people (again, in the first world) to drive hybrid cars. But how many people are you going to convince of the overriding ethics of your position such that they will act against their own self interest (economic, cultural, social, familial)? Not enough to do what is necessary. And even those people who accept and follow these ethics are not going to have the detailed information required to make environmentally-friendly decisions throughout their lives. It's the same problem experienced with command economies: without a reliable price signal to base purchasing decisions on, counter-productive decisions (decisions that result in more carbon pollution instead of less) will be common.

The only behavioral solution to climate change is a universal carbon tax (which would of course supersede any current carbon subsidies that would need to be repealed). Only a carbon tax will allow corporations to reduce their carbon footprint without worrying about giving ground to their competition. Only a carbon tax will cause ordinary consumers to change their behavior without expecting them to completely re-vamp their ideologies and value systems. And a carbon tax can only be implemented politically.

You site smoking as an example of how focusing on changing public views can be effective. Look at the history, though. Although there had been a gradual long-term decline in adult smoking, student smoking had been climbing significantly in the US until 1998 [0], when a settlement between the tobacco companies and 46 state governments forced the tobacco companies to basically abandon the US market [1]. This demonstrates both that the demand for smoking was being propped up by corporate propaganda, and that only activism with an agenda focused on a specific litigation strategy was ever going to be effective at fighting it.

The other great example is the civil rights movement in the US. Did Martin Luther King set out to end racism in the United States? No, social change at that level would have been laughable. Civil rights leaders had very specific legislative and judicial objectives: to end state tolerance of segregation, guarantee universal suffrage, end ensure de facto equal treatment of blacks under the law. All of the activism, outreach, protest, and public-relations efforts were orchestrated and timed to maximize their effect on those specific outcomes. Broad changes in public attitudes towards race have distantly lagged the legislative and litigative successes of the civil rights movements; I believe that it was changes in the law that created the space required for attitudes to change.

Leadership is essential, but the kind of leadership we need is leadership that organizes people around narrow, actionable, and feasible legislative and judicial objectives. You are right to identify "reducing subsidies to polluting industries" as a worthwhile political objective, as well as "accounting for externalities of pollution". If you count yourself a leader fighting climate change, though, these policies cannot just be something that other people worry about. They need to be the specific and central focus of your entire effort.

[0] http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/tables/trends/cig...

[1] http://publichealthlawcenter.org/topics/tobacco-control/toba...

[Mendenhall]

I agree with much of what you say. I do notice how your solution squarely targets corporations. I think that gives everyone a passive excuse and shifts blame. I say target the individuals with the laws and make them feel it and take ownership. You drive,you get taxed per mile. You dont seperate your garbage you get fined. You fly you get taxed. You buy plastic you get taxed...etc. That way everyone doing those things and every company doing those things will then all pay for it. Thing is its easier to shift blame and point finger at corporations than for people to accept it themselves. Then good luck trying to convince other countries to do the same.

[slavik81]

Why tax people per mile driven? Just put the tax on the gasoline (the actual source of the carbon) and you'll promote both driving less and fuel efficient vehicles. Whenever possible, design laws that promote the end result you want, not some proxy.

Of course, as much sense as it would make, raising the tax on gasoline is politically impossible. As is imposing a tax on miles driven.

The problem with making things directly visible to consumers is that everyone is a consumer and if the laws are annoying or harmful to them, they will vote in a government that repeals the laws. Then your carbon reduction measures are gone.

[Decade]

That has huge issues with equity.

Especially a transportation-based tax. Right now, the major US cities are having an affordability crisis. Bad decisions have led to a housing shortage, and many residents (NIMBY, really) are convinced that these are correct decisions, that people who can’t afford it should just move out. So, we have people living in Stockton who commute to San Francisco for work, because they can’t afford to live in San Francisco.

A tax per mile is a regressive tax on the poor people who don’t live in walking distance of their workplace.