Billionaires emit more CO₂ in 90 minutes than most people do in a lifetime
oxfam.orgTheir main demand seems pretty reasonable to me:
"ban or punitively tax carbon-intensive luxury consumptions — starting with private jets and superyachts"
You don't even need to go to punitive taxation. Simply charging them the associated costs would be enough. The parking cost for a private jet should not be any less than the cost to park a car or, more rightly, the dozen cars that could fill the same space. Similarly with the superyachts, charging full price for the inevitable support and emergency service requests would drive down usage without needing to go anywhere near "punitive" taxation.
https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/news-and-advice/why-it-...
>>Britain's most expensive airport parking is at Heathrow Terminal 5, where the 24-hour rate of £51.80 costs more than an off-peak flight to Aberdeen. Heathrow, along with Gatwick and Stansted, does not routinely handle light aircraft. Manchester is by far the biggest regional airport. It charges £35 for 24 hours in the short-stay car park, but only £21 to park a Piper PA-46 – a six-seater light aircraft that weighs just under two tonnes.
Someone should sell paper costumes so that you can make your car look like an airplane and save on parking fees ;)
The problem is that it doesn't matter.
Most of that those giant emissions are your daily commute etc. The aren't enough private jets to really make a dent compared to all the middle-class car drivers.
Merely being a reasonable demand isn't enough to get a law or treaty. A good intention won't be enough, a likely significant effect is politically necessary.
>> Most of that those giant emissions are your daily commute etc.
Daily commutes, even by IC car, are not the bulk of carbon emissions. Carbon emissions from all transport are only about 1/3 of total emissions, with commutes being a subset of that. The bulk of emissions, the other 2/3, are from non-transport things like electricity and food production. Installing some solar panels and not eating meat might be more effective than avoiding the daily commute.
Yes, and no matter how much less meat the billionaires eat, it's not going to move the needle.
A treaty that is sure not to move the needle won't get signed.
It's not about the effectiveness: it's about the message.
Wow. So instead of fighting climate change with measures that are actually effective, we’re going with ineffective measures with good “messaging?” I’m sure the millions of climate refugees in 2100 will appreciate our spot on messaging!
> The problem is that it doesn't matter.
This line of reasoning can be applied at any level: "my commute to the office? Oh, that doesn't matter, it's the big factories, the big coal-based power plants that pollute. It's the billionaires that pollute. Not me."
So either we all stop shifting the blame on somebody else and we all start cutting our carbon emissions or, we might as well enjoy polluting: we can still blame it on somebody else! (i'm being bitterly sarcastic here)
"On average, a billionaire’s investment portfolio is almost twice as polluting as an investment in the S&P 500". That is very interesting.
However, I don't think their investment should really count (or at least not totally) as their own co2 emissions. If they have shares in BP or Shell for example, the emissions of those two companies should be counted towards those who buy their products, in my opinion.
Agreed. I thought the comments about the private jets and yachts were fair, because those things emit so much carbon and solely for the pleasure/convenience of the billionaire. But throwing "investments" into the mix kind of ruined the message for me, because it's not like those companies are only servicing the billionaire.
If you're making money, you're burning carbon (either directly or indirectly).
> Reduce the emissions of the richest. Governments must introduce permanent income and wealth taxes on the top 1 percent, ban or punitively tax carbon-intensive luxury consumptions —starting with private jets and superyachts— and regulate corporations and investors to drastically and fairly reduce their emissions.
If europeans are so upset about the emission of American private jets and yachts, don't grant landing/overflight/docking permissions then? Most of that fuel would be used crossing the Atlantic. Build a few more nice airplane first class suites in the EU airlines so the billionaires can still travel with their comforts?
My reading of the article was that African&Asian countries are upset because they
1. suffer the most from global warming
and
2. currently aren't in any position to negotiate or enforce their rights
Relevant quotes:
"Counting dead bodies after a typhoon isn’t something any child should have to do."
"Rich countries have failed to keep their $100 billion climate finance promise"
"Rich countries continue to resist calls for climate reparations."
Is a citizen of a an African/Asian country, we're just pissed we can't live like the G7 folk do. Nothing more.
You only have to observe how we behave once we get residence in EU/America/Australia and how quickly we forget our compatriots left behind.
Don't fall for this faux outrage.
I remember listening to `Climate Justice | James Lindsay & Michael O'Fallon | Changing Tides Ep. 1` talking about this
https://youtu.be/1A8oyO9LoOo?list=PLZJe-MWy0cYc6g4XGnbAdenV4...
You're cherry-picking and generalizing an entire population based on anecdotal evidence. Sounds like you're projecting.
That would help. A better way of tackling the issue is:
Governments must introduce permanent income and wealth taxes on the top 1 percent, ban or punitively tax carbon-intensive luxury consumptions —starting with private jets and superyachts— and regulate corporations and investors to drastically and fairly reduce their emissions.
This would probably require some kind of revolution to achieve. But yes, basically that's what we need for rationality.
> If europeans are so upset about the emission of American private jets and yachts,
Americans should be, too.
Some billionaires will get touched by this report and will buy a country's worth of forest to become "carbon-neutral" /s
Seriously though, its not the absolute value of direct impact that matters here (or even the indirect via their investments) but the multiple negative messages that it sends to the billions of non-billionaires:
- that the burden of shifting towards sustainable living will not be felt and shared fairly
- that the pinnacle of "worldy success" means also not caring about your impact on the rest
While countless studies have looked at corporate and consumer responsibilities at macro level, the role of individual ownership much less so. Mostly the work of Chancel and Piketty
So Oxfam is just a socialist think-tank now? These numbers make for a great headline, but they really don't mean anything. You could take every penny from every billionaire in the world today and it wouldn't really make a difference in the grand scheme of things.
Millions of people being lifted from lower into middle-class is sure to be much worse for climate change. Poorer countries tend to not have the infrastructure to support a green power grid, and they generally need carbohydrates to industrialize.
In many countries the top 10% of earners tend to bankroll most government spending due to progressive taxation. If that income was distributed to the bottom 90%, the lower tax brackets would lead to much lower tax revenue in advanced economies, meaning that governments have less to spend on switching to green power sources and the infrastructure to support them.
But of course blaming the rich is a more comfortable truth for many, because covering up envy as a fight against injustice is killing two birds of morality with one stone.