Climate Taxes: The Quick, Cheap & Easy Climate Change Solution
A Carbon Tax is the fastest and simplest way to get CO2 emissions under control. (Image: ClimateCrisis.net) |
| See our one page Tax Swap PDF or Tax Swap Spreadsheet with current ABS data. |
The Revenue Neutral Swith to Climate Taxes
A revenue-neutral switch to climate taxes is the best way to beat climate change!
- A carbon tax is the most economically efficient means to convey crucial price signals and spur carbon-reducing investment and low-carbon behaviour.
- A methane tax can be applied to ruminant stock on a per-head basis to encourage the transition to use of non-ruminant animals (E.g. Kangaroo) for meat and industrial hemp for fibre. (See Rural & Regional)
- Carbon Taxation is inherently progressive - the richer you are the more carbon you emit.
- Climate Taxation does not stop working when some (inadequate) target level is reached - it keeps pushing emissions down regardless.
- A switch to eco-taxes can be made progressive so no / low income earners are better off too.
More Eco-Tax ⇒ More Jobs!
- Eco-Taxes steer the economy towards investment in 'sunrise' industries with greater export potential - i.e. More jobs!.
- Eco-Taxes encourage minimisation of energy usage rather than minimisation of labour usage - i.e. More jobs!
- Eco-Taxes are often simpler than the tangled web of taxes they replace - i.e. Less jobs for creative accountants, more jobs for everyone else!
Carbon Tax vs. Carbon Trading
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Here are the six reasons the Carbon Tax Center believes carbon taxes are superior to cap-and-trade systems:
- Carbon taxes will lend predictability to energy prices, whereas cap-and-trade systems will aggravate the price volatility that historically has discouraged investments in less carbon-intensive electricity generation, carbon-reducing energy efficiency and carbon-replacing renewable energy.
- Carbon taxes can be implemented much sooner than complex cap-and-trade systems. Because of the urgency of the climate crisis, we do not have the luxury of waiting while the myriad details of a cap-and-trade system are resolved through lengthy negotiations.
- Carbon taxes are transparent and easily understandable, making them more likely to elicit the necessary public support than an opaque and difficult to understand cap-and-trade system.
- Carbon taxes can be implemented with far less opportunity for manipulation by special interests, while a cap-and-trade system’s complexity opens it to exploitation by special interests and perverse incentives that can undermine public confidence and undercut its effectiveness.
- Carbon taxes address emissions of carbon from every sector, whereas cap-and-trade systems discussed to date have only targeted the electricity industry, which accounts for less than 40%
[in the US] of emissions.- Carbon tax revenues can be returned to the public through progressive tax-shifting, while the costs of cap-and-trade systems are likely to become a hidden tax as dollars flow to market participants, lawyers and consultants.
An Effective Global Emission Cap & Trade Treaty? - Not Likely!
There is no chance effective Carbon Trading scheme will ever be introduced for the following reasons:
- Each country has to be allocated a target. The developed world will never agree to an emissions target as low as China's emissions are now, and if China and India increases emissions to levels in the developed world then its "Game Over" for the biosphere.
- China and India strongly dislike Carbon Trading and will never agree to it. more...
- Emission target compliance is only evaluated at the end of the target period when its too late to do anything about it.
- There is a high risk of rorting and corruption given the complexity of carbon trading regimes.
A Global Carbon Tax Treaty? - The Way Forward
A global agreement that each nation swaps taxation on to greenhouse gasses is much more likely.
- There is no need to define emission targets for each country.
- There is no need to agree on what each country is emitting now or should emit in future.
- Compliance can be evaluated immediately.
- Each country has wide scope as to how their tax is set and spent.
- No adverse global economic impact as overall tax levels remain the same.
See our draft New Kyoto treaty.
Export Coal Tax
Australia supplies almost 40% of the world's coal and so can have a huge impact on the price of this damaging product. Our coal exports account for more than half of Australia's total emissions. (See "Out with the coal" by John Perkins.)
Through a combination of coal taxes and export quotas we could drive up the price of coal until other energy sources become more attractive. (This would need to be done carefully to ensure that our black coal wasn't substituted by even worse products such as brown coal or oil shales.) In the short term revenue from coal could stay the same as the lower volumes of coal is sold for a higher price. Ultimately though all coal mining has to stop if the biosphere is to be saved.
New Kyoto Treaty
Draft New Kyoto treaty. No global ETS, just get each nation or state to swap some old taxes for a new carbon tax!
The Carbon Tax Center
For more great information about the benefits of Carbon Taxes visit the Carbon Tax Center.
- Debunking the Myths.
- Cap & Trade Problems.
- FAQ.
- Winning Arguments.
OzPolitic
OzPolitic Green Tax shift Page.
Labor's Carbon Tax
13th Aug 2011:
Carbon Credits Scam
2nd July 2009: How Goldman Sachs has created and exploited succesive bubbles to enrich itself and how it plans to exploit the next bubble: Carbon Credits.
more...
Symbolic climate pledge
9th Jul 2009: "The G8 agreement was overshadowed by major developing nations rejecting even an aspirational goal for 2050. They wanted to see rich nations commit to emissions reductions of 40 per cent by 2020 before agreeing to a long-term goal." more...
Scrap emissions trading
23rd Feb 2009: "Economists on the left and the right who are concerned about global warming are now openly opposed to carbon trading as proposed by the Government and in favour of a carbon tax."
more...
Livestock methane issue
17th Feb 2008: 'Livestock reform is just a greenhouse whisper'. An Age article looking suggesting carbon labelling of food. (
US flags carbon tax
14th Feb 2008: "US Energy Secretary Steven Chu has floated the idea of a carbon emissions tax to fight global warming."
more...
Telling Omissions
17th December 2008: Tim Colebatch on the 5% target. more...
Act fast on emissions: Swan
30th Oct 2008: AUSTRALIA could lower the cost of tackling global warming by 15% if it moves quickly rather than waiting until the world is ready to act, according to Treasury modelling to be released today.
more...
Taxing carbon better
13th August 2008: An ETS seems to have been accepted, but a carbon tax might be a better solution. more...
No to Carbon Trading
15th July 2008: ONE of the world's best-known economists, Jeffrey Sachs, has warned Australia against using an emissions trading scheme to tackle climate change, saying it would never win global support....Professor Sachs said the concept was "highly disliked" by China and other developing countries, and they would never agree to it. more...
G-8 Climate Failure
10th July 2008: India and China rejected the Group of Eight's declaration on climate change yesterday as leaders of the developing world demanded that rich countries should take a stronger lead on preventing global warming. more...
Petrol $8 Litre by 2018
11th July 2008: PETROL prices could reach $8 a litre within a decade if oil production peaks and Australia is not ready to shift to alternatives, according to a CSIRO analysis. more...
British Columbia's CO2 Tax
26th Feb 2008: British Columbia will implement a carbon tax of $10 per
metric ton of carbon dioxide on July 1, rising in $5 / tonne annual increments to reach $30 in
2012. more...