CMV: Conservatives will always hold that Climate Change is a hoax because capitalism has no answer for it
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Posted Feb 11, 2019, 1:47 AM UTC · edited
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I would like to challenge your edit
EDIT: Additionally it conflicts with other conservative ideals. Conservatives tend to be more religious, climate change would hold that humans can harm and even destroy the earth they believe god made.
There are actually quite a lot of religious, Christian environmentalists. It's actually an old source of environmentalist sentiment. It primarily stems from three Bible verses.
In Genesis 1:26-28, God instructs humanity to administer over the Earth in particular ways:
"And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth." 1:28
In Genesis 2:15, it says God actually put Adam in the garden of Eden to care for it:
"And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it." (Genesis 2:15)
Many Christian environmentalists point out that the biblical emphasis is on stwardship. It's not that the earth belongs to the Lord and does not belong to humanity, it's that he gave it to us to take care of. Leviticus 25:23 states:
"The land must not be sold permanently, because the land is mine and you are but aliens and my tenants."
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This is true and I'm not denying Christian environmentalists do exist, but rather that you would be hard pressed to find a majority of conservative Christians who would accept that the Earth could be uninhabitable as a result of human activity. Thanks for the response!
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This is true and I'm not denying Christian environmentalists do exist, but rather that you would be hard pressed to find a majority of conservative Christians who would accept that the Earth could be uninhabitable as a result of human activity.
That is substantially different than what you wrote in your edit, which was the Christian beliefs conflict with environmentalism. Has your view changed?
Otherwise, you may wish to edit your OP again to clarify.
Thanks for the response!
You are most welcome.
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Not really. I understood exactly what he meant and he is right.
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Christian beliefs do conflict with environmentalism. All information about our environment and climate change's effects on it come from Science. Christian beliefs rely on not believing Science.
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That sort of depends on what your beliefs are, though, doesnt it? Obviously a fundamentalist or literal interpretation of the Bible or other scripture is incompatible with science. But there are many Christians who believe that the Bible is a flawed product of flawed humans attempting to interpret a divine message, and that science is a tool that God gave humanity to help understand creation.
Obviously that view is unfalsifiable, but I don't think that's necessarily the same as saying being Christian is incompatible with science.
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This statement is true but most Christian environmentalism revolves around God's intended state for mankind and that perception changes all the time. The idea of preserving wildlife is an expression of modern values and not a generational mission for Christians. This means Christians will likely lose interest in climate change as a threat once we are accustomed to "century storms" happening every 3 years. This is why Christian environmentalism is inferior to secular efforts, the one exception being recruitment. You guys are insanely good at getting people on team.
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You are absolutely correct, Christian beliefs are definitely subjective and subject to change over time. My point was not to say that they are absolute, I was just pointing out that contrary to what the OP said Christian beliefs are not inherently incompatible with environmentalism as being Christian can actually be a motivation to preserve the environment for many people.
Also, I'm not Christian, and I'm not really trying to get anyone on my "team".
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Ah, my bad.
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Most Christians don't give a shit about saving the Earth.
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Im not sure about the specific percentage, you could be right. But the OP's post implied that Christian beliefs are incompatible with caring about the environment, and they are not.
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Christian beliefs are incompatible with capitalism, but I would agree that it's not incompatible with climate change. Though it is often at odds with science.
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How are Christian beliefs incompatible with capitalism? I think this sort of gets into "No True Scotsman" territory, deciding what is and what is not Christian.
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Preface: I am a conservative, so hopefully I can offer some insight. I will ONLY be referencing the US unless I explicitly say otherwise.
Conservatives will always hold that Climate Change is a hoax
Title Response: Most conservatives don't claim climate change is a hoax, it has and always will change, but rather than
In the US, most climate change deniers are conservative
I would agree, but also know that most conservatives don't deny the existence of a changing climate. Just because most deniers are conservatives DOES NOT MEAN that conservatives are mostly climate deniers.
Most of the regulations that are enforced, almost always by liberals, are to coerce the free market into greener solutions that would otherwise not come about
Coercion of the free market is the opposite of a free market, which is against conservative ideals. You also assume that other solutions would not come about but I disagree. Where there will be profit there will be development and since renewable energy is renewable (and free waiting to be harvested) there is already great incentive to develop solutions.
It has been estimated that we will need to zero our carbon emissions in 30 years to even start to reverse climate change.
I don't have time to read the whole article, but isn't this assuming that EVERYONE stops producing emissions? We can't control, nor should we, and force every country to work differently (due to costs and energy needed high emissions energy sources are needed for countries to develop). Also not sure if this somehow changed but in school and over the years have seen online that the earth has been heating for a long time and that human impact has just sped it up. Does zero emissions somehow negate that?
A few ways to do this that many countries are doing is to place a ban on emissions by a certain date.
What if we logistically can't reach these goals by a certain date? Does the government start giving fines for people unable to meet goals?
For example car emission standards which might not be working fast enough. These laws encourage innovation away from fossil fuels in an effort to curb climate change.
How do we deal with the cost of the people who need vehicles and can't afford new ones? Do they have to walk? Also there are limitations on batteries (storing clean energy is pretty inefficient, oil/NG holds much more energy for longer) so we just can't develop these faster. Current market incentives are enough to promote the development of things that will bring companies and help them profit (Tesla has been doing a lot of things I believe). I think these laws might encourage things but also HURT the majority of the economy.
Obviously these regulations would not be in place in a pure capitalist society
Most conservatives aren't for a "pure capitalist society". There must be systems in place (anti trust, monopoly laws, etc) to ALLOW the market to be free. Its just we want as near as possible to pure capitalism without allowing the winners to prevent capitalism to prevail.
conservatives lean against these regulations.
Yeah, because we want a free market. Unnecessary regulations hurt the economy and don't have a large impact. Free market solutions are much better than hurting the economy and hoping a non-free market gets lucky.
I think conservative ideals cannot hold that the climate is changing
Most conservatives realize the climate is changing, its just the solutions that would do more harm than good are disagreed upon.
because that would mean either enforcing laws against companies and consumers with high emissions (potentially seen as limiting the free market or a government overstep) or government climate clean up efforts (which would require tax money). The only other option is climate change denial.
The only other option is denial? Pretty sure I am not denying the existence of climate change (and I barely ever see full on denial that the climate is changing). That seems a bit binary. Most conservatives are for free market solutions not government overreach. Of course the climate is changing, killing our economy isn't a solution to that. In the end conservatives and liberals (note: liberals, not leftists) all want the same goals but just believe different ways of getting there (conservatives: free market, liberals: big government control).
Additionally it conflicts with other conservative ideals. Conservatives tend to be more religious, climate change would hold that humans can harm and even destroy the earth they believe god made.
False. Religion actually plays a role SUPPORTING wanting to protect His creation. I am religious and want to prevent climate change but don't think big government will do it well. This argument is like saying that since murderers exist God made murderers so its against religion, which is wrong and actually about free will.
As natural disasters due to climate change happen, people will need relief, often at the cost of the government..
Conservatives are against government intervention in most cases. Lots of "relief" should be eliminated (of course some is needed, a government must protect it's people) and allow communities to help each other instead of having Big Brother hop in.
Overall I think its a straw-man argument to say conservatives deny climate change. It has and always will change, its the methods of dealing with it that are disagreed upon.
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Title Response: Most conservatives don't claim climate change is a hoax, it has and always will change, but rather than
The majority of GOP does not believe in climate change.
Where there will be profit there will be development and since renewable energy is renewable (and free waiting to be harvested) there is already great incentive to develop solutions.
Sure, once the fossil fuels run out there will be scarcity and capitalism will do it's thing and we'll all be fine. Except that won't happen for a hundred years and in 30 years climate change will have caused irreparable harm to the planet.
Also not sure if this somehow changed but in school and over the years have seen online that the earth has been heating for a long time and that human impact has just sped it up. Does zero emissions somehow negate that?
Why would it negate that... Any green policies are better than none but on the path we are going it will still not be enough. We need negative emissions, to spend money reversing climate change.
How do we deal with the cost of the people who need vehicles and can't afford new ones? Do they have to walk?
This is getting at the heart of my point. Capitalism cannot hope to solve this. Some taxes on companies might encourage them but most of the tax will fall down to the customer. In that way the government must step in with regulations and helping people directly influenced by climate change.
Most conservatives are for free market solutions not government overreach
My point is that free market solutions will never work, either they will be too slow and irreparable damage will be done to the planet, or companies will simply pay the fines/taxes and continue doing what the company was founded on.
conservatives deny climate change
Not all, just most.
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Sure, once the fossil fuels run out there will be scarcity and capitalism will do it's thing and we'll all be fine. Except that won't happen for a hundred years and in 30 years climate change will have caused irreparable harm to the planet.
Renewable energy is the fastest growing energy sector my orders of magnitude, so this is false. Coal is dying and there's very little that any amount of govt subsidies can do to save it. u/xFYD_ is correct when he says that the renewable market is hugely attractive. The people who figure out how to most efficiently capture an unlimited energy source are going to be incredibly wealthy, and this isn't a secret. Even under a business as usual assumption, renewables are expected to make up 50% of energy production by 2050, and these estimates have historically been very low end as they significantly underestimate the ability to increase the efficiency of these energy capture devices. In order to tip these more favorably, we don't need a total takeover of the energy sector. This also ignores the fact that we will develop new technologies in order to combat these effects. This idea that technology won't advance in the next 3 decades is incredibly confusing to me.
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Renewable energy is the fastest growing energy sector my orders of magnitude, so this is false.
You're purposefully conflating growth speed with growth potential. Just because renewables are growing fast doesn't mean they can EVER replace.
The instinct to deny the reality that we may never replace fossil fuels and our only choice might be between an energy poor future and an energy poor future with no civilization is the most insidious form of climate change denial.
Climate change is not just a logistics issue, it is an existential threat to the very idea of progress. It is real, measurable evidence that progress may be coming to an end.
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You're purposefully conflating growth speed with growth potential. Just because renewables are growing fast doesn't mean they can EVER replace.
I'm not. They're growing in proportion as well as overall output. The numbers I gave to you are business as usual in relation to proportion of renewable energy in the economy by 2050. You're conflating, not me.
The instinct to deny the reality that we may never replace fossil fuels and our only choice might be between an energy poor future and an energy poor future with no civilization is the most insidious form of climate change denial.
You seriously believe we don't have the capacity to increase renewable and nuclear output (mostly renewable) to keep up with energy demands? The data simply don't agree with you...neither does human history, to be frank.
Climate change is not just a logistics issue, it is an existential threat to the very idea of progress. It is real, measurable evidence that progress may be coming to an end.
This is the hysterical alarmism that most people don't really agree with, to be honest.
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Title Response: Most conservatives don't claim climate change is a hoax, it has and always will change, but rather than
The majority of GOP does not believe in climate change.
Im not sure if I missed it but where did they ask if climate change does or does not exist?
Where there will be profit there will be development and since renewable energy is renewable (and free waiting to be harvested) there is already great incentive to develop solutions.
Sure, once the fossil fuels run out there will be scarcity and capitalism will do it's thing and we'll all be fine. Except that won't happen for a hundred years and in 30 years climate change will have caused irreparable harm to the planet.
Its profitable now, developments are being made. Not sure why you think people don't want to get into a good market only when a current one dies. There is a huge market for green energy. Wind, hydro, and solar are being worked on. If someone develops efficient ways of storing these energy sources they will instantly become rich.
Also not sure if this somehow changed but in school and over the years have seen online that the earth has been heating for a long time and that human impact has just sped it up. Does zero emissions somehow negate that?
Why would it negate that... Any green policies are better than none but on the path we are going it will still not be enough. We need negative emissions, to spend money reversing climate change.
You said it would even start reversing climate change in 30 years.
How do we deal with the cost of the people who need vehicles and can't afford new ones? Do they have to walk?
This is getting at the heart of my point. Capitalism cannot hope to solve this. Some taxes on companies might encourage them but most of the tax will fall down to the customer. In that way the government must step in with regulations and helping people directly influenced by climate change.
Capitalism can solve it, its called the free market developing efficient, profitable, and effective systems. No economic system prevents the need to travel. The government stepping in also won't stop climate change and influence isn't that great unless we decide to take over and influence countries other than our own (China and many developing countries ramping up emissions as energy is needed). Regulations only hurt the economy while only delaying issues that could be solved, if solvable at all, in a free market.
Most conservatives are for free market solutions not government overreach
My point is that free market solutions will never work, either they will be too slow and irreparable damage will be done to the planet, or companies will simply pay the fines/taxes and continue doing what the company was founded on.
Free market solutions have worked for years (see: US history). The free market is going to work much better than destroying our economy and HOPING for a solution to be found under governmental control. Destroying a free market will not fix anything.
conservatives deny climate change
Not all, just most.
Citation needed.
Also, can you provide any notable examples of killing a free market helping people?
-2†
The amount of hairsplitting here is unnecessary. The majority of people who do not believe humans have a substantial impact on our climate are conservative. Should be talking about this in good faith instead of confusing the subject with “they believe climate changes”
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It's not hairsplitting. It's like saying "All dogs are mammals so that means all mammals are dogs". No... that's not how it works.
Or perhaps we could say "Most murders are commited by non-whites, therefore most non-whites are murderers". And then when someone points out how illogical that is we can dismiss it as "hairsplitting"?
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The majority of people who do not believe humans have a substantial impact on our climate are conservative
That doesn't mean that the majority of conservatives don't believe in anthropogenic climate change. Climate change deniers are a crazy subset of conservatives, just like hardcore Marxists/Stalinists are a crazy subset of liberals.
Should I assume that because of that political minority that it's okay to say that "everyone who describes themselves as a Liberal is an advocate for Stalinist communism"?
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Also, can you provide any notable examples of killing a free market helping people?
The Montreal Protocol was essentially governments across the globe agreeing to heavily regulate then entirely ban CFCs (chemicals which were used in hair spray, refrigerants, and many other uses). This was so far from free market. The free market was making a fortune on cheap and effective hair sprays and refrigerants. CFCs were treated as a wonder chemical by industry based on how effective they were for their wide variety of uses, and how cheap they are to produce. However when the govenments stepped into the market and phased them all the way out, our ozone hole essentially went away. It is arguably one of the single most important achievements humans have made in history. We averted a very serious global catastrophe with heavy government regulation. It is a truly exceptional success story which is incredibly similar to what would be needed for global warming. There are so many parallels: the cause of the problem is a seemingly harmless gas, the problem is a global problem unlike localized problems like farm runoff, the negative effects of the problem get dispersed over the globe, and one nation stopping their production of the gases is not sufficient, everyone needs to work together to reduce emissions.
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China is still using CFCs. We know because we have detected higher than natural concentrations in the air over china using satellites.
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Im not sure if I missed it but where did they ask if climate change does or does not exist?
The GOP's own leader says climate change is a hoax.
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I would still like to see a citation about the GOP as a whole. I was responding to a link that I didn't see anyone saying it doesn't exist but rather disagreeing with affects.
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Also, can you provide any notable examples of killing a free market helping people?
Would you consider the fact that:
- Most developed countries have either "single-payer" government-funded healthcare or a very tightly regulated system of compulsory and universal private insurance, whereas
- The US has (especially before the ACA) far less regulated insurers, hence, a much more "free market" for healthcare, and
- Healthcare costs about double in the USA compared to most other developed countries, with worse outcomes
to be an example where "killing" a free market helps people?
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No, since these other countries are essentially free riding on the US system which creates most of the medical innovations. Medical R&D ain't cheap. And also the US doesn't have anything close to a free market health care system.
If you want to compare other western countries with a free market system you'd first need an actual free market system.
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Im not sure if I missed it but where did they ask if climate change does or does not exist?
Citation needed.
Here are the stats as collected by Gallup. Only 42% of Republicans believe that global warming is happening, and only 35% of them believe it is man-made. That's compared to 86% of Democrats who believe it is happening and 89% who believe it is caused by human activities.
That there is a partisan divide over this is not a question that can argued in good faith.
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From the link in the article, 19% of conservative Republicans believe the earth is warming because of human activity and 39% of moderate Republicans believe so. Compare that to 69% and 83% of moderate dems and liberal dems. And before you say “oh well they don’t deny climate change just that humans are causing it,” denying that humans are the primary factor leading to the rapid changes in climate IS climate change denial. The scientific consensus is in and has been for quite some time. The phrase “climate change” refers to an idea bigger and more complicated than just “the climate is changing”
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I don't have time to read the whole article, but isn't this assuming that EVERYONE stops producing emissions? We can't control, nor should we, and force every country to work differently (due to costs and energy needed high emissions energy sources are needed for countries to develop). Also not sure if this somehow changed but in school and over the years have seen online that the earth has been heating for a long time and that human impact has just sped it up. Does zero emissions somehow negate that?
I don't really have time to go into depth on a lot of what you say, so I'd just like to focus on this one thing. The IPCC plans, which the Paris Climate Accord was based on, assume that we will develop and begin employing carbon capture and storage technologies, while simultaneously drastically reducing our emissions via green technologies (electric cars, renewable energy, etc.). To give an idea of how critical this is to averting catastrophic climate change, the IPCC reports are based on an amalgamation of climate models that trie to predict various large-scale choices. Of the 116 that avert 2C warming by 2100, 101 of them depended to some extent on the assumption that massive deployment of these technologies would occur in order to eventually start net removal of carbon from the atmosphere. The remaining 15 depended on bad assumptions, such as net carbon emissions peaking in 2010.
Now a lot of people, including many that support the 'Green New Deal', don't like to acknowledge this because they think it will disincentivize a shift to green energy, but that's what the science says. And this is why simply relying on free market solutions without some form of government coercion cannot prevent catastrophic climate change. Because the effects of climate change are so diffuse and so far removed from the actions that cause them that there is not and never will be a market willing to pay for carbon removal. The closest thing we can get to it is placing a tax on carbon.
In fact, back in the 2000s, that was the Conservative answer to climate change, before different forms of denial became the prevailing attitude. Sadly, there is absolutely no sign that we'll go back to that, especially now that lowering taxes has become one of the few remaining ideas that unifies the Republican party.
And yes, such a thing could very well harm the economy, I wouldn't be surprised if it did. But we have to ask ourselves, is it worth having a recession today in order to avoid an apocalypse in ~100 years? It's ironic that traditional conservative values would say, yes.
EDIT: Like OP, I'm talking about American Conservatism.
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Overall I think its a straw-man argument to say conservatives deny climate change. It has and always will change, its the methods of dealing with it that are disagreed upon.
obviously when we talk about climate changs its about the human impact on climate.
you also didn't say what your solutions would be. you just keep saying "free market."
this stuff isn't going to change anyone's minds dude. it just shows the shallowness of conservative thinking if anything.
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Free market has already shown improvements in this area. Look at industrial revolution to now. Technological advancements through market demand have been fixing this issue, right?
So when someone says the free market this is what i take from it:
Someone can eventually profit off of making things "greener", therefore the technology/advancements WILL inevitably come that push us towards fixing this because of incentive.
You're calling it shallow because you don't understand it.
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Ok at least here you aren't pulling the intellectually dishonest rhetorical trick of "climate is always changing." So we agree that humans are impacting climate and we need to do something about it. This is not even mainstream conservative thought in the US though, where climate "skepticism" is still the prevailing outlook.
But your claim that the free market has been fixing the issue is just empirically false. Like, completely and totally false. The free market has always fought against regulations, against limits on what is profitable. The EPA and all other regulations were created when things like oil spills and heavily polluted cities happened. and now conservatives have taken apart those same protective regulations.
And its shown that oil and gas are still higely profitable and the free market isn't moving in a green direction quickly enough for the time we have.
This kind of thinking is akin to hoping that the free market would just adapt to the threat of Hitler and re-direct our economic resources to produce for the war effort instead of a planned and collective push in that direction. or hoping the free market would somehow figure out space travel. there is no incentive, no profit, in those things.
so Im not sure what evidence you see that within 10-15 years the free market will allow us to cut carbon emissions drastically.
Even conservative solutions like the carbon tax are not going to make the necessary impact.
And I don't know if you're just naive and think a "free" market actually exists. What we actually have (and theres no getting away from this) is a system based on public subsidies and tax breaks that help coal and oil companies over other forms of energy production.
so I'd like to see this:
an actual conservative outlet or writer arguing that climate change is real and an emergency.
concrete market based solutions to how we will solve this emergency. or how the free market is already doing it, and we just need to sit and watch.
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First: The climate is always changing. If its not please explain the multiple ice ages we've been in and out of before this was a thing. It is not debatable. What is debatable is how much of an impact humans have on that and scientists don't all agree on it.
The second thing is technological advancements do fix things like emissions. As we find new sources of energy, people will be able to profit off them, and whoever can do that will be reducing the amount of "bad sources" we have.
The third thing is who decided this is a crisis that needs to be fixed in the next 30 years? This also isn't agreed upon in science. Actually, for the past 200+ years people have been saying this. So this is an emergency based on what sort of data that is scientifically and widely accepted?
Also, your example of space Travel for profit is bad. Elon Musk and space X say otherwise. Along with Tesla helping to eliminate emissions.
There is a reason we don't use other sources as much. Its just not efficient right now. As processes/ways to make this cheaper and more efficient come out, they will get used.
And "renewable" sources of energy are also subsidized. So i dont see where your point is with that.
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The idea that US republicans support a free market isn't really true. Especially now. Protectionism, subsidies, tariffs etc.
Conservatives like the idea of a free market cos its still touted as the goody in the goody vs baddie battle of capitalism vs socialism. This completely made up battle still seems to envelop America, despite the fact that no politicians in the US are actually proposing a free market system... or a socialist one.
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Where there will be profit there will be development and since renewable energy is renewable (and free waiting to be harvested) there is already great incentive to develop solutions.
I dont understand. The drive of capitalism and "the free market" is profit. How is a profit driven model going to incentivise something thats basically free? Wouldn't that go against the main goal?
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Because collection and storage isn't efficient, which is the main issue with renewable.
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The earth goes through periodic phases of heating and cooling which last approximately 160,000 years. We're going through a period of cooling and yet the global mean temperature has increased at a rate analogous with 120,000 years of gradual HEATING all in the last 50 years.
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Conservatives are against government intervention in most cases. Lots of "relief" should be eliminated (of course some is needed, a government must protect it's people) and allow communities to help each other instead of having Big Brother hop in.
I'll ask you about a different point to other commenters ... In your view, what happens if that government relief is eliminated AND communities fail to help each other in the face of an emergency?
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Coercion of the free market is the opposite of a free market, which is against conservative ideals.
We impose restrictions on the use of hammers and knives and automobiles, are those restrictions "against conservative ideals"?
Why then should restrictions on the use of free markets be "against conservative ideals"? They're tools, not Gods.
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Those things can be in any economic system, or even no system at all. Solar panels on the moon will not cease to exist if capitalism on Earth does. Rather capitalism alone cannot seek to curb climate change. Thanks for the response.
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Then didnt you just defeat your own argument? You say those things can exist in any economic ststem... capitalism is an economic system... therefore solutions to climate change can (and do) exist in a capitalistic system.
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One, two, or a million solar panels does not defeat climate change. A solution to the problem of climate change (in my view) does not come out of a pure capitalist system because it's not as profitable as the alternative.
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1: people want to solve global warming.
2: Companies can offer solutions to global warming which generate a profit.
3: people buy products from these companies which solves global warming.
Capitalism functions as intended and entrepreneurs get rich.
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If climate change destroys the planet that won't be good for profits. Even from a purely selfish POV CEO millionaires have a vested interest in preventing their fancy beach houses from being flooded or what have you.
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Look around the world, where do you see more innovation in green technology and deployed solar panels in general? Is it capitalist countries or socialist countries?
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The US subsidizes solar power. It is a public/private partnership.
This is true of other renewable sources of energy as well.
There is heavy investment in solar power in China and somewhat socialist countries in Europe. I'm not real familiar with the industry, but I don't think the US is the main player.
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somewhat socialist countries in Europe
Which ones exactly? The nordic model is explicitly based on Free market capitalism not socialism.
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Government subsidies, which is socialism.
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Conservative politicians outside America don't deny the existence of climate change. It's mostly a USA thing,
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Yeah but they don't do anything about it anyway.
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There have been plenty of environmental regulations that have been passed and worked pretty easily such as protecting the ozone be restricting aerosals.
Also there are plenty of places where forms of green energy are simply more economical than fossil fuels already. Eventually natural gas and oils will simply become more expensive than they are worth to mine and solar/wind/hydro/tidal will become.
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Hmm. The resources being limited could drive prices up but I believe it wouldn't be fast enough. The change can be irreversible in the next 50 years and fossil fuels won't be close to gone anytime soon. I don't believe this will be enough.
My point was that in a pure capitalist society (the dream for many on the right) there would be few, if any, regulations on business.
Thanks for the response.
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Also there are plenty of places where forms of green energy are simply more economical than fossil fuels already.
Because of government investment.
In fact, most of the things we consider capitalist victories, like computers, were government inventions. iPhones, and Apple in general, were helped along in big part with government subsidies to promote technological innovation.
The idea behind this CMV is that libertarian conservatives will deny climate change in order to protect their worldview. If they admit climate change is real, they admit that there is a problem that companies will not be profit-incentivized to solve in a purely free market.
(That said, some historically minded ideological purists might also point out that massive government investment is what led to the fossil fuel mess in the first place. We could have been fully electric a century ago, maybe even earlier, but oil companies lobbied hard for government protections. Without those, the free market would likely have opted for enormously cheap electric power - and from generator-powered electricity to renewables. But this is purely academic territory and not really worth talking about in this context.)
I'd even argue that we live in a socialist society in America and should lean into it and try to make it work. People keep trying to bring us back from a socialist brink we crossed over a hundred years ago.
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You missed the point. Conaervates are against regulations and don't read vox.
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Obviously these regulations would not be in place in a pure capitalist society and conservatives lean against these regulations. I think conservative ideals cannot hold that the climate is changing because that would mean either enforcing laws against companies and consumers with high emissions (potentially seen as limiting the free market or a government overstep) or government climate clean up efforts (which would require tax money). The only other option is climate change denial.
Although we could debate whether or not Trump is a true conservative (I don't really think he is), we probably both agree he is the most prominent face of the conservative movement today (for better or worse). A big part of why Trump opposes unilateral American action on climate change is that he thinks it will be ineffective while also harmful in the near term to our living standards. In particular, he probably believes any measure that involves some amount of sacrifice -- like a carbon tax or passing legislation to encourage reducing meat consumption -- isn't worth the costs since it won't affect emissions on a global level enough.
For evidence of this, I point to a recent tweet he made: "I think it is very important for the Democrats to press forward with their Green New Deal. It would be great for the so-called “Carbon Footprint” to permanently eliminate all Planes, Cars, Cows, Oil, Gas & the Military - even if no other country would do the same. Brilliant!"
He is right in many respects. The Union of Concerned Scientists (pro-climate change action group) estimates America only accounts for 15% of CO2 emissions globally. I am not a scientist, but we probably need action on a global scale to actually combat climate change.
So what does this mean for your view and why do I disagree you? Well, you diagnose the problem as conservatives in America not wanting to regulate companies or increase taxes. I disagree. While that is part of the problem, I think the larger problem is global inaction towards climate change. This global inaction has nothing to do with capitalism and everything to do with the fact that countries don't want to limit their economic development (and the standards of living for their citizens) by foregoing the usage of cheap sources of energy. But why aren't governments taking action? It's because, in essence, the real problem is that people around the world don't want to incur the costs (higher energy costs now, less consumption of goods like meat the production of which creates CO2 emissions) of combating climate change.
In light of this global inaction, why should America take steps (like passing a carbon tax, raising taxes or borrowing money which needs to be repaid in the future with higher taxes to subsidize green energy development, encouraging Americans to eat less meat, etc.) that hurt us in order to combat change when it is likely they will only have a small incremental effect on overall emissions? This is the conservative argument (or, rather, Trump's argument) as I see it.
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Thing is, the idea of global inaction isn't real. It's a convenient fantasy for the US to maintain so that it can excuse not doing anything.
The EU has a major climate change mitigation program, with serious reduction targets. The rest of the western world (with the exception of the US) does too.
Even China and India (those usually blamed for inaction) are making efforts. And they have the good excuse of wanting to raise standard of living, of trying to lift millions out of poverty, whereas the US doesn't have anything similar.
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The EU has a major climate change mitigation program, with serious reduction targets. The rest of the western world (with the exception of the US) does too.
Even China and India (those usually blamed for inaction) are making efforts. And they have the good excuse of wanting to raise standard of living, of trying to lift millions out of poverty, whereas the US doesn't have anything similar.
But this isn't really true. America does take action to reduce CO2 emissions. If you look at CO2 emissions, they have slightly fallen in the West (including America) but dramatically increased in the rest of the world over the last few decades. Also, in 2017, America experienced the largest decline in CO2 emissions in the world. In fact, in 2017, emissions decreased in America nearly to the same extent that emissions increased in the European Union.
(It's important to note that in 2018 the numbers were a little different and emissions increased in America.)
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If you look at CO2 emissions, they have slightly fallen in the West (including America) but dramatically increased in the rest of the world over the last few decades
This isn't really true.
In OECD Europe, Co2 emissions have gone down over the last ~3 decades (since 1990). 5 582 651.29 -> 4 698 654.13
In the US, they went up, from 6 355 634.21 thousand tonnes of Co2eq to 6 511 302.42 (2016)
https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=AIR_GHG
This is the same timeframe as your graph.
In addition, while emissions have gone up in other areas of the globe, one has to consider the original starting point. It's kind of evil to suggests that people in India or China should live in squalor and poverty just so that everyone in the US can keep driving an SUV. Per capita emissions are important factors to consider.
Also, in 2017, America experienced the largest decline in CO2 emissions in the world. In fact, in 2017, emissions decreased in America nearly to the same extent that emissions increased in the European Union.
(It's important to note that in 2018 the numbers were a little different and emissions increased in America.)
It's also important to note that the 2017 numbers are basically lying with statistics.
The US is only the largest because the writer of the article decided to use absolute figures, rather than percentage or population figures. This dramatically over-exagerates the US reduction, because the US is big.
If you don't manipulate the stats like that, and use proper per capita measurements, then the US reduction is considerably smaller.
In addition, it's basically a cherrypicked value, as it runs on a 1 year difference. This is shown by the fact that the 2018 numbers are different.
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This isn't really true.
In OECD Europe, Co2 emissions have gone down over the last ~3 decades (since 1990). 5 582 651.29 -> 4 698 654.13
In the US, they went up, from 6 355 634.21 thousand tonnes of Co2eq to 6 511 302.42 (2016)
https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=AIR\_GHG
This is the same timeframe as your graph.
Using the data from the link you sent, starting from 2000, we see a decrease from 7 216 645.32 to 6 511 302.42 (an almost 10% decrease) in the US and a decrease from 5 366 979.11 to 4 698 654.13 (a 12% decrease) in Europe. Again, it fluctuates year from year and yes it seems Europe is a little more climate conscious, but America has also taken action.
It's kind of evil to suggests that people in India or China should live in squalor and poverty just so that everyone in the US can keep driving an SUV. Per capita emissions are important factors to consider.
I'm just saying any action to combat climate change will require global cooperation. Since India and China are the largest countries, they also need to take action to lower emissions. Otherwise, unilateral action by the West won't do much in the grand scheme of things. We can dramatically reduce our per-capita emissions but this would still likely be offset by development in India, China, and the rest of the world.
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!Delta
This is my favorite answer. I hadn't considered the global perspective and you are very right that the US only produces a small amount of emissions. While I would say the US is a technological leader in the world and what regulations they place on industry can effect the whole world, it is ultimately up to many countries as a whole to come together to fight climate change.
This global inaction has nothing to do with capitalism and everything to do with the fact that countries don't want to limit their economic development (and the standards of living for their citizens) by foregoing the usage of cheap sources of energy.
I like this too. Developing countries are hard pressed to fight climate change with other more pressing problems. I would say however that capitalism has everything to do with how that economic development happens.
Thanks for the response.
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Confirmed: 1 delta awarded to u/PoliticsThrowawayAcc (1∆).
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We know this isn't true. People have looked at conservative parties all over the world. Aside from the US, conservative parties are not against environmental regulations are believe in climate change. It's only in the US that they are against climate change.
Capitalists exist all over the world in every country, but in all other places they acknowledge reality.
But, pro-environment conservatives aren't even special in the US. The EPA was set up by the Republicans, by Nixon! Nixon and the republicans literally created the anti-environmental movement in the government, almost nothing at all existed before that. They set up a framework where you could sue people for damaging the environment and where the federal government and state governments could set limits on how one can pollute. Well before this Theodore Roosevelt, a Republican, set up the national park system. Being stewards of the environment was actually an important part of their platform in the 1970s.
The situation started to change with Regan who ushered in a very pro-business anti-environment sentiment in the Republican party. By the 90s this had spread into the rank and file of the party and you can see sentiment changing and people starting to oppose the idea of climate change.
Put simply. This is a new phenomenon. It's only happening because the US Republican party lies to its base in order to appease its pro-business wing. It isn't the case in any other western country, and it wasn't the case until the 1980s in the US either. It changed over 50 years in the US and it can eventually change back as well.
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I do not believe this is why conservative climate change deniers hold their beliefs. I think this is much too complex of a reasoning, as it requires an actual understanding of how capitalism is meant to work. A lot of conservatives don't even truly view capitalism as a system of economics, they view it as the ONLY system of economics.
The real reason that I believe conservatives see Climate Change as a hoax is simply because it's the biggest and scariest thing targeting humanity, and life is a lot easier to live if you pretend that it's not there. Clean energy is also a massive change in status quo, which plenty of conservatives are innately afraid of.
I definitely think some people view climate change the way you're saying they do, but I think your blanket statement requires that conservatives know much more about how capitalism works then they actually do.
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[deleted]
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Few conservatives deny climate change or deny anthropomorphic climate change.
The majority of GOP voters do not believe that climate change is anthropogenic, even among millennial Conservatives (though they are less likely to think so than older conservatives).
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Look, no right minded person would ever say we shouldn't be doing more to reduce pollution and create better technologies for the future. There is too much smog and way too much plastic. But we know the climate has never remained constant and we couldn't change the weather if we wanted to.
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But we know the climate has never remained constant and we couldn't change the weather if we wanted to.
That's actually not true at all, humans change the weather all the time. When humans create man-made lakes, for instance, they change the cooling and warming patterns of the surrounding area. Depending on the size of the lake, this can actually alter local weather patterns significantly.
That's just one example, there are countless ways that humans affect both weather and climate.
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Fossil fuels are the best and most cost-effective form of fuel right now. As soon as a new technology that is better is invented, the financial incentive to deny climate change will be gone, and no one will deny it anymore. People are happy to say that whaling is unethical today because they don't depend on the practice for fuel.
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First, your edit is pure speculation. The majority of conservatives even if they are Christian are not the type of Christian you are making them out to be. I’m conservative and tell people I’m Christian but hold no such beliefs as do most others i know. We believe in evolution, Dinosaurs, and science. That would be more of a radical Christian view (which there aren’t very many of) and to the best of my knowledge it doesn’t say anything about not being able to screw up earth in the Bible.
Most conservative are climate change skeptics not deniers. I’ve stopped looking into it because it’s exhausting but the whole 99% of scientist agree climate change is happening and it’s man made was from a survey they sent out to anyone doing any kind of research with a PHD. They are also skeptics because this has been going on forever and some scientist is always putting out some radical deadline that always get pushed back.
On top of that, most regulation put into effect punishes companies for not innovating fast enough instead of rewarding those who do. Conservatives don’t like that because it’s a government money grab. Most if not all companies would benefit from using renewable energy because it would be cheaper, the tech just using there yet and saying we are going to tax you higher until it gets there will only make the process longer.
Capitalism is already taking steps towards stopping climate change. People want to reduce their carbon footprint so they start buying electric cars. Since there is now a demand for electric cars more car companies start producing them, which then lowers the cost, so more people can buy them. This is how capitalism works, once you start regulating it (outside of corruption) the whole thing gets screwed up. For those companies too cheap to upgrade their practices you can start only buying goods from manufactures that use clean energy practices and watch how fast the others follow suit.
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(which there aren’t very many of)
I'd challenge this part.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Level_of_support_for_evolution#United_States
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This data makes no sense and it’s because of the fact that the sample size (only one i found but may have missed one) was 35,000 people which is 0.000107692307692% of the population.
Biological science degrees (which are accurately measurable) rose 59% from 1987 to 2001
But acceptance of evolution in America (religious or not) went from 45% to 40%.
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Conservatives don’t like that because it’s a government money grab.
Money that goes into subsidizing renewal resources - which is incentivizing growth. The problem is Obama had to pass this back when conservatives were pretending to care about the deficit so it had to be deficit neutral - so he had to tax businesses that polluted the most. Funny how you either forgot that important aspect or were intentionally omitting it.
but the whole 99% of scientist agree climate change is happening and it’s man made was from a survey they sent out to anyone doing any kind of research with a PHD.
They did it again with exclusely climate scientists - 99% agreed again. Conservatives said it was because "global warming is their livelihood" thereby proving that even experts in their feild, 10,000 published and peer reviewed articles, and a scientific consensus cannot change their minds - because they aren't honest actors. Even if they knew for a FACT it was real they wouldn't care.
Capitalism is already taking steps towards stopping climate change. People want to reduce their carbon footprint so they start buying electric cars.
The only reason electric cars got off the ground was because they were subsidised. And even if everyone in the world had an electric car it wouldn't put a dent in the problem, 80% of dangerous emissions come from corporations.
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It doesn’t incentivize growth. The amount of people who would or would not buy electric cars doesn’t change because of the amount of funding a company gets. In fact light car sales dropped from 7.3 in 2014 to 6.9 million units in 2017 while light truck sales went from 8.7 to 11.1 million units in the same time period. While I’m not the biggest fan of subsidizing anything at least most republican backed subsidies provide a budget positive. Subsidizing farming allows us to drive down prices and undercut completion.
You can’t deny the fact that climate change is their livelihood. I’m not saying they know it’s not an issue and are making stuff up. I’m saying i wouldn’t be surprised if they answered idk if you put a gun to their head with a lie detector that pulls tigger when asked the same question. I would say the 99% figure is also the same when it comes to the average person (1 out of every 100) willing to lie to save their livelihood. Most likely it’s more like 1 in every 10,000. I mean the events that led to the #metoo movement were a secret almost every actor and actress knew about it but no one said anything because they feared being blacklisted and that was men and women being sexually assaulted or raped. So it’s really not that far of a stretch to believe it. If it were a 100% fact then I’m confident they would do whatever it takes to fix it. Republicans aren’t on some kamikaze suicide mission.
Actually in America, the two largest producers of greenhouse gases are Transportation (28%) which is tied with........ wait for it...........wait for it......... electricity productionfollowed by industry at 22%. I don’t know where you got your 80% figure from.
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The amount of people who would or would not buy electric cars doesn’t change because of the amount of funding a company gets.
You seem to not understand what happened. They didn't subsidize the companies, they gave a credit to Americans who purchased an electric car. If you bought a car that was 38k, the government would give you 18% back of the cost on your return.
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If consumers want eco friendly products then businesses that sell those products will succeed and this drives innovation. Socialism/communism does not reward innovation and excels in creating mediocrity. That’s why you don’t have a Yugo in your driveway.
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Free market capitalism isn't the only form of capitalism. A pigovian tax is often viewed by capitalists as an efficient mechanism to price for the marginal cost of externalities thus minimizing deadweight loss and improving value for society. A carbon tax is this pigovian tax and it is capitalism's answer to climate change. It is well supported by many capitalist economists.
You are correct that conservatives may hold that climate change is a hoax because conservatives don't have an answer for climate change but don't mixup capitalists with conservatives. As a very capitalist liberal it offends me when people attribute capitalism to conservatism because they are both completely different. Capitalists are far more literate than conservatives when it comes to ways to improve society and the lives of the humans in it.
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Conservatives hold that Climate Change is a hoax because they don't want to pay for it.
Capitalism already has an answer to Climate Change: Make companies pay to clean up the results of their pollution. Currently pollution is an externality to companies. They make it and then don't really have to worry about it. If we could show Hurricane Harvey was due to climate change (which I believe we showed it was affected by it) and can basically sent the bill for the damages of that hurricane (over $100 billion) and kept doing that for disasters we can show are caused by climate change (other hurricanes, wild fires, the recent polar vortex) to the companies that are contributing then they'd adjust their behavior to mitigate it pretty quick since they'd be paying the cost of their actions. That would be capitalism basically handing the costs of their pollution back to them, which then the market would adjust.
We can't do this today because people keep denying Climate Change exists. If we could show it exists and bill the people that cause it for the damage it is already causing today Capitalism would probably correct it. If we keep denying it exists it's hard to make companies pay the bill.
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I guess I don’t see how capitalism plays into this. And why it would be up to an economic system to stop environmental damage.
And guessing that you are anti-capitalism. You believe socialism is the answer. Well we have 2 large scale implementations of socialism. Present China. Past USSR. Both were and are the biggest polluters on the planet.
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If capitalism doesn't play into this why would socialism? China and the USSR were certainly not socialist I'm really not sure where you got that. China is the biggest polluter on the planet and they have some of the least regulations on business...
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You don’t believe China and the USSR were socialist governments?
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Capitalism in an unregulated free market could hypothetically solve climate change and global warming when renewables become cheaper than fossil fuels, and damage to our global resources is enough to damage industries... ie the bottom line is cheaper to produce renewables. That’s in a vacuum though and the truth is the bottom line won’t be cheaper before our planet is toast anyway, and I doubt you’d accept a hypothetical like that. Just pointing out the element you’re forgetting is capitalism is ultimately driven by the bottom line, and companies will move mountains to save pennies on the dollar. Also thank god we’re not in an unregulated free market, it’s enough of an oligarchy as it is
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Conservatives will always hold that Climate Change is a hoax because capitalism has no answer for it
Two immediate problems with this view:
- Conservatives have not always held that climate change is a hoax. In fact, it appears to be a fairly recent phenomenon.
- Capitalism does have an answer to climate change. Specifically, a tax on pollution (or a system of tradeable pollution permits) allows the (otherwise) free market to find the most economically efficient way to reduce pollution. The 1990 Clean Air Act (under George W Bush) created a system of tradeable pollution permits to control SO2 emissions, and was very effective.
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Cutting hard away from our fuel industries, as many Democrats want, would absolutely cripple our country, perhaps even effectively end our "world leader" status.
At which point, countries that care even less about the environment, such as China or India, might start to take over. Then the train is really off the rails.
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As a conservative I'm not going to vote to cripple our economy and lower our standard of living if China doesn't go along for the ride, and they won't. They're still building coal fired power plants as we speak. Yes, they are investing in some green energy, but not nearly enough to contain their growing carbon footprint. I view China as the greatest threat to freedom in this world in the 21st century. Ergo, we'll have to find other solutions in the future to adapt to climate change, like carbon capture technology.
In 30 years we have no idea what kind of breakthroughs will be made, like the very real possibility of viable fusion power, which many capitalist startup companies are working on right now. If that's the case, all the Government investment and regulation you're proposing is more waste and misallocation of resources which distorts the free market which is proven to be far from perfect, but is the most efficient mechanism for enhancing human wellbeing we have.
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Free market extremists including Milton Friedman advocate taxing pollution to make companies pay the cost of that externality. The Capitalist position is to tax carbon emissions (no cap and trade, a straight tax), give an equal amount per ton to carbon sequesters, and use the excess to lower income taxes. This isn't a hard problem for free market enthusiasts at all, the only question is setting the specific rate and avoiding the complicated schemes (grandfathering old power plants, turning it into a green new deal, etc) that others want to tack on.
Thanks for the response. I think this is the big question. Will coal and fossil fuel centered companies bend to the will of a few taxes or will it take a lot more force to pressure them to almost switch industries. I personally think it will take more than even a steep tax on carbon emissions to pressure fossil fuel industries to switch to low emissions power. Additionally this doesn't take into account other kinds of pollution like needless waste. I think this is a problem that a few taxes cannot hope to solve and will require regulation that most conservatives wouldn't call pure capitalism.
The capitalist would say that if the tax is correctly priced, the coal companies that ought to close will and the ones that ought to stay open will. If (hypothetically) we calculate that the damage per ton of CO2 emitted is $30, then if a coal plant can profitably operate while paying that tax then it ought to stay open, and if it can't it shouldn't. Useful use and needless waste should be charged identically.
While I agree this is a market solution to the problem, it is not a conservative one (at least in the US today).
Conservatives in the US are strongly against new taxes.
Conservatives are happy to see revenue neutral taxes that lower the income tax... This would flatten taxation.
Hahaha I laughed at loud when I read that. The Capitalist position is to take money from one way through taxation and redistribute it somewhere else? You know that's socialism right? Taxation is the redistribution of wealth, which is one of the three tenets of socialism. The Capitalist position should be that everyone donates money to stopping Global Warming.
Everytime something is taxed to pay for something else that's socialism. I honestly do not understand how you don't know that.
Here's the definition of Socialism - a political and economic theory of social organization which advocates that the MEANS OF production, DISTRIBUTION, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the.
It's not redistribution, it's a tax on pollution. Milton Friedman advocated for that. The money isn't going anywhere, it's being used to stop taking income tax. Reducing/eliminating the income tax isn't "giving" people anything, it's just taking less from them.
The government does have the right to tax pollution because it has the right to regulate/eliminate pollution because thats a fundamental role of government in any society.
Hahaha no, that's the fundamental role of government in a society thats, at least a little bit, socialist. In a purely capitalist society the government doesn't have the power to tax - they operate purely off of voluntary contributions. I'm order for the free market to actually be free it must also be true that any form of taxation is theft. In a capitalist view, companies would be able to pollute THEIR LAND and do whatever they wanted to THEIR LAND with no say from the government.
As an aside I find it extremely amusing that when people talk about socialism they pretend like it's only available in it's most extreme form while simultaneously spouting a bastardized, watered down version of capitalism.
If we're talkin capitalism then let's be genuine in what we're describing: a society in which the government can't tax, can't regulate in any form, can't own land that isn't granted to them on a temporary basis.
Seem a bit extreme? That's why there isn't a single purely capitalist country on earth. It would be a shit show, worse then pure socialism. The US is, by it's own admission, a mixed economy - equal parts socialism and capitalism. As is most every countryon earth. The only think liberals and conservatives debate about is the level at which the country should be one of the other - ex. 62% capitalist & 48% socialiat? 30% capitalist & 70% socialist?
In a world of absolute property rights, I have the right to protect my property from others' pollution. If you have a grill outside a hundred miles from me, several molecules of carcinogens will enter my property violating my property. If I ask you to stop and you laugh at me, I have the right to kill you. That's not tenable. So any government must limit property rights to permit some pollution.
For a normal extremist libertarian or moderate libertarian or anyone who likes capitalism, the government has every right to regulate pollution and taxation of pollution is an efficient way.