“As a matter of fact, accounting can now only exist, if it is to have a long-term future, in a world where sustainability is the only primary issue of accounting concern”
And I just happen to have the standard for that ‘ere in my back pocket.
The thing that really grates is that Stern and Nordhaus have already given us how to do this. A carbon tax would mean that sustainability is now in all market prices. So it’s inevitably now included in all accounting. What’s the one solution to climate change that Spud won’t support? The carbon tax…..
The primary issue of my accounting is that I have sufficient income to pay for outgoings.
If of course you believe in climate change. Since climate changers are dedicated to shutting down zero emissions power plants and replacing them with gas backed solar panels and windmills, my faith is sorely lacking.
Carbon tax, still bollocks.
Please stop using “sustainability”. The correct term is “stagnation”.
“Climate change” is bollocks and is just an excuse for deluded top down control.
Carbon tax, still bollocks.
Pricing bullshit into a market gives the market price of goods, services and bullshit, nothing more. It will incentivize reductions in carbon only if those reductions are the path of least resistance. So, you live with a useless carbon tax and freeze wages of your workers to offset the reduction in profits. It’s what happens in the Real World; increases in taxes that cannot be passed on to consumers come out of workers’ wages.
The science sucks, and so does the economics.
If costs exceed income, how is the loss funded?
If income exceeds costs, where does the benefit go?
Regardless of profit/loss, is there enough actual cash to pay creditors before they send round the knee-breakers?
“primary issue of accounting concern” – my chubby arse. If the man ever knew how to help run a business he’s long since forgotten.
How can Spud expect a business to account for the future cost of legislation designed to combat climate change when they don’t know what that legislation might be let alone how much it’s going to cost them. Thanks to human ingenuity the cost could be zero. In fact if the cost of solar (in sunny places) continues to fall and deep geothermal works as hoped the shift to green energy could have a negative cost.
The thing that really grates is that Stern and Nordhaus have already given us how to do this.
They’re a couple of college professors who’ve written a couple of papers.
There are 195 countries in the world with 195 economies and 195 tax systems. Stern and Nordhaus provide any detailed guidance for design, implementation and monitoring across the economic and tax spectrum? Nope. What we got in hand are a couple of papers from a couple of academics.
They haven’t shown anyone in the Real World shit, Timmy.
“As a matter of fact, accounting can now only exist, if it is to have a long-term future, in a world where sustainability is the only primary issue of accounting concern”
Spoken like a man who doesn’t have a clue of the sort of information needed to run any sort of enterprise in any economy on the face of the earth.
Yep. I’m all in favour of hanging Stern & Nordhaus. Castrating, drawing & quartering if you like. There is no punishment too severe for these scum.
How it started: Ragging on Ritchie
How it’s going: Carbon tax, still bollocks.
.
Yup, choosing that subject (about which Ritchie is, entirely accidentally, correct) is not going to go well for you no matter how you dress it. If you can’t simply observe and acknowledge that every fucking country on Earth that has a carbon tax also has all the interfering statism you imagine the tax is supposed to avoid, then you deserve all the Ragging on Timmie you get.
@ Dennis: ‘There are 195 countries in the world with 195 economies and 195 tax systems.’
There may be 195 countries in the world, but there are a lot more than 195 tax systems. Even if you just look at taxing jurisdictions, the UK has two and the US has over fifty…
@PJF
I find it hard to understand how anybody can be so stupid. Sure it’s a fine academic theory. But when it meets the real world of politicians & government, they’ll simply use it as a revenue raiser. The level of Carbon Tax will always be the highest they reckon they can get away with to satisfy their short term needs. They won’t care what long term economic damage it does. They won’t be here facing the consequences. We will.
The real intention of pushing all this nonsensical carbon taxation is to soften up the public before the reduction in world population. Not reducing atmospheric CO2? That’s because there are too many people.
Reduce the number of ‘breathers’ and CO2 follows (both from fewer oxygen consumers, reduced economic activities and by burying all the ‘extra’ carbon-based lifeforms).
The great reset requires it – you know it makes sense! Spud for President!
Something to add to the above. The vast majority of the people with power over our lives are in the final ten years of their careers. Those that aren’t don’t don’t think much further ahead than that. They’ve got where they are by looking after their own personal interests against strong competition. They’re looking after their personal interests now. They don’t give a flying fuck about us or what our world will look like in 20 or 30 years. The people on the greasy poles below them, trying to get to where they are now, are exactly the same sort of people with the same aims.
So, for a start, you can forget about all your pet conspiracy theories. All your seeing is result of various personal interests coinciding. There is no guiding hand on the tiller steering us into the future. All there is is a continuing fight in the wheelhouse.
BiS
Completely agree. It’s a strange form of Warrior (and thus ‘stupid’, or ‘shortsighted’) types fighting for power. It’s a distributed, chaotic fight. Many use the same themes – because they’ve found it works for them, not because that’s what they believe. And, frankly, a Warrior is easy to deceive, so even if they do believe – so what?
I find it hard to understand how anybody can be so stupid.
Religion can do it. Tim is a recovering Catholic so it’s possible there’s a bit of faithiness being applied to economic theory. Social status can also do it. Acknowledging that this particular Pigovian tax doesn’t pass the smell test will probably go down like a lead balloon at the Adam Smith Institute xmas drinks do.
1) I don’t go to the do
2) I’m weird even by ASI standards on this one.
. . . this nonsensical carbon taxation is to soften up the public before the reduction in world population.
There’s going to be a reduction in world population come what may. It’s already written in the demographics of the small or non families that people are choosing of their own accord.
If Klaus Schwab and the Chemtrails are going to perform their hit “The Great Reset”, the idea is not to kill us but to make us poorer. Because they really would rather rule in a basket case Venezuela than be whatevs in a free, wealthy Texas.
Hasn’t it always been?
And there was me thinking that accuracy was the prime concern in accounting…
Ah well…
“There are 195 countries in the world with 195 economies and 195 tax systems. Stern and Nordhaus provide any detailed guidance for design, implementation and monitoring across the economic and tax spectrum? Nope. What we got in hand are a couple of papers from a couple of academics.”
What “design, implementation and monitoring” do you think is required? Assuming that this is real and the science is right (and I’m somewhat sceptical), all you do is stick a few pennies on petrol or coal to correct the price for pollution and let the market come from that.
And the main point of all of this is to not bother trying to fight on the science, but to stop the commies. A large number of people who bang on about climate change have a self-interest about it. They don’t care about the planet, they just want to have more choo-choos, trams or to spoil everyone else’s fun. If you have an answer which is “save the planet, but no choo-choos” they’ll stop pushing it.
The other way of doing it, cap & trade, has not been conspicuously successful, so why would you think a carbon tax would be any better? The supposed purpose of both is to reduce the emission of CO2, not to pay Danegeld & carry on doing it but the latter seems to have been the outcome. Which is kinda sad since we don’t need to do either. As Bjorn Lomborg has said, we would be far better off economically by dealing with any consequences rather than trying to hold back the tide.
I don’t really go in for the WEF conspiracy view but it’s hard to think about other motivations when you see supposedly sane people buying into the climate emergency therefore net-zero crap.
I’ve observed before, and if it was here I don’t apologise for the repetition, that if somebody invented the Mister Fusion, the size and price of a toaster, which would provide the electric and heat energy for a household using old coffee grounds, the bloody greens would ban it because of the freedom which it would provide.
No apology for the run-on sentence either.
Since rising atmospheric CO2 is wholly beneficial, with increased world-wide plant growth, then the ‘carbon tax’ should be negative.
Will you pay me for each environ-mentalist burnt?
I detect a new cottage industry for the coming winter.
Rhoda
The post-carbon fix they’ll jump on is very very simple. **All** energy dissipation is evil and is pushing up the temperature of Gaia. Mr Fusion would be double evil bad, because it would provide “unlimited” power which would Doom our fair Gaia even faster.
When your goal is the destruction of the society that brought you antibiotics, medical science, transport, freedom from armed warrior kings (well, mostly)and communications, there’s nowhere to stop.
What “design, implementation and monitoring” do you think is required?
I don’t know. Of far more importance is the fact that neither Stern, Nordhaus nor any of the other carbon tax supporters don’t know either. There hasn’t been any thought given to that… And therein lies the problem: The devil is always in the details.
As someone who’s worked in tax for 35+ years, I can say that simply slapping a tax on something in order to change behaviors may sound like a nifty idea, but one should note that I’ve been paid for 35+ years to find ways to mitigate those taxes so folks can continue to behave as they please. And where there is a will, there’s a politician to be bought off and a loophole to be created.
A carbon tax sounds wonderful, but in reality it’s the lazy man’s solution. Stern and Nordhaus present the idea and then walk away, leaving the practical matters to others. It’s kind of like telling an alcoholic all he has to do is quit drinking. Sounds great in theory, and it’s an easy solution to propose, but when faced with reality, it doesn’t quite work as intended. And it’s important to note that usually the Big Thinkers like Stern and Nordhaus are nowhere to be found when the shit hits the reality powered fan.
Tim you’re labouring under a whole set of delusions
1) Global warbling is a set of vampire problems, the elites don’t want solutions
2) Applying logic to your solutions won’t make them any more acceptable
3) The only solutions that will be considered are those which lead to mass depopulation and totalitarian control
Hunger and cold are going to become very familiar in our near future
Thanks to increased levels of CO2 starving Africans can now grow more food and avoid any hit from the Ukrainian grain embargo.
I’m feeling a little upset about everybody’s cavalier rudeness about our gracious host’s apparent support for carbon taxes.
Yes, I know that from observation all governments are a collection of me-first, power-grabbing, backstabbing (each other and us) lying scum who will say anything and do anything to attain and keep power.
So our best bet is to seek to convince them that there’s a Magic Solution to Armageddon that lies **entirely within their power to deliver with no risk to them**.
None of this “oh well, a hydrogen economy would be great let’s spaff a few trillion kickstarting it – oh noes – the idiot scientists *failed to produce what they promised*”. Nope. No need to rely on other folk doing what they promised. None. You cannot get let down, politician.
There’s one cure. It’s magical. It is supported by science (it really is!) It requires great personal courage (of the sort that’s trivial to fake and easy to claim) from the politicians involved. It’s – the Carbon Tax! There’s Science behind it – even better than Climatology – – all economic scientists know you get less of stuff when you tax it more and that Dennis and his ilk typify folk who try to find ways round paying the tax (eg, an at-home fusion reactor!). Science, I tell you!!
Of course the dishonest bastards will add it to everything else, but a good campaign might get them to accept the science and claim credit for saving the world rather than doing all that and then outlawing petrol and gas heaters. If a few wise ones had jumped on the bandwagon back in 2010 or whenever, they could even claim credit for the observable reduction in
If no other reason persuades you of a CO2 tax, which would be surprisingly low if implemented alongside the abolition of green subsidies, then it should be that P3 originally supported it but now opposes it.
‘Cos he’s an ideas man you see, a cat changing the narrative, so he can’t be on the side of something devised by intelligent people he once agreed with.
…… gah. My last phrase got removed because I foolishly put angle brackets around it.
Anyways, the last sentence should be
If a few wise ones had jumped on the bandwagon back in 2010 or whenever, they could even claim credit for the observable reduction in {whatever metric turns out to be politically useful – temperature, perhaps}
Sorry about that.
The Greenies hate cap & trade because it doesn’t actually stop people having a modern civilisation.
Gotta admit jgh, that the fact that the Greenies’ policies’d stop ME!!!!!!! enjoying a modern civilisation is what makes me hate them.
@BlokeInTejas
I’m sorry but you have to accept that there will never be a Carbon Tax other than in name. Governments will use it as a revenue source & it therefore becomes the same as any other tax. Its level will be at their whim. If it’s said to moneterise carbon externalities, the value of the externalities will be chosen from the range of possible externalities closest to the revenue they wish to raise. Basically, you end up with a competition amongst climate effects economists to produce the highest externalities cost estimate to obtain government funding.
Incidentally, that raises an important question. Is science itself completely corrupted because so much of it is funded by government? He who pays the piper calls the tune. Scientist’s professional integrity? Do you want to buys this bridge I have going?
. Is science itself completely corrupted because so much of it is funded by government?
Or regulated by government?
The response to Covid answers this quite well. I’ve never seen a group of people so enthusiastically selling their souls as doctors.
Flubber.. The vast majority of doctors aren’t scientists. They’re very highly trained specialist tradesmen making use of actual science.
Academically trained != scientist.
Science is a mess. The peer review process is compromised. When reviewers were independent and honourable then it worked, but nowadays everyone is on the same publishing – citation – funding treadmill so that much of the integrity has gone. So we’re now seeing doubts being raised about a lot of papers published in recent decades.
I would venture that engineering has more integrity because if you get it wrong, bad things can happen – falling bridges, Internet outages etc.
From Eric Lonergan’s blog:
《To summarise, we think policy should be focused less on accurately pricing an externality, and more on altering the price elasticity of demand. Simply put, to get anywhere close to meet our climate objectives, we need to collapse demand for fossil fuels. Taxing an externality will not significantly reduce demand if it is price inelastic – which is the case in many carbon intensive activities, from steel to transport. If we target the price elasticity of demand, however, we are forced to focus policies on the creation and pricing of substitutes. Furthermore, if we can create close to perfect substitutes for carbon intensive goods and services, and then devise policies to target the relative prices, demand collapses.》
《When your goal is the destruction of the society that brought you antibiotics, medical science, transport, freedom from armed warrior kings (well, mostly)and communications, there’s nowhere to stop.》
How about rising suicides, weapons of mass destruction, a huge increase in relative poverty, rising overdoses, laws preventing me from exercising my natural right of free migration and sleeping outside?
Boganboy, can you see that your ideology has the outcome of forcing me to live indoors, being poisoned by your toxic modern civilisation?
Why can’t we fix the problem by re-establishing the Lockean Proviso so I have an out? Otherwise, how is your policy different from might makes right?
“Simply put, to get anywhere close to meet our climate objectives, … ”
Pray tell why “we” should meet, or even try to meet your objectives?
“exercising my natural right of free migration”
What “natural” right? Mother Nature and everything part of it is pretty solid on the concept of “territory”. You migrate, you be prepared to take your lumps from the critter already occupying that bit of planet and its resources.
On the other hand, the occupant does have a “natural right” to defend what he occupies.
You’re getting things ass-backwards while showing your true colours.
I shall call you “Elizabeth” from now on.
Grikath
What about absentee ownership?
Why do Border Patrol harass me more than illegals even 40 miles from the Arizona-Mexico border?
What if I gave CBP agents a generous, non-tax-funded, inflation-proofed universal basic income? Would they even need to defend imaginary lines in the sand anymore, or could they relax, take more siestas?
‘Boganboy, can you see that your ideology has the outcome of forcing me to live indoors, being poisoned by your toxic modern civilisation?’
rsm, I’m sure you can see that your ideology has the outcome of forcing me to live in some squalid mud hut, being starved and impoverished by your loathsome and primitive savagery. Now I have no problems at all with YOU living like that!!!!!!
But it’s definitely NOT for ME!!!!!!!!!!!!
Boganboy, are you paranoid, and strawmanning?
How does a strong basic income, legal drugs, open borders, and free sleeping need to change your current lifestyle?
What am I taking from you, aside from your current “might makes right” to coerce ppl into dependence on markets by enclosing everything, thus blatantly violating the Lockean Proviso?
Can you still enjoy a modern civilisation if ppl aren’t coerced (by laws!) into markets?
The whole point of accounting is that it is a measure of past financial performance! Would have thought an accountant would have known that!
‘How does a strong basic income, legal drugs, open borders, and free sleeping need to change your current lifestyle?’
Well rsm, provided you go off to say Chad or Zimbabwe and get the locals to provide you with all that, it doesn’t affect me at all.
It’s only the possibility that you want to do it to me and mine that worries me.
Boganboy, why can’t I sleep outside on state land, far away from anyone? My answer in Jeopardy form: what is loggers want to treat public land as if they alone own it?