(task) Republican statesmen propose replacing Obama’s climate plans with a carbon tax - The Washington Post

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climate change, Petro, carbon tax, economics

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> https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/02/07/senior-republican-leaders-propose-replacing-obamas-climate-plans-with-a-carbon-tax/?utm_term=.32e4cdbc6781 <https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/02/07/senior-republican-leaders-propose-replacing-obamas-climate-plans-with-a-carbon-tax/?utm_term=.32e4cdbc6781>
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> Republican statesmen propose replacing Obama’s climate plans with a carbon tax
> <>James A. Baker, seen here at former first lady Nancy Reagan’s funeral in March 2016, is a member of the Climate Leadership Council. Despite its impeccable Republican credentials, the group faces long odds with its carbon-tax idea. (Jae C. Hong/Associated Press)
> A coalition of veteran GOP officials — including five who have either served as treasury secretary or as chairs of the Council of Economic Advisers — will meet Wednesday with top White House officials to discuss the prospect of imposing a national carbon tax, rather than using federal regulations, to address climate change.
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> The newly formed Climate Leadership Council — which includes James A. Baker, Henry Paulson, George P. Shultz, Marty Feldstein and Greg Mankiw — is proposing <https://www.clcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/TheConservativeCaseforCarbonDividends.pdf> elimination of nearly all of the Obama administration’s climate policies in exchange for a rising carbon tax that starts at $40 per ton and is returned in the form of a quarterly check from the Social Security Administration to every American.
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> “Mounting evidence of climate change is growing too strong to ignore,” the proposal said. “While the extent to which climate change is due to man-made causes can be questioned, the risks associated with future warming are too big and should be hedged. At least we need an insurance policy.”
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> Despite the group’s impeccable Republican credentials — Baker, Paulson and Schultz served as treasury secretaries and Feldstein and Mankiw as CEA chairs, under GOP presidents — the proposal faces long odds.
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> Many congressional Republicans are adamantly against a tax increase of any kind, and President Trump repeatedly emphasized he is far more interested in promoting the extraction of fossil fuels in United States than curbing the nation’s carbon emissions.
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> A proposed carbon tax also failed recently in a ballot initiative in Washington state, in part because it divided the environmental and social left — with many liberals wanting to use any revenue to invest in clean energy and other social causes rather than to return it to the public.
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> Neither President Trump’s nor Vice President Pence’s spokespeople immediately responded to requests seeking comment on the carbon tax proposal, and Pence’s public schedule did not list the meeting with the group.
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> The revenue-neutral “carbon fee and dividend” idea, as it is sometimes called, has been popular among economists, including conservative ones, for years. It has also been strongly embraced by some leading climate scientists, such as former NASA researcher James Hansen, and advocacy groups like Citizen’s Climate Lobby. But never before have major Republican statesmen from past administrations aligned behind it as publicly as they’re doing now <https://www.clcouncil.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/TheConservativeCaseforCarbonDividends.pdf>.
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> The policymakers estimate that the average family of four would receive $2,000 annually in dividends from the fee if it starts at $40 per ton — hard to see why that wouldn’t be popular — and as the tax rises, so would their dividends. This would naturally create a constituency for ever-tougher climate change action.
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> As soon as the plan was hatched, it got a tweet endorsement from Mitt Romney:
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> Thought-provoking plan from highly respected conservatives to both strengthen the economy & confront climate risks: http://www.clcouncil.org  <https://t.co/U6kmrQTPth>— Mitt Romney (@MittRomney) 7:17 PM - 7 Feb 2017 <https://twitter.com/MittRomney/status/829121887217319938>
> Among Trump administration leaders, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is also familiar with and supportive of a carbon tax, which he championed at ExxonMobil. In general, however, Trump Cabinet appointees have been largely noncommittal about the issue of climate change and its human causation, seeming more to try to deflect on the topic than to be seeking some big idea to break the political logjam over it.
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> Meanwhile, at agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency and Energy Department, Trump transition teams have brimmed with conservative think tank personas who have a history of questioning the science of climate change and standing up for fossil fuels. It is also unclear how a carbon tax would help the carbon intensive coal industry, as Trump has pledged to do — except perhaps by helping to render carbon capture and storage technologies more economical.
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> The new idea is quintessentially conservative, the group argues, because not only would it not increase the size of government — revenue would go to the public instead of to new government programs — but, by canceling out Obama’s climate regulatory moves, it would reduce it.
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> “In order to separate the consideration of carbon taxes from debates over size of government, most carbon tax proposals are now revenue-neutral,” the proponents wrote. “This proposal, however, would go one step further by shrinking the overall size of government and streamlining the regulatory state.”
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> The question, however, is whether the current White House is up for big, wonky crossover ideas — especially when recent polling suggests that only a small fraction of Trump voters even believe in human-caused climate change <https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2017/02/02/survey-only-a-quarter-of-trump-voters-believe-in-human-caused-climate-change/>.
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> “Now that the Republican Party controls the White House and Congress, it has the opportunity and responsibility to promote a climate plan that showcases the full power of enduring conservative convictions,” Baker and his colleagues wrote.
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