You cannot make people adopt more expensive clean energy, because higher fuel prices are political suicide under any government.

Added to korrents 16 Aug 2023 · How quotes work · Something wrong? Tell us

Where this collides

• Cannot both be true

  Free markets alone cannot solve environmental and energy problems; legislation, regulation, and taxation are also necessary.

  MacKay says legislation, regulation and taxation are necessary alongside markets. Handmer says it is obviously impossible to make anyone adopt more expensive carbon-free energy, because higher fuel prices are political suicide under any system of government — which rules out the tax half of MacKay’s toolkit rather than disagreeing about whether it would work.

• Cannot both be true

  The way to cut emissions is to tax the most emission-intensive goods, not to stop growth.

  Milanovic’s alternative to degrowth is to tax emission-intensive goods and services so people consume less of them. Handmer says it is obviously impossible to make anyone adopt more expensive carbon-free energy, because higher fuel prices are political suicide under any system of government. Milanovic’s remedy is the thing Handmer says cannot be done.

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