Partial Basic Income through Universal Carbon Dividends
@scottsantens posted on Medium a few weeks ago about a very interesting way of bringing about a partial basic income. https://medium.com/basic-income/this-idea-can-literally-change-our-world-107cbc94057a
We are all citizen-owners of the air that we breath and the global climate. Since carbon emission harms everyone, carbon emitting behaviors are taxed and then the tax is paid out to everyone. In effect, it normalizes the air we breathe as a property right.
If this seems confusing to you, definitely read the article, because @scottsantens explains it much better. I believe that incentives are extremely important in the way they impact behavior (you can see that in the design of Steem Basic Income). Putting negative incentives on carbon emission is a good way to put a stop to excessive consumption of fossil fuels, and distributing the tax revenue as a basic income is a great way to prevent that revenue from creating other distortions in the economy.
We will return to the normal schedule of @steembasicincome updates in our next post, but we plan to keep sharing resources about basic income alongside our program updates.
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Man, this is a great idea! Implementation is tricky though! Air doesn't care about country borders :) Thanks for sharing this idea!
Yes, it would be very challenging to implement correctly.
Well I gues because of this border issue, it should be implemented globally. But then the problem arises that 1 dollar of tax is worth differently in different places in the world. One simply can’t sunply put the same pricetag on one ton off carbon globally. Man the more i think about it the more comlpicated it gets :)
There are purchasing power parity indexes that are published, but they are very easily manipulated and could result in carbon emissions moving into poorer countries - or in starving poorer countries of the resources they need to improve their situations.
First thing, looked at the conference and considering making the trip based on a couple things. But wanted to double check something.
You said:
When I did that the "More Info" button below your name says:
I'm assuming the ticket is good for the entire event and this is just a tracking method to know who brought in how many people. Great and I'm all for that, but that wording makes it sound like you don't get access to everything. Please clear that up.
With business out of the way, onto your post.
The concept of taxing carbon usage would be great! If a large enough tax was placed on carbon usage we would see a real change in peoples daily routines which would benefit the planet and remove profits from Big Oil.
Then to use this as a base living income in the form of a debit card issued to citizens of any given country which this is collected. As I don't see the World agreeing on this it would have to be a Country by Country change sadly.
That issue creates a unfair trade issues which would need to be addressed. As these taxes would be collected on local business and not imported goods if say China refused to implement the tax (which they never will).
At that point you would need to implement added Carbon Import Impact Taxes. These taxes on imported good would then be added to the Basic Income pool. The incoming tax should also income the amount of Carbon used to transport these goods across the world.
Just maybe at this point people would start to change habits to buying local as the carbon tax would be lower and make these goods more attractive.
I had these same concerns about the wording, but the organizers decided that promoters can just clarify in their promotion posts. You are correct that it's just for tracking, and the ticket is good for the entire event.
That's my read on the situation, too. You have some great points about Carbon Impact taxes being necessary too. My fear is that those taxes would be diverted and not flow into the basic income pool. I don't have the highest trust or confidence in governments, but my concern for the environment is more important to me than my distrust of the government.
They've certainly covered the point that irks most people about the idea of a carbon tax; that being stopping it going to government. It still raises many more questions though. @michelmake mentions one in the fact that our air knows no borders. I also wonder, if this has the affect that is wanted, the reduction of use of polluting products, then surely we'll reach a point where the tax is no longer generating much income and there goes the partial basic income.
I see your points, but the same concerns were given about taxing cigarettes and alcohol as a source of revenue. If they reduce usage, then they don't generate as much revenue.
In reality, there will always be some basic level of usage where carbon emissions are profitable, even after a graduated carbon tax. What level the equilibrium settles at will be a matter of experimentation. There would eventually be some level where increasing the tax rate starts to decrease the tax revenue, and that's the level that should be targeted to achieve both objectives.
Thank you so much for this! I love what you are doing :)
...And invited to Vegas for the conference...so exciting! I'll be very interested to hear your take on everything you learn there!
Cheers :)
Thanks for your support. I'm really looking forward to the conference!
"Partial Basic Income" really sounds interesting. Thanks for sharing this concept with us. Keep up the great work. 🙂
Partial because it won't be enough to meet minimum sustenance, but it's a good start.
Yes, something is better than nothing. And it sounds great too, so in future it can be expanded.
This is something to definitely think about because this Earth isn't getting any cleaner. Plus our oceans are filled with plastics.
Funny that you should mention this. I chewed out some co-workers last week because they covered a desk with tiny plastic confetti for St. Patrick's Day.
Theoretically talking the carbon tax is a great idea, and in some countries like Switzerland, Finland and Italy it's been already done. From a worldwide perspective a global adoption would present an amount of legal issues (mount-Everest size). It's enough to look at how the Kyoto protocol has been poorly adopted... I believe we need to find other incentives other than negative ones.
That's a very fair point. It becomes a global geopolitical issue.
Is it possible for a person to send 1 steem to @steembasicincome and choose himself as the beneficiary? If yes, it means that this person would have two shares? Thanks to whom answer these questions.
No. The other share will go to another member who only has one.
So, if I have a friend and send 1 steem I make him the beneficiary and we both receive 1 share. Later he sends 1 steem and makes me the beneficiary. Now we both have two shares, right ? Can we continue doing this till we have thousands of shares each? Is there a limit in shares by subscriber ? Thanks again.
You can continue doing that to support each other. We have a few members that have done this. We have a limit on how many shares members can have in each pool, but no maximum limit outside that. Currently there are 5 pools, so that's a theoretical limit of 500 shares, but each pool is limited to 500 members, so the total maximum would keep increasing as we grow and open new pools.
There is no limit to how many bonus shares you can have from delegation. So you could max out your actual shares and then delegate thousands of SP to increase your upvote weight even more. If you're in more than one pool, the bonus from delegation only apply to your highest pool.
Thank you very much for your attention and fast answer.
You're welcome!
Guilty as charged. 😇
If you are searching a "friend" to do that, what you have suggested, I would like to strike that two for one deal.
Also I could pay the share in advance. Got some Steem in my wallet to do that multiple times, one share at a time.^^
Just inform me, if you want to do that. 😉
(I should open a steembasicincome barter club, but how...)
Thank you for your offer. I accept it and I will now send the 1 steem to @steembasicincome putting your name as my beneficiary.
Wow, that was fast.
Send my part of the deal now, too. 😎
https://steemd.com/tx/e19b6dd5af0271b44abd4ea9fb940d43ce30e1b6
Pleasure doing business with you. 👍
If you want some some more shares, I still got some Steem left. 😁
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