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Federal Carbon Tax

Humphrey Bogart said:
:nod:

Tobacco Farming is on the rebound in Ontario.

Tobacco is wildly profitable.  Big Tobacco is going to play the long game and if anyone thinks the Government is going to go after Big Tobacco, they are wrong.

JTI for instance, is 33% owned by the Japanese Government.  What is the GoC going to do to Tobacco, start stripping its assets if it doesn't pay settlements and enrage foreign governments in the process?

That’s one thing that still takes me aback some places I travel, how much people still smoke. I was in Japan a couple years back and there were a few places I just couldn’t walk into because of how smoky it was.
 
QV said:
If a carbon tax is about changing behaviors, then why not bypass the bs and just make it illegal to buy and drive that F-350 unless for an authorized, government approved, commercial purpose?  Otherwise it seems like a very passive-aggressive way to achieve one of it's goals.  If the government doesn't think you need that pick-up truck, then maybe you shouldn't have one.  It's happening with firearms.  Why not vehicles and other heavy polluters since climate change is the existential threat of our time? 

Don't give them any ideas. I am sure there are some out there who are advocating for this approach.
 
It’s more likely the government will propose something like a carbon points card: https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/should-canadians-carry-a-carbon-card-loaded-with-a-year-s-worth-of-points-1.4733293

This way they aren’t banning property, they are forcing people to minimize their carbon footprint or risk draining bank accounts.  The buying and selling of these points will create a new type of carbon market based commodity sector that is potentially very profitable.
 
CloudCover said:
It’s more likely the government will propose something like a carbon points card: https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/should-canadians-carry-a-carbon-card-loaded-with-a-year-s-worth-of-points-1.4733293

This way they aren’t banning property, they are forcing people to minimize their carbon footprint or risk draining bank accounts.  The buying and selling of these points will create a new type of carbon market based commodity sector that is potentially very profitable.

Just what we need in a big country like Canada. An urban centric model that will only end up punishing rural producers, and the transportation infrastructure they need to get food to market.

 
You know, it strikes me that as long as China, Russia, India and the rest of Asia, South America and Africa aren't on board with this whole thing (or are exempted so that they can "develop") we're just farting into the wind.

e.g. https://santiagotimes.cl/2017/03/06/santiago-among-top-10-cities-with-worst-traffic-jams-in-2017/
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/oct/09/revealed-20-firms-third-carbon-emissions

But so long as Justin can feel good about himself, or delude his supporters into feeling good about themselves, who am I to complain?

:pullhair:
 
FJAG said:
You know, it strikes me that as long as China, Russia, India and the rest of Asia, South America and Africa aren't on board with this whole thing (or are exempted so that they can "develop") we're just farting into the wind.

e.g. https://santiagotimes.cl/2017/03/06/santiago-among-top-10-cities-with-worst-traffic-jams-in-2017/
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/oct/09/revealed-20-firms-third-carbon-emissions

But so long as Justin can feel good about himself, or delude his supporters into feeling good about themselves, who am I to complain?

:pullhair:

Can you not make that argument about any number of things that are objectively positive and modern policy options? There are many problems in the world that we’re unable to unilaterally fix, and where Canada can’t even make a huge dent- but are still worthwhile/the right thing to do. I would consider measures to move us in reasonable ways towards an economy less damaging to the earth’s environment as among those. Bear in mind also that any new approach to a problem has to have first movers. Other countries might get onboard with this, that, or the other thing a generation down the road based on a couple decades’ worth of data.
 
Brihard said:
Can you not make that argument about any number of things that are objectively positive and modern policy options? There are many problems in the world that we’re unable to unilaterally fix, and where Canada can’t even make a huge dent- but are still worthwhile/the right thing to do. I would consider measures to move us in reasonable ways towards an economy less damaging to the earth’s environment as among those. Bear in mind also that any new approach to a problem has to have first movers. Other countries might get onboard with this, that, or the other thing a generation down the road based on a couple decades’ worth of data.

Sure you can make that same argument. I'm just a pessimist on this issue. I'm a firm believer that personal, national and political self interest will always outweigh altruism in the long run. If that wasn't the case, the 2nd amendment would have been repealed, sugar, salt and nicotine additives would have been controlled, nuclear weapons would have been banned, long ago.

Hell we can't even get 100% buy in on whale and dolphin hunting and have an enormous patch of garbage floating in the Pacific. If we can't take care of these simple things do you really think we'll be able to universally control our energy usage/carbon emissions through taxation or some nebulous credit program? Sure didn't seem like it in Brazil last month.

One would have a hard time even getting 197 countries to agree that the sky is blue without a multi-day summit, a dozen drafts of the resolution, and one country threatening to derail everything because they believe that turquoise should count as blue in some circumstances. On climate change, this process often results in the most tepid and toothless actions.

https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2019/12/18/21024283/climate-change-cop25-us-brazil-australia-japan

 
I'm okay with a carbon tax for the purpose of modifying behavior if behavior change is what we need. Money is the most effective lever that can be pulled other than going full authoritarian and making things illegal.

The Liberals are walking talking contradiction for using a carbon tax to modify behavior, while simultaneously arguing all of the other taxes they put on (like raising corporate tax rates or personal income tax) won't have an effect on the economy (in other words, it won't modify behavior).

The Conservatives are a walking talking contradiction for arguing that the carbon tax won't be effective unless it's raised to insanely high levels, while simultaneously arguing that any small tax increases will modify behavior so effectively it will destroy the economy.

All taxes modify individual decision-making and create inefficiencies as a result. That's basic economics that even the most Keynesian-drunk economists wouldn't argue with. This is simply a question of how much we *value* other things than simply dollars and cents. We make these value-based decisions all the time by having things like minimum wage, labour laws, etc... all of which create an inefficiency *but* we value other non-monetary aspects enough to accept the inefficiency.

For this reason, I think a carbon tax is actually a conservative (classical liberal) solution to the problem as it involves the least amount of government intervention possible for the maximum result. It's something the Conservatives should have thought of... and now they cornered because there is no other solution that would involve less government intrusion than the carbon tax.

That said, I also can't get over the futility..... Canada just isn't a big enough part of the problem for Canadians to be able to fix this by modifying their own behavior. If we really want to fight climate change, we need to export solutions to the real problem emitters. How to effectively manage that, as such a small and not influential country, I have no idea....
 
ballz said:
That said, I also can't get over the futility..... Canada just isn't a big enough part of the problem for Canadians to be able to fix this by modifying their own behavior. If we really want to fight climate change, we need to export solutions to the real problem emitters. How to effectively manage that, as such a small and not influential country, I have no idea....

Its easy, first off we stop buying products from countries that refuse to follow similar environmental standards as Canada, or tariff it significantly (to the point it would be cheaper to make in Canada even with our regulations). Then we open up industry in country with our high standards, creating excellent jobs, helping the environment, and overall benefiting the world. The tariff money could be used for environmental projects such as trying to clean the plastic out of the pacific (which again creates tons of jobs).

If we stopped shipping our raw resources to places like China, they would be forced to seriously cut their manufacturing, which would only help the planet.

That's why I laugh whenever the modern 'environmentalists' have a factory or industry shutdown in Canada, its just picked up somewhere else in the world with less environmental standards and ultimately ends up being worse for the planet.

Other benefits of manufacturing locally means less fuel burned in transportation (these international shipping ships burn a ton of fuel every year, both ways as we send the resources to them and get a product back), a higher quality product (usually), taxes earned in country increase, our self sustainability in the event of war goes up, and ultimately its more ethical as they have to pay a realistic wage in Canada unlike some of these countries where it is essentially slave labour with no safety regulations.
 
1) Tariffs are essentially taxes on ourselves.

2) Whenever you start paying more for something you already have, your standard of consumption - which is a proxy for standard of living - falls because overall you must consume less.

3) If creating excellent jobs is the path to prosperity, try to imagine running a 20-year experiment during which we cede to all demands by workers for more compensation.

4) Also try to imagine opening up industry in a country where most industrial undertakings must overcome at least some energetic litigation.
 
Eaglelord17 said:
Its easy, first off we stop buying products from countries that refuse to follow similar environmental standards as Canada, or tariff it significantly (to the point it would be cheaper to make in Canada even with our regulations). Then we open up industry in country with our high standards, creating excellent jobs, helping the environment, and overall benefiting the world. The tariff money could be used for environmental projects such as trying to clean the plastic out of the pacific (which again creates tons of jobs).

If we stopped shipping our raw resources to places like China, they would be forced to seriously cut their manufacturing, which would only help the planet.

That's why I laugh whenever the modern 'environmentalists' have a factory or industry shutdown in Canada, its just picked up somewhere else in the world with less environmental standards and ultimately ends up being worse for the planet.

Other benefits of manufacturing locally means less fuel burned in transportation (these international shipping ships burn a ton of fuel every year, both ways as we send the resources to them and get a product back), a higher quality product (usually), taxes earned in country increase, our self sustainability in the event of war goes up, and ultimately its more ethical as they have to pay a realistic wage in Canada unlike some of these countries where it is essentially slave labour with no safety regulations.

So environmental communism?  Sounds wonderful  :rofl:

 
Brad Sallows said:
1) Tariffs are essentially taxes on ourselves.

2) Whenever you start paying more for something you already have, your standard of consumption - which is a proxy for standard of living - falls because overall you must consume less.

3) If creating excellent jobs is the path to prosperity, try to imagine running a 20-year experiment during which we cede to all demands by workers for more compensation.

4) Also try to imagine opening up industry in a country where most industrial undertakings must overcome at least some energetic litigation.

1) If you choose to buy the products yes there is a price to pay. The reality is we shall be paying more for these items in the future, we just aren't paying for the environmental costs today. When you buy from a factory in India, China, etc. who just pollutes with no environmental controls, we are selling our futures for short term gain. If they choose to start following similar environmental standards then we start removing tariffs.

2) I am convinced our standard of living in the western world is on a steady decline. As the rest of the world becomes wealthier they are able to start to afford the standard we take for granted which shall slowly push up prices either way. We need to stop making items which are designed to be broken and thrown out instead of fixed. Higher prices can be justified if the item lasts significantly longer. The problem with that is, it doesn't drive the massive profit margins that companies want.

One interesting thing though is with automation there is less workers needed to produce products so the cost can go down either way. This isn't the 1950s, places that used to require over 16,000 people to run now run on 3500.

3) So you think its acceptable to pay someone a fraction of what you would accept for pay for a similar job? Not to mention you expect them to do it in a more hazardous way with much less safety and environmental regulations to protect them. I can tell you the minimum wage 'service' economy is a joke, and there is a ever expanding gap between the public sector and private sector in this country. I am not saying that unions or ceding to workers demands is what we need (that's why the public service has ballooned so much), what I am saying is manufacturing jobs pay much more than working at Timmies, but requires the same skill level. If you were a highschool graduate with no other education would you rather make 30$ a hour or 15$? 

4) Those are barriers we have set ourselves, we can also remove those barriers.

And this isn't totalitarianism this is levelling the playing field. You don't have to buy products from those countries but we won't stop you from doing so. You just will have to pay the costs which aren't factored in when the item was manufactured. Not having environmental regulations in these countries is basically a massive subsidy by foreign governments, and globally we will pay the price long term.

You all are right, changing the little things in Canada won't make a massive difference globally as long as everyone else isn't on board. The way you get them on board is by hitting them where it hurts, their cheque books. I'm not even fully convinced in all the global warming arguments, most of them don't hold water in my opinion. But what I am convinced of is we need to change some of how we do things as the world has only so much resources. The throw away model needs to change.
 
Eaglelord17 said:
If we stopped shipping our raw resources to places like China, they would be forced to seriously cut their manufacturing, which would only help the planet.

You appear to believe Canada has some kind of serious influence in the world and are proposing Canada start trade wars to try and force other countries to be more environmentally responsible. Canada has very little influence, countries like China don't need Canada.

Canadian imports make up a grant total of 1% of China's total imports, and there are tons of other countries lining up to replace any of our goods.

Canada makes up less than 3% of Chinese exports, but Chinese exports make up 16-17% of Canadians imports. Who do you think is going to feel the tariffs more?

Regarding your comment about taxing Canadians and then paying Canadians to go pick up plastic being a great way to create jobs.... the fact there is anybody out there that thinks that's how job growth / economics works terrifies me.
 
Eaglelord17 said:
If we stopped shipping our raw resources to places like China, they would be forced to seriously cut their manufacturing, which would only help the planet.

That's not at all how commodities work. Commodities of the sort you're talking about are 'fungible'. China can import product x from Canada and use it as a raw material in production of a given item. If they don't get that raw material from us, they can just as easily import it from someone else and use it interchangeably.

As an actual example, let's take Ethylene Glycol. It's an industrial chemical used to make, among other things, polyester. A key material in low skill, low tech manufacturing such as clothing, furniture stuffing, etc. Pretty good, simple example.

Let's say tomorrow we decide we're no longer going to sell China Ethlyene Glycol. We sell them a lot of it, however we are one of a number of exporters. If Canada were to stop selling it to them, they would turn around and buy it from Saudi Arabia, for a slightly less cost efficient transaction. Demand for Saudi Ethlyene Gloycol goes up, price goes up a bit. But now we have a bunch we need to sell to someone else. Demand for ours is down, demand for Saudi product is up. We get a slight cost advantage that offsets transportation costs. Malaysia and Singapore both come knocking, and we sell ours to them instead of china. Supply and demand balance out, prices blip fractionally and stabilize. That's it. Substitute crud eoil, bauxite, what, whatever you want- simply refusing to sell to China would not be crippling or even particularly problematic thing. But, because we're now flexing weight we don't have, they might turn around and slap an export tariff on consumer gods that they have a commanding supply position in. Maybe a 10% export tariff on Apple products. Or maybe they slap a premium on the export of rare earth elements that we need for high tech and military production. Something to slap us around a bit and remind us that the tail does not wag the dog.

China is one of the biggest problems in moving towards more environemtnally friendly global supply chains... *but* they are also not idiots. They're choking on smog. China is very pragmatic, very rational, and extremely strategic. They're perfectly content to set thing in motion that will take 30, 50, or 100 years if it suits their long term national interest. We cannot coerce them. We can support the gneeration of sound science, we can support the incubation of technological inovation that creates more energy efficient products and processes, we can support advanced materials research, we can do things to improve the economics of more environmentally friendly power production, be it renewable or nuclear... Stuff like that. We can develop and refine (no pun intended) solutions that will provide options as other countries - including China - recognize that there are problems.

The earth's environment is a tragedy of the commons. Some will realize it sooner, some later. There's little to nothing we can do on an individual level to tangibly affect it other than making sentiments known to political leaders and at the ballot box. I wish our politicians could be less ideological and more evidence based about this- on all parties.
 
ballz said:
You appear to believe Canada has some kind of serious influence in the world and are proposing Canada start trade wars to try and force other countries to be more environmentally responsible. Canada has very little influence, countries like China don't need Canada.

Canadian imports make up a grant total of 1% of China's total imports, and there are tons of other countries lining up to replace any of our goods.

Canada makes up less than 3% of Chinese exports, but Chinese exports make up 16-17% of Canadians imports. Who do you think is going to feel the tariffs more?

Regarding your comment about taxing Canadians and then paying Canadians to go pick up plastic being a great way to create jobs.... the fact there is anybody out there that thinks that's how job growth / economics works terrifies me.

Positively terrified.  What the poster appears to be advocating for is really a return to Mercantilism for the sake of the Environment.

As you have rightly pointed out, this doesn't work because a) we have no actual influence in the world and b) we are wholely reliant on others for many/most goods and services within this country.

Canada has no closed looped system of Colonies or Client States that we could even hope to form any sort of closed system with. 

I don't know why anyone would think a closed loop economic system would even work.  History is replete with examples of this failure.  The Soviet Union essentially bankrupted itself by refusing to participate in the international monetary system or conduct any sort of external trade other than resources for hard currency and ended up indebting itself massively to bankers.

This also created a massive shadow economy in the country.  Minimal goods and services were available on the open market while criminal elements profited from actually selling goods & services people wanted/needed.



 
Carbon tax will be to the environment what the gas tax was to our roads.....
 
Bruce Monkhouse said:
Carbon tax will be to the environment what the gas tax was to our roads.....

In what way do you mean that?
 
Climate change is a hoax designed to get the wealthy to pay more in taxes, at least that would be the goal of the government. So far the US has avoided this fate but with one election that could change.
 
tomahawk6 said:
Climate change is a hoax

For reference to that  discussion,

Climate Change Super Thread 
https://navy.ca/forums/threads/32987.925
118 pages.
 
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