Hacker News Reader

Comment by alfredallan1 | Hacker News Reader

I’m less liberal than many, but I’m curious how the conservative movement feels issues like climate change and clean oceans and clean air, or even net neutrality ought to be dealt with, if not by govt regulation. Or is the line of thinking that only those rich enough to buy face masks, and have climate controlled mansions with private beaches may enjoy those things.. Maybe this is entirely orthogonal to this thread, so maybe there could be a separate HN thread just for this discussion? I welcome your suggestion and am wholly on board but I really don’t think individually emailing you is the most productive method to have, what is in fact, a wide ranging discussion with multiple participants.

View on HN

>I’m less liberal than many, but I’m curious how the conservative movement feels issues like climate change and clean oceans and clean air

Generally, via Pigovian taxes that internalize the externality consistently without creating additional distortions or utilizing arbitrary ad-hoc regulation — ideally in a revenue-neutral way via dividends.

See, for example, the Trent Lott-John Breaux group announced this week to push for the Baker-Shultz carbon dividend plan (supported by economists including former CEA chairs Greg Mankiw and Martin Feldstein and Fed chairs Ben Bernanke and Janet Yellen).

(It should be noted that the Clean Air Act and the formation of the EPA came under Richard Nixon, of all people.)

[0] Americans for Carbon Dividends (new group, political): http://www.afcd.org

[1] Climate Leadership Council (old group, academic): https://www.clcouncil.org

[2] AFCD Article: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/19/climate/carbon-tax-climat...

[3] This year's op-ed on AFCD: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/opinion/climate-change-fe...

[4] Last year's op-ed on CLC (economists): https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/08/opinion/a-conservative-ca...

[5] Last year's op-ed on CLC (politicians): https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-conservative-answer-to-climat...

If that approach truly had broad support among conservatives, it likely would have been implemented by now. (I consider myself very liberal and am a strong supporter of such an approach.) But the reality is that a plurality of US conservatives still (as of 2015) believe that the impacts of climate change will never materialize. https://news.gallup.com/poll/182807/conservative-republicans...

Right. That covers how to solve them, not that they should be solved. (But I suspect Bay Area conservatives aren't heavily represented in the climate change denialism group.)

Sure - but it’s important to distinguish that that’s a mainstream view among a relatively small subset of conservatives, not a mainstream view among conservatives in general (though I agree that the split is probably different in Silicon Valley). Liberals support a broader range of solutions, some of which would create harmful economic distortions, but my impression is that few liberals would choose the status quo over the approach you’re suggesting.

To put it another way, if you’re a single-issue voter in favor of Pigouvian taxes on greenhouse gas emissions, you’re probably better off voting straight-line Democrat than straight-line Republican. If it were a question of whether to implement a Pigouvian tax or, say, subsidies for wind and solar, that would be a different story (and there’s a decent chance that I’d vote Republican).

The Baker-Shultz plan was written in February 2018 so it's going to take some time until it is finally implemented. Also, a lot of hard-core party line Republicans are old and hold the same beliefs from decades ago. These are the conservatives who believe that climate change is all a hoax. When they die, their voices and beliefs will phase out and the voices of the new evolving GOP will phase in. Just my two cents.

The plan was actually written in February 2017. Pardon my mistake.

Older Americans are overrepresented among climate change deniers, but not overwhelmingly so. As of 2014, 44% of climate change deniers are under 50, and 77% are under 65 [0]. So most will still be around for several decades. More concerning to me are those who will acknowledge the impacts of climate change but balk at the costs of addressing it, further delaying action. And of course, even if and when a global consensus is reached that significant action is needed, that action will take years or decades to take effect.

In the meantime, how many trillions of dollars will we spend to address relatively immediate impacts such as flooding in coastal regions and changes in growth patterns for crops? And how many trillions of dollars will we add to the cost of reversing climate change's effects - if it's even possible to reverse them at all? Not to mention non-economic consequences like the disruption of marine ecosystems.

[0] https://news.gallup.com/poll/168620/one-four-solidly-skeptic...

As a conservative from the SF Bay Area, I support putting a price on carbon. I see this as an opportunity for Republicans to take a seat at the climate table and make sure that our voices are being heard. The gradual increasing tax that the Baker-Shultz plan proposes would incentivize companies to innovate and transition toward greener energy. Because this revenue-neutral tax would be passed on to consumers in the form of a monthly dividend, the economy would benefit because there will be more consumer spending. This Pigovian/correctional tax would help the free market in accounting for unforeseen individual costs/benefits. Additionally, about 70% of Americans would be net financial winners. Plus, the plan would make a lot of current regulations unnecessary, reducing the size of government. What's interesting to note is the fact that a lot of young conservative Republicans are supporting this (like the group Students for Carbon Dividends) revenue-neutral carbon tax. I think that as time goes on, the GOP will evolve and it won't be unusual for conservatives to address climate instability.

The result of the conservativism and libertarian things you mention are not properly considered. It results in what is known as the Tragedy of the Commons.

As personal profit and selfishness takes a greater precedence than the wellbeing of the public, the commons must suffer tragedy.

It is indeed true that selfish motives take precedence - in the minds/deliberations of those that stand to profit. But isn’t a govt formed of the elected representatives, who are in office just to represent the interests of the commons?

I think an argument is that at some point the government becomes an entity of its own e.g. thousands of faceless bureaucrats so they are not fighting for the commons but for their own existence.

This is getting OT, but I think there is a mimetic and performative nature to any discussion larger than, say, four people that means you can never get serious as a group (or on a web forum). In any event would love to hear from you.

Yes, this is both generally relevant, but specifically OT.

Hope the mods split it off.

There is indeed a performative aspect to a broad discussion, but it offers the advantage of raising broad based issues that just might not occur to an individual in a limited closed session.

While HN is not immune to the cons of online communities, I feel a generally civil tone, free of political snark, or heavy biases can be maintained.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com