Social engineering and the Pigou Club
Interesting post at:
http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2006/10/pigou-club-manifesto.html Raise the Gas Tax
I would like to see Congress increase the gas tax by $1 per gallon, phased in gradually by 10 cents per year over the next decade.
Besides my total agreement, I'm depressed that it is "too small, too late". There's simply no chance that $0.10/gal increase per year is sufficient to have any effect in consumption.
Then I read comments down to
Raising the gas tax to force changes in behavior smacks directly of social engineering. No matter how you dress it up (environment, congestion, etc), it is quite clear that is what is intended, to coerce changes in people's behavior. I find it quite similar to the social engineers(technically urban planners) who wish to impose their vision of society on the people. They dress their views up in similar rhetoric. They argue that it is good for the environment, less congestion, or my favorite "sustainable" cities. I have to ask you and them, what is wrong with letting people make their choices? I could agree with a higher gas tax, if it could be demonstrated that the cost of the gas tax (both explicit and implicit) would be less than the perceived environmental benefits.
I find this reply as thoughtful. No one wants to be "controlled" by others. We want our freedom to do what we want and we EXPECT anyone who tells us otherwise to PROVE the harm, and then they'll voluntarily refrain from doing something. However projections of the future are best proved by waiting until you get there but some harm may be irreversible, or much more expensive to deal with then.
Mostly when I hear rejections like this I think rather than trying to prove what can't be proven I'd prefer to pout and wait until the day I can say "I told you so."
What is wrong with letting people make their choices?
It's a funny game - choices. We're given a menu and we make our choice. Next year we're given a different menu and we make another choice. Our choices are limited by external circumstances beyond our control. However our decisions can effect our future choices. If everyone lived in their own world, they could do whatever they want and take the consequences.
However when YOUR choices now are affecting my future choices, then I imagine it is reasonable to set limits on your choices.
But it's more than just that. If collectively we're ALL reducing the future's potential, then we can all accept the consequences. I don't know. For me it comes down to an assumption that as long as we're dependent upon fossil fuels, there's no honest economics at all. We're all spending down inherited wealth and creating a world that can't exist in the future.
I can argue that if every human on earth had "choices" to use as much power as Americans, that the system would collapse because there's not enough available. Others can argue we'll transition to something new when we need it, and so its better to stay on course and just wait for circumstances to force change.
I suppose I must be arguing against myself, since I always back down to bullies who want to wait for the consequences to be apparent before changing course. It's a good way to learn, when you have wealth to burn.
It is fun to imagine the opposite approach to my retreat is militancy - taking matters into your own hands with terrorism or revolution as your means allow.
Extra fun to look at issues I don't support, like imaginary fears on the morality of killing unborn babies to justify killing doctors. At least there everyone can agree minimizing abortion is good, while there is no clear consensus that minimizing fossil fuel burning is good.
I'm basically a fatalist I guess. I'll let the fuckers destroy the world, and clean up my corner as I can. It just seems hopeless to fight.
I guess I don't want to be wrong either. That's what separates me from the fundamentalists. A fundamentalist will kill a logger or a doctor for their cause because they know they're right. I don't know what will happen. I expect things'll get ugly whether or not we decide to respond to peak oil or climate change. Bad things will happen, people will suffer and die, and others will survive, and move on as choices happen.
We're just dumb animals too clever for our cages.
http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2006/10/pigou-club-manifesto.html Raise the Gas Tax
I would like to see Congress increase the gas tax by $1 per gallon, phased in gradually by 10 cents per year over the next decade.
Besides my total agreement, I'm depressed that it is "too small, too late". There's simply no chance that $0.10/gal increase per year is sufficient to have any effect in consumption.
Then I read comments down to
Raising the gas tax to force changes in behavior smacks directly of social engineering. No matter how you dress it up (environment, congestion, etc), it is quite clear that is what is intended, to coerce changes in people's behavior. I find it quite similar to the social engineers(technically urban planners) who wish to impose their vision of society on the people. They dress their views up in similar rhetoric. They argue that it is good for the environment, less congestion, or my favorite "sustainable" cities. I have to ask you and them, what is wrong with letting people make their choices? I could agree with a higher gas tax, if it could be demonstrated that the cost of the gas tax (both explicit and implicit) would be less than the perceived environmental benefits.
I find this reply as thoughtful. No one wants to be "controlled" by others. We want our freedom to do what we want and we EXPECT anyone who tells us otherwise to PROVE the harm, and then they'll voluntarily refrain from doing something. However projections of the future are best proved by waiting until you get there but some harm may be irreversible, or much more expensive to deal with then.
Mostly when I hear rejections like this I think rather than trying to prove what can't be proven I'd prefer to pout and wait until the day I can say "I told you so."
What is wrong with letting people make their choices?
It's a funny game - choices. We're given a menu and we make our choice. Next year we're given a different menu and we make another choice. Our choices are limited by external circumstances beyond our control. However our decisions can effect our future choices. If everyone lived in their own world, they could do whatever they want and take the consequences.
However when YOUR choices now are affecting my future choices, then I imagine it is reasonable to set limits on your choices.
But it's more than just that. If collectively we're ALL reducing the future's potential, then we can all accept the consequences. I don't know. For me it comes down to an assumption that as long as we're dependent upon fossil fuels, there's no honest economics at all. We're all spending down inherited wealth and creating a world that can't exist in the future.
I can argue that if every human on earth had "choices" to use as much power as Americans, that the system would collapse because there's not enough available. Others can argue we'll transition to something new when we need it, and so its better to stay on course and just wait for circumstances to force change.
I suppose I must be arguing against myself, since I always back down to bullies who want to wait for the consequences to be apparent before changing course. It's a good way to learn, when you have wealth to burn.
It is fun to imagine the opposite approach to my retreat is militancy - taking matters into your own hands with terrorism or revolution as your means allow.
Extra fun to look at issues I don't support, like imaginary fears on the morality of killing unborn babies to justify killing doctors. At least there everyone can agree minimizing abortion is good, while there is no clear consensus that minimizing fossil fuel burning is good.
I'm basically a fatalist I guess. I'll let the fuckers destroy the world, and clean up my corner as I can. It just seems hopeless to fight.
I guess I don't want to be wrong either. That's what separates me from the fundamentalists. A fundamentalist will kill a logger or a doctor for their cause because they know they're right. I don't know what will happen. I expect things'll get ugly whether or not we decide to respond to peak oil or climate change. Bad things will happen, people will suffer and die, and others will survive, and move on as choices happen.
We're just dumb animals too clever for our cages.
posted by Ares Olympus at 3:32 PM
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