Hacker News Reader

But it is the middle class’s problem. If we take the Oxfam figure that the top one per cent cause sixteen per cent of the world’s emissions, it’s impossible to achieve sufficient reductions in emissions without action by the ninety-nine per cent.⁰ And of course quite a lot of the top one per cent are in fact ‘middle class’ by Western standards.

0: https://www.oxfam.org/en/press-releases/richest-1-emit-much-...

View on HN

Your source also says 'The richest 10 percent accounted for half (50 percent) of emissions.'

Right, well, again, it would be very hard to meaningfully respond to climate change ignoring half of emissions.

It’s plausible that very little should be asked of the bottom half, who contribute under ten per cent of emissions if we follow Oxfam’s methodology.⁰ That would exclude nearly everybody in the West, though. And I take it that people on HN do not mean the global middle class when they say ‘middle class’.

0: https://oxfamilibrary.openrepository.com/bitstream/handle/10...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com