[eduren]

The easiest way to get people to buy less is to raise prices.

If we had a carbon tax that correctly priced the environmental impact of goods, it would decrease consumption. Without having to shame people into removing themselves from the economy.

[lukifer]

Yes. I've become convinced that Pigovian taxes [0] (connected to a basic dividend) are the answer to climate change, and to ecological externalities in general. (In addition to greasing the wheels of political viability, a dividend ensures that paying the true cost of carbon is not a de-facto regressive tax, as that cost hits the working class the hardest.)

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pigovian_tax

[eduren]

I agree that we will definitely want to do it in a way that minimizes how regressive the outcome is.

[reubens]

Same with smoking cessation:

"Increasing the retail price of tobacco products through higher taxes is the single most effective way to decrease consumption and encourage tobacco users to quit." [0]

https://www.who.int/tobacco/mpower/publications/en_tfi_mpowe...

[brycehamrick]

Carbon taxes could help, but end-of-life taxes on the producer would be more effective at actually driving change. The consumer doesn't have the decision making power to choose lower-impact materials in products or packaging they buy, but the producer does. If we tax them on the disposal cost and other negative externalities resulting from the use and EOL of their products those producers will likely choose different materials.

[TheChaplain]

Raising prices is effective but can have serious side-effects.

E.g. raising gas prices will dramatically hurt citizens living on the country side or outside cities without public transport, and force them to move into the cities, which in turn cause higher demand on housing and rent increase.

[orev]

Isn’t that the point though, to change behavior? People who live in the countryside and work in the city have only been able to do that because of improperly priced fuel that enables them to do so. Adjusting the price of fuel to reflect the true cost would drive the change in behavior that we need to have. You can’t expect things to change without making actual changes, and it will of course require a transition period as people adjust.

[TheChaplain]

Sure, if you work in the city.

But if you live and work on the country side, higher gas prices will crush you because it impacts not only you personally but the school transport for the kids, the transporting wares from/to rural supermarket, for infrastructure maintenance/development, agriculture/farmers etc etc

There are so many little things that people take for granted that is will have an impact on those living on the country side.

And in the end you just shift the problem to the cities, where the influx of more people cause rising housing costs, higher unemployment, more miserable people and higher prices on foodstuffs because farmers give up.

Living rural areas and farmers are a very important factor for a happy nation IMHO.

[orev]

The post I replied to specifically mentions people who live in the country who would then have to move closer to cities. That is the profile of a commuter with a city job, not a farmer. Farmers don’t have to commute into the city every day, and thus are not the people who are being discussed here.

Yes, obviously higher fuel prices would affect those who need to drive further due to longer distances between things (i.e. the countryside), but it will also encourage those who only do so by choice to make different choices, which is what we desperately need.

[_y5hn]

Many people can't live in busy cities, and cities need countryside.

[sieabahlpark]

Have you ever heard of a thing called agriculture?

[skittleson]

Raising prices does this but the side effect could be putting individuals that really need a product in hard spot. Creating laws on single use non-biodegradable material and/or the amount of it could be beneficial. This will increase prices slightly on those goods.

[aaomidi]

Carbon taxes should be levied in such a way that most people who are buying the basic necessities would actually see a growth in their income.

Lower middle class should see no change. Middle class should see a net loss if they don't change their habits. And anything beyond would see a substantial loss.

Give each person a carbon ration, if you didn't use it fully you get money back. If you used more than your fair share you have to pay significantly large taxes that go directly to the pockets of people who use less and infrastructure.

[skittleson]

"Give each person a carbon ration" agreed. Achieving this with each individual could be the hard part where as enforcing a company to "behave" and/or limit consumers from buying excessively could be quicker win that achieves the same goal.

[tomjen3]

If it also was used to help the environment, and strictly tied to cost of cleaning up CO2, I would be for it.

[ftkudtkfkl]

Pricing a good out of someone's budget range seems entirely like removing them from the economy. What's more, your tax will hit the most economically vulnerable people in society the hardest. It's hard for me to believe people won't feel ashamed when the things they enjoy are suddenly beyond their reach.

[daenz]

>Without having to shame people into removing themselves from the economy.

No, you'll just remove them from the economy without their consent, by introducing regulation to artificially lower supply. Everyone is against this: the companies who won't make as much profit and the consumers who won't be able to purchase the goods that they want. Good luck with that.

[eduren]

>No, you'll just remove them from the economy without their consent, by introducing regulation to artificially lower supply

A few things:

1. Presumably any carbon tax would have to be secured and defended by our democratic institutions. Thus we would have consent (or as close as you can get to large scale consent in our multi-actor society). While I agree that regulating basic consumption for large swaths of the economy has a bit of an authoritarian bend to it, I'm not sure how else we incentivize ourselves to decrease consumption.

2. Lowered supply is not a given. Companies would be incentivized to find production chains, energy sources, and materials that had a lower impact (and thus a lower tax). Less impactful products would be able to price themselves under the high-impact products and satiate the demand.

EDIT Added 3. Consumption itself is not the enemy. The thing we want to minimize is negative externalities. It just so happens that under our current system, manipulating levels of consumption is the only lever our society has for affecting industrial emissions.

[prepend]

A carbon tax will shift shift purchases to government. So unless the goal is to have one group buying less, a carbon tax won’t matter too much. Since any drops in consumption will be offset by using that new tax revenue to do and buy stuff.

If we want to buy less we need to shrink the economy, including government spend.

Personally, I’m just trying to build more things and gather more things myself. Buys less and saves money.

[bognition]

The money collected from the carbon tax would have to be earmarked for things that improve our ecological situation: carbon sequestration, replanting forests, buying and protecting land, etc...

[prepend]

That’s buying things no? Sequestration systems. Tree nurseries and all the stuff to service forests.

Buying land gives money to someone who buys stuff.