Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by freedomben 1567 days ago
> or what the solution should be (e.g. carbon tax).

There's a ton of nuance around what the solution should be. a carbon tax is one, but far from the only one, and it has a lot of downsides. It's difficult to measure and enforce, and creates ripe breeding ground for corruption. It's harmful to the economy, harmful (in some ways) to the development of alternative energies, and it's mainly the developing nations that are the biggest problem, but the carbon tax either doesn't apply to them or it would stifle their development, which is bad for humanitarian reasons (and pretty damn unfair given that the US was allowed to develop restriction free)..

I'm not saying we shouldn't consider a carbon tax, because it might be one of the better options. But there's definitely nuance around it and plenty of important ideas to debate and discuss.