> Which is fine, but it punishes us for travelling rather than encouraging us not to.
Why do you think this distinction is important, though? They seem like two sides of the same coin to me.
> Those with significant disposable income who might go on three or more leisure flights per year (e.g. one ski trip, one beach holiday, one city break) may not notice until it gets really expensive. They can often downgrade their hotel/restaurant/activity choices to compensate.
Sure that's true. But as you ratchet up the tax, fewer and fewer people can afford it. And if you set the tax at its efficient point, you can use the revenue it generates to offset the carbon the planes emit.
> However, it's a similar issue to arguments of an unfair eco burden being placed on developing countries - Those of us who have already benefitted from poisoning the world are now telling others that they have to rein in their emissions. If the richer people I mention above have to drop one of their annual foreign holidays due to the expense are still going on two more return trips than the ones who have to drop their only holiday.
This is a valid criticism for things like industrial development. I don't think it applies as much to leisure activities like jet travel, though I can see an argument for it there too.
However, you can structure the tax in a progressive way. Wealthier countries pay more, and subsidize poorer countries. So they each get to use comparable amounts of jet travel, but the richer countries pay much more than the poorer countries.
> All of this is a long winded way of saying that certain kinds of taxation solution can allow certain people to maintain their current lifestyle, by pricing others out of it.
Yes, that's exactly right though. At the end of the day, you either have to ban jet travel entirely, or treat it as a scarce resource. If you're not going to completely ban it, then you have to decide who gets to use it. The way we do that is with all our scarce resources is money.