I liked Sky Hatter’s column very much. Hatter points out that the climate change situation is very dire, and calls for cooperation and a plan to stop pumping disastrous quantities of carbon into the atmosphere. This is right on the money.
Here is a big piece of the plan that we need: a tax on carbon, with the revenue returned to the population on a per-capita basis. People who burn less carbon than average would end up ahead. People who drive Hummers and fly a lot would pay more. Use of fossil fuels would go down because the cost would go up. Renewable sources of energy would become cheaper and would be used a lot more.
A research group called Regional Economic Modeling incorporated to examine the effect of a carbon tax from now until 2030. The results: a big decrease in carbon emissions. And more prosperity, with about 2 million more jobs than business-as-usual. And, of course, less global warming.
A tax alone won’t stop global warming. It will take new technology and a change in how we choose to live our lives. But such a tax would push us all in the right direction.
The Citizens Climate Lobby works in hundreds of chapters in North America and in a number of other countries. One chapter is active here in Oak Park. Check it out on the Web, and consider joining our drive to get a revenue-neutral carbon tax enacted.
Doug Burke
Oak Park
