Carbon tax with 100% dividend

Bad habits.

If politicians remain at loggerheads, citizens must lead. We must demand a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants. We must block fossil fuel interests who aim to squeeze every last drop of oil from public lands, off-shore, and wilderness areas. Those last drops are no solution. They yield continued exorbitant profits for a short-sighted self-serving industry, but no alleviation of our addiction or long-term energy source.

Moving from fossil fuels to clean energy is challenging, yet transformative in ways that will be welcomed. Cheap, subsidized fossil fuels engendered bad habits. We import food from halfway around the world, for example, even with healthier products available from nearby fields Local produce would be competitive if not for fossil fuel subsidies and the fact that climate change damages and costs, due to fossil fuels, are also borne by the public.

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Almost 40 per cent of carbon dioxide emissions in California comes from passenger vehicles. © US Environmental Protection Agency

A price on emissions that cause harm is essential. Yes, a carbon tax. Carbon tax with 100 per cent dividends is needed to wean us off fossil fuel addiction. Tax and dividend allows the marketplace, not politicians, to make investment decisions. Carbon tax on coal, oil and gas is simple, applied at the first point of sale or port of entry.

The entire tax must be returned to the public, an equal amount to each adult, a half-share for children. This dividend can be deposited monthly n an individual’s bank account. Carbon tax with 100 per cent dividend is non- egressive. On the contrary, you can bet that low and middle income people will find ways to limit their carbon tax and come out ahead. Profligate energy users will have to pay for their excesses. Demand for low-carbon high-efficiency products will spur innovation, making our products more competitive on international markets. Carbon emissions will plummet as energy efficiency and renewable energies grow rapidly. Black soot, mercury and other fossil fuel emissions will decline.

A brighter, cleaner future, with energy independence, is possible. Washington likes to spend our tax money line-by-line. Swarms of high- riced lobbyists in alligator shoes help ongress decide where to spend, and in turn the lobbyists’ clients provide “campaign” money
The public must send a message to Washington. Preserve our planet, creation, for our children and grandchildren, but do not use that as an excuse for more tax-and-spend. Let this be our motto: “One hundred per cent dividend or fight!”

Dr James Hansen directs the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, a laboratory of the Goddard Space Flight Center and a unit of the Columbia University Earth Institute. He spoke this week at the National Press Club and gave a briefing to the House Select Committee on Energy Independence & Global Warming. He is co-author of "Target atmospheric CO2: where should humanity aim?" The His proposed “tax and 100 per cent dividend” is based largely on the cap and dividend approach described by Peter Barnes in “Who Owns the Sky: Our Common Assets and the Future of Capitalism”, Island Press, Washington, D.C.,2001.

© People & the Planet 2000 - 2008 - COMPLETE ARTICLE

also see:

• CapAndDividend.org - How to curb global warming while protecting the incomes of American families. Download PDF
• Markey climate bill is best yet
• A Climate Change Proposal With Cash - U.S. News & World Report