Beating Something With Vague Aspirations
Kevin Drum’s done a series of posts on the carbon tax versus cap and trade issue recently, but I think the last one gets at the most important bit.
I’d put it this way: It’s true that the carbon tax I would design would be better policy than the cap-and-trade program congress is designing, but by the same token the cap-and-trade program I would design is better than the carbon tax law congress would right. Congress is an inherently problematic institution, populated by flawed human beings who are primarily accountable to the short-term desires of narrow interest groups. Consequently, it’s a rare day indeed when a congressional process results in an optimal policy outcome. But that’s just life. There’s no sense pretending that if advocates took a different approach that the inherent limits of politics would be transcended.
14 Responses to “Beating Something With Vague Aspirations”
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May 12th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
Points to remember: A carbon tax would get “polluted” gamed and bloated just like the rest of the tax code; a carbon tax is not on the table anyway; the debate right now is really about Waxman-Markey – and in Wax-Mark, the complimentary measures are about *80 percent* of the reductions, with cap and trade as a catch-all for the remainder. Eighty percent.
So even the blogo wonk debate is not focused. Again, urge everyone to read Joe Romm at Climate Progress.
May 12th, 2009 at 3:45 pm
My Congress Write Or Wrong!
May 12th, 2009 at 4:13 pm
I’m just being a troll.
Everyone makes mistakes. I seem to remember Yglesias agreeing with Ezra Klein some time ago and bashing Tom Friedman for implying a distinction between a carbon tax and cap-and-trade plan in one of his columns. Klein was convinced that this was because Friedman wanted to imitate David Broder and say everyone was wrong (which was the immediate context of the column). Yglesias did his smarmy “I’d put it this way” routine and said it was because Friedman was stupid. These competing but also complementary memes were, in that case, misapplied, but the conventional wisdom of liberals consumes all facts in the fire of its resentful righteousness.
May 12th, 2009 at 4:14 pm
… Not that this is important in any way.
May 12th, 2009 at 4:16 pm
A measure of our modern madness is the argument between two varieties of carbon encumbrance, both of which are regressive, expensive, unnecessary and lethal.
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May 12th, 2009 at 4:25 pm
Nuclear power and more trees. This is an easy solution to a nebulous problem. Leave the sackcloth, ashes, and scourges, to idiot environmentalists and their religion.
May 12th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
This is rather neatly sidestepping the fact that we’re drifting into a constitutional crisis, *again*, because of an archaic document that we have far too much pride in.
May 12th, 2009 at 5:06 pm
MY argument here ‘proves too much’ since as stated it could be used to ignore pretty much all policy proposals that aren’t currently embedded in Congressional legislation that is likely to pass. If better policy is feasible with a bit more work (and that needs to be argued under realistic assumptions), then it seems silly to propose that those arguments cannot be made since Congress in its wisdom is currently off trying do something else.
Some people are going to push for a well designed carbon tax and some people are going to push for a well designed public transport policy, even if both are not on the Congressional docket right now.
BTW, I don’t think Congress would mess up a carbon tax as much as cap-and-trade, and the legal and interest group issues are sufficiently different that outcomes thirty years down the line are going to be sufficiently different to at least care which system we get. Think western water law for cap-and-trade without any necessity for going that way…
May 12th, 2009 at 6:25 pm
“There’s no sense pretending that if advocates took a different approach that the inherent limits of politics would be transcended.”
But here’s the thing:
We’re going to be at this for 50 years.
When you’re designing a government program that is going to span generations, you want to design it properly.
Think about Social Security. It was designed in a gimmick-free manner, and it’s served us well for eighty years. Cap’n Trade is a stupid way to approach the global warming problem, and we’re going to be stuck dealing with the unpleasant political and climate fallout its architecture leaves in its wake for a looooong time because folks just wanted to pass something now.
A fully rebated carbon tax could politically be strong enough to actually let us deal with the problem in the long run. Too bad folks like Matthew and Kevin aren’t that interested in dealing the problem in the long run.
May 12th, 2009 at 6:37 pm
Nuclear is way too expensive, and there is not enough uranium in the world anyway. Plus, there’s the waste issue. Nuclear is a niche solution.
And Petey’s argument is wrong. The framework being considered now can be modified over time, and it can work. And the climate science dictates that we must begin making cuts in emissions NOW. The perfect is the enemy of the necessary-for-survival.
Carbon taxes are not happening now. At all. It’s a fantasy. Therefore, there is no point in discussing it. Even better than carbon taxes: voluntary universal emissions reductions. That is also a fantasy. They are equivalent fantasies. n
Until a President runs on carbon taxes, and gets elected, it will remain a fantasy. It’s not “matthew and kevin” and bloggers.
May 12th, 2009 at 8:40 pm
It’s true that the carbon tax I would design would be better policy than the cap-and-trade program congress is designing, but by the same token the cap-and-trade program I would design is better than the carbon tax law congress would right. Congress is an inherently problematic institution, populated by flawed human beings
…whereas Matthew Yglesias is…
Oh never mind.
May 12th, 2009 at 9:17 pm
When I read Drum’s pieces I feel like I’m in some kind of alternate reality. It just seems so OBVIOUS to me that a carbon tax is clearly better. And it seems like Drum OBVIOUSLY thinks that cap-and-trade is the way to go and can’t fathom how a sincere, intelligent person would think otherwise. I have no idea where this gap is coming from.
The point, btw, isn’t that a carbon tax won’t have loopholes. It’s that there are far fewer points in a carbon tax bill that can be manipulated. To me, that’s an acknowledgment of the political reality, not ignoring it.
May 12th, 2009 at 9:45 pm
Hot, hot, hot news, kiddoes. Now the EPA says that a finding of endangerment from CO2 will not necessarily result in regulations. This is apparently in response to a White House memo that finds that regulating CO2, via the EPA, will result in too much economic damage. So, the ball is now in Congress’s Court, which is not playing team doubles very well. Meanwhile, the globe cools. What is wrong with all these pictures? C’mon, you’re bright people; think about it.
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May 12th, 2009 at 9:51 pm
Omigod, it gets even better. Apparently the memo even challenges the EPA’s pronouncement that CO2 endangers public health. Listen up, fellas; I could tell you a thing or two.
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