
The Case for a Carbon Tax on Beef - cageface
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/17/opinion/sunday/carbon-tax-on-beef.html
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andy_ppp
I was thinking about a more interesting policy around this; let’s give
everyone a meat quota (at some sustainable level) and allow them to trade
their quota for cash or buy more. This would make meat very expensive but
would also mean if you are going to bother it had better be good meat and
additionally might be a way to supplement the income of poorer families and
people... just a thought.

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dahdum
Is meat so different than other carbon producers like air travel, electronics
manufacturing, or others? I think what you are proposing boils down to basic
income and carbon taxes if you take it far enough.

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lern_too_spel
It's the difference between a carbon tax on meat and carbon permits (cap and
trade) on meat.

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dahdum
Ahh, yeah it would be more comparable. Though I think a sin tax is more
workable that getting a cap on meat legislated.

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twblalock
I'm increasingly convinced that carbon taxes, as well as cap-and-trade
schemes, would end up being gamed like any other tax systems. They would
create substantial complexity and harm the economy without reducing emissions
by as much as expected.

There are some examples in this article:
[https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/gaming-carbon-
mus...](https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/gaming-carbon-must-end-to-
solve-global-warming/)

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SubiculumCode
If the tax was placed as a fixed cost per pound of cattle product, regardless
if its prime steak or pink goo, it would be a hard tax to game: In the end all
meat products are packaged and a weight placed on it.

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hackeraccount
That might create odd effects. Consider. What if, right now, cows are raised
using feed that's a inedible cast off of food grown for human consumption. If
you tax all meat equally the incentive to do that would be reduced. You might
as well raise cows on food that _is_ fit for human consumption if it
marginally improves the quality of the cow because you're paying the same tax
either way.

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spraak
Not only is is industrial agriculture a huge part of CO2 emissions, it's also
one of the biggest consumers and polluters of water.

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bamboozled
Don't forget deforestation, which severely amplifies the effects of climate
change and the water table, for obvious reasons.

In Australia this is a serious environmental issue and often the cattle
industry is fighting to remove or stop land clearing laws being reinstated
[1]. It's a disgusting industry on so many levels IMO.

[1]
[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/mar/05/global-d...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/mar/05/global-
deforestation-hotspot-3m-hectares-of-australian-forest-to-be-lost-in-15-years)

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betterbeehome
Stop trying to manipulate people with morality based taxes. Actually try and
solve the problem. These people don't care about the environment. Otherwise
they would completely cut subsidization to wheat & corn. Then farmers would
stop feeding their cows those things, thus reducing mono-culture pollution.

Make feeding them corn illegal. The cows would be healthier and they wouldn't
need to subsidize pharmaceuticals for antibiotics to keep cows alive.

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cageface
This isn't about morality or feeding wheat and corn to cows. It's about the
greenhouse gas production inherent to raising beef. There's no way you're
going to sustain the current volume of beef production on free range grazing
alone. Industrial feeding techniques are required.

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betterbeehome
Yes you can. Stop farming corn. Start farming grass. If we committed to it,
it'd be possible. But it isn't BECAUSE of the government. And no this isn't
about greenhouse gas production. If they cared, they would stop fracking for
gas, releasing enormous amounts of methane and pollution a 1000 times worse.

They just don't care about cows. Or health. Or the environment. Or even
science. We've already figured out how to solve this issue. This isn't it. All
they've figured out is how to get more taxes.

These are morality taxes based on nonsense that would solve nothing. It blinds
us to how we're farming wrong.

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darawk
Why don't we just put a carbon tax on...carbon?

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unit91
Do you realize this would tax people for breathing?

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p1necone
Assuming a "Tax" is an extra percentage amount on money paid in exchange for
goods/services: no this would not tax people for breathing, unless you know of
someone who already pays for the privilege of breathing.

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oldandtired
There is such a big hoohaa over CO2 emission. We have much more pressing
concerns and about things that we cannot control. Yet there are no mitigation
efforts even being discussed.

The problem area is the changing magnetic fields of this planet. If any of the
scenarios play, even the least problematic, then we are going to be in more
trouble, more quickly than we will ever be with CO2 emissions.

The Van Allen belts are a highly protective shield for this planet from highly
energetic radiation (solar and cosmic). If these belts ever get destabilised
then we (most life will be affected) will being facing more serious health and
well-being problems than what we would ever have from CO2 emissions.

All that the CO2 debate is about is distracting the general populous of this
planet from more immediate problems. The beneficiaries of any carbon trading
or taxation regime are not the general population.

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utopkara
OK sure, do we also put carbon tax on wheat, and other vegetables? ~750
million tons of wheat is produced yearly, vs ~260 million tons of beef.
Excepting the case of perennial plants, unused parts of vegetables (e.g. wheat
straw) have a hefty carbon footprint. BTW, rice is a case in itself.

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SeeDave
From my understanding (which could be complete and total junk
science/quackery)... wheat and other vegetables are carbon neutral. CO2 is
extracted from the atmosphere, and used to grow the plants. Even unused parts
(wheat straw) are a type of carbon "sink" in that the atmospheric carbon is
trapped in organic matter which can be "upcycled" into paper products, etc.

I believe this thought process is why corn-ethanol was so hyped, as it was
sold as a 'net carbon zero' fuel.

Not looking for a flamewar here, and I would be grateful if you could correct
any misunderstandings I may have. I've got an 8th grade science-fair level of
education on this one, so I'm more than open to your thoughts!

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Neeek
Not to mention that you need to grow the grain to feed the beef if they aren't
grass fed cattle.

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eeZah7Ux
It's worth noticing that animal farming is heavily subsidized in some western
country, much more than agriculture.

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GiorgioG
A carbon tax on beef would have exactly zero impact on my consumption. It
would sure reduce it at the low-end of the economic spectrum, but beyond a
certain point it won’t make a difference.

I’m against taxing things because they’re bad for us.

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adventured
It'd be a belligerent, regressive tax on the bottom 2/3.

There are other prime carbon tax choices that place the tax burden higher up
the income scale. We should be starting there.

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wmf
Many people suggest returning the carbon tax to the people in the form of
basic income to prevent it from being regressive.

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40acres
I'd suggest trying pork. I've eaten a lot of pork over the past year. It's a
tasty and versatile cut & apparently very good for the environment!

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blueside
I didn't know cows could type

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strictnein
Clearly you haven't read the kids book "Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type".
Rather good, in my opinion, and actually touches on organized labor of all
things.

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username223
I'm nowhere near becoming vegetarian or biking everywhere, but I have all but
given up beef for this reason. Eating a quarter-pounder is similar to burning
a gallon of gas, which is shockingly worse than most other meats. Ars Technica
had a good writeup awhile back:

[https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/10/emissions-
eschmissio...](https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/10/emissions-eschmissions-
how-to-simply-reduce-your-carbon-footprint-in-2017/)

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awt
We are surely fortunate that the U.S. and Canadian settlers decimated the
estimated 60 million head of buffalo ranging North America until the late
1800s. Global warming could have been exacerbated greatly by their continued
existence.

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tommoor
Considering there are almost 100million cattle alive in just the USA right
now, I'd say that 60million 200+ years ago are pretty negligible ;)

[http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/usda/current/Catt/Catt-01-31...](http://usda.mannlib.cornell.edu/usda/current/Catt/Catt-01-31-2018.pdf)

