The Sydney Morning Herald has run reports for two days in a row on the imposition of congestion taxes on the CBD and other parts of the city. Today there are two stories and an editorial. The first article yesterday, seemed to indicate that an RTA study had indicated popular support for the idea of imposing one on the city, but the main piece today seemed to suggest the opposite.
Most disappointing was Eric Roozendaal the NSW Roads minister ruling it out, not because its unnecessary but because:
“This market research survey from six years ago did not indicate Sydneysiders would support a congestion tax and I can categorically rule it out,” he said.
“The RTA and Government are constantly looking at ways to improve traffic flows through the building of better road infrastructure and better traffic management.”
The problem with this being that, in general, improving flows merely increases the numbers of cars using the road and in pretty short time we have the same problem again.
The Lord Mayor Clover Moore, quoted in the same piece, makes a slightly better case for not imposing a congestion tax,
I don’t support it at this time for Sydney because we don’t have that efficient effect of public transport system and disappointingly we don’t appear to have a commitment from the Government to do something about it,” she said.
but it remains a cop out. There should be alternatives if we are going to propose it, but these can be done in conjunction with imposing a congestion tax. Unfortunately imposing a tax never sits well with anyone and certainly it seems the media is unwilling to explain it in a way other than just imposing a charge to keep people away.
The logic of a congestion tax is that by reducing even a small amount of total vehicles on the road who are making unnecessary trips or encouraging car pooling, the roads are freed up for the rest of the cars, who get a faster trip. On top of this, there are other benefits like less pollution. Also, unlike the tolls imposed on other roads, it should be time varying. There is no reason to impose it in off peak times
However there are good arguments against it. One concern is that it is a regressive tax. The rich are barely effected and the poor can’t afford to pay and suffer as a result. As Tim Harford pointed out in his book The Undercover Economist this is not necessarily so. Certainly in London it was mostly the well off who would drive into the city, the poor already caught public transport, so it was in effect a progressive tax. He acknowledges though that in other places this may not always be the case, but it is possible to redress this in other ways.
One way would be to decrease registration costs, which would deliver more cash into people’s hands which they can then either choose to spend on paying the charge, or alternatively save by reducing their trips into the city. The other side is of course you use the money to increase the amount of public transport infrastructure.
For Sydney at least it is difficult to see how flows can be improved, given that the street layout will not change significantly. Jason at Catallaxy recently summarised a talk on the effect of government spending in reducing congestion costs, highlighting that reductions in congestion from road improvements are extremely cost ineffective and that congestion charging was one of the few tools left to tackle the issue.
I think that a plan involving congestion charging could be politically salable if introduced in the right way. Our current experience with tolling is that it is done for the purpose of raising money for infrastructure. As John Quiggin points out in this AFR article, pricing based on the historical accident of government not having enough cash to fund it doesn’t make sense, but pricing based on congestion does. If issues such as fairness can be addressed, as well as providing better public transport facilities there is no reason it couldn’t be a popular way of reducing congestion.
Elsewhere: Jason at stoush.net has a go, and more commentary at Spinopsys.
I think, weighing up the issues here, a congestion tax seems entirely defensible. As you say, I think there are ways to get around issues of economic inequality among motorists. And this is one of the few areas (perhaps the only) which I think should be partially privatised (I support tolls on roads, too), and which a user-pays system might, in the end, be more equitable. Of course there are class issues and issues of infrastructure in blue collar regions. But I think these can be surmounted with robust policy, and I these issues are secondary to the more presssing and immediate one of global warming.
Clover Moore’s weaselly objection is answerable by just earmarking the revenue raised for public transport, as Red Ken did.
A congestion charge in the CBD must be progressive – lower income people who live in inner suburbs tend to forgo cars (it’s one of the attractions of the inner city lifestyle compared with the outer ‘burbs that you can), and never use them to commute to the city. The charge will tend to fall on the owners of those 7-series BMWs and Ferraris you see in the financial quarter.
Though no doubt if the charge was brought in the tabloids would manage to find some worthy proletarian with an old Kingswood who says he can’t use public transport and must travel to the city every day.
This is one issue where the corporatised mindset of the ALP comes out to the fore. It is patently obvious that Sydney (and Melbourne) needs a congestion tax. The Greens strongly support this tax and in Melbourbne where a Green COuncillor sits there is a possibility it may eventuate.
Yes, certainly anecdotaly. The only people I’ve ever met who regularly drive to work in Sydney CBD are either middle management and higher bankers, law firm partners and barristers.
Yes, Steve, those who can afford to pay CBD parking rates or those who have a parking space provided – not for your average secretary or shop assistant.
‘..a user-pays system might, in the end, be more equitable. Of course there are class issues and issues of infrastructure in blue collar regions. But I think these can be surmounted with robust policy,’
Yes but isn’t the polly’s problem that the congestion tax bites long before the compensating infrastructure kicks in? A better congestion tax for the polly is to let things drift and the punters will slowly work it out for themselves.
Doesn’t the current congestion downtime bear hardest on the high income earner now, in terms of income forgone?
Singaporeans have gone a long way to solve this problem with fees to enter the CBD and defined areas.
http://www.imprint-eu.org/public/Papers/IMPRINT3_chin.pdf
(pdf file)
“Doesn’t the current congestion downtime bear hardest on the high income earner now, in terms of income forgone? ”
Well that is precisely the point, observa. Unlike you punishers and straiteners who want to penalise people for the sake of it, we economists do so to increase efficiency. The point is that these people caught up in congestion have no choice but to implicitly pay for this price except by sitting in their cars aimlessly. A congestion tax in effect allows them the option of paying to avoid this downtime, hence allowing everyone to make more productive use of their time, to the benefit of all concerned.
Incidentally and linking this back to the thread on think-tanks, UK’s Adam Smith Institute can take some credit for inspiring Red Ken’s London scheme (though it also has some criticisms):
http://www.adamsmith.org/cissues/transport/roadpricing.htm
This is a case where neo-liberal think-tanks can even work in support of traditional left green causes. Are weathergirl and Steve Munn prepared to acknowledge this? (and on my side I will say that in my view, the IPA attempt to demonise greens is foolish. there is a lot of potential for collaboration between free market economists and the green movement)
In answer to your last para, Jason, the answer is Yes. And yes, some greenies have some things in common with the right, at least the conservative (rather than neoliberal) right.
weathergirl,
I think Jason is proposing that there is free market solutions to issues greens are concerned with like efficient taxation regimes for polution, and that greens should look to collaborate on such issues.
Correct Steve Edney.
As an aside, almost all right wing think tanks are neoliberal rather than conservative in the generic sense. Conservatives in the generic sense don’t tend to form think-tanks because, as JS Mill alluded to, they are of the Stupid Party. They are conservative because of sentimental attachments rather than carefully thought out rationales. While that may incline them towards being conservationists too, they are not likely to think about innovative ways of helping the environment or addressing other social problems.
e.g. with conservatives I think you can say their commitment to the environment is going to be uncertain. For something like logging in Tasmania, they may well says ‘We need to conserve those forests’. But they will be equally likely to say: ‘We must protect those salt of the earth timber workers and their lifestyles. Logging has been a way of life in those parts for a long time’. In short conservatives are muddle-headed.
Neo-liberals on the other hand will say “let’s look at what the most valuable use of those forests in Tasmania is. Is it ecotourism or controlled logging or some combination thereof?”
Neoliberals put principles of cost-benefit analysis before sentimentality and prejudice which is an unreliable way of ensuring environmental sustainability (think cuddly animals before valuable flora). (I’m writing this partly as an antidote to Strocchi’s paean to conservatism over at the other thread). A Malcolm Fraser who mumbles the odd sentimental guff about the environment is also as likely to support protectionist policies that keep alive industries that are neither economically nor environmentally sustainable and which should be allowed to die quick deaths so that resources are not wasted on them (surely wasted resources are another concern of environmentalism?)
OF COURSE cost-benefit analysis is all that’s required for any decision to be made correctly. That’s self-evident, and indeed sufficient for most neo-liberals to think that anyone identifying as a neo-liberal is automatically correct, as long as whatever crap they’re talking SOUNDS LIKE a CBA.
The problem (AS FREAKING ALWAYS!!!) is to properly evaluate the costs and benefits. Not for ‘think tanks’ to do this, but for TRULY VESTED INTERESTS (from tourism operators to logging/mining companies) to be OBLIGED to do it PROPERLY.
Unfortunately, this means putting up one nebulous, wishy-washy pseudo-science up against another – i.e. economics vs ecology.
I didn’t advocate that ‘think tanks’ do this, FDB. They are non-profits and realistically don’t have enough resources to do this quite intensive exercise. I was merely noting that there is no inconsistency between sound environmentalism and sound neo-liberal economics and a more consistent fit with environmentalism than other non-leftist philosophies.
Good point Jason, but would any conservatives really care enough to protect ‘those salt of the earth timber workers and their lifestyles’? Surely the new IR laws have put paid to that. I always thought that Howard was only trying to wedge Labor with this at the last election (and maybe to expose any potential ‘Liberals for Forests’ still left in the coalition)
To clarify, I would see neo-liberal think-tanks as either
(a) advocating the use of CBA in resolving disputes such as the Tasmanian logging industry one rather than resorting to silly populist rhetoric about loggers’ livelihoods and all the rest of it (if it is not economically efficient to subsidise the car industry from general tax revenues, then neither is it economically efficient to subsidise the timber industry from unsustainable logging practices)
The resulting CBA is best done by an independent regulatory body.
(b) identifying areas where greater user pays can lead to better environmental outcomes and coming out with indicative studies of how such approaches can work, leaving the finer details of implementation to policymakers.
inserts tongue in cheek
Can always give country/regional and rural motorists tax rebates for not having congestion
That way when the urbanites get up in arms we can have that or we can have a congestion tax on our city
We know what to do?
Anyone who has done Eco. 101 knows what to do. Its time to move on to phase 2.
Phase 2 is where we start abusing commie-witch-hunters for getting in the way of doing what we already know is the right thing to do.
Lets move this story along
FOR WE HAVE A CIVILISATION TO SAVE.
Faster please.
SE, yes, I speed-read Jason’s comment. Look, I don’t think the market in its current incarnation very often works for the green movement. Market values are at steep odds with green values, except, as Don Henry observed, when they coerce politicians into look at issues like global warming. The nuclear, insurance and real estate industries, among others, see the sense in addressing global warming. As I’m aware, it was the nuclear industry that forced the US government (and then of course us) to accept the human impact of global warming. So yes, there are instances where capitalist interests can help the green movement.
And of course, as the slogan goes, No Economy Without Environment.
Have you read Natural Capitalism, Jason?
Where does this hatred for warmer winters for the Siberians come from saster?
What is your MAIN problem with CO2-based warming?
weathergirl, I think that the references to the market refer to the advantages to the environment of things like carbon taxes, various quasi-markets which seek to price externalities in to corporate behaviour, and potentially also things like tradeable water on a grid. Those things might be appealing to neo-liberals, and indeed just to liberals, but there’s no reason in principle why social democrats would not also find them appealling. I don’t know too much about John Quiggin’s work on environmental economics and salination, but I’d be very surprised if he hadn’t advocated some use of market or quasi-market signals. And John of course is Australia’s premier social democratic economist. I could be totally offbase about his work in this area, of course, but I’m sure someone here will correct me if I am.
” I think that the references to the market refer to the advantages to the environment of things like carbon taxes”
Now what would those advantages be fella?
No I haven’t read Natural Capitalism.
And yes I am aware of the critique that because environmental ‘goods’ in economies are valued based on whatever contingent valuations that *humans* put on them, this is a far cry from what some environmentalists who think there should be intrinsic, non-human-based valuations put on nature are really after. But this reflects a division within the Greens themselves between ‘pragmatic’ greens (middle of the road people who are concerned about things that do impact on their quality of life in a very obvious way and are galvanised into action because of it – things like water quality, pollution and global warming) and the true believers. And the twain shall meet between economics and the environment at least with respect to the first group.
PS Ignore Panelbeater Bird.
He’s funded by CO2, Lord of Creation
That’s a very well mannered discourse by Birdy’s standards I must say. Things have gone downhill since his Wiki days.
Sorry, Mark. Again speed-reading, drank too much on the plane, am reducing the argument to simplistic cliches, starting to embarrass myself. Should shut up now, except to say Natural Capitalism is a book about where green values and those of capital, even neoliberalism, coincide. http://www.natcap.org/sitepages/pid5.php
But I do think, Jason, your characterisation of how greens think is wrong. Will elaborate tomorrow when I’m sober.
“That’s a very well mannered discourse by Birdy’s standards I must say. Things have gone downhill since his Wiki days. ”
My theory is he’s been screwed over by the Wiki guys so much he has to take it out on the rest of us:-)
I prevailed in that wiki Stoush and the lies I was concerned about aren’t there.
Look Mark you must be a commie.
Because all this ho ho CO2-Lord of Creation smalmyness reveals… the only thing it reveals is you just couldn’t give a toss what is true or not. Or what you pass on to the kids.
I cannot understand people like you.
I just can’t.
You elude me entirely.
Honestly. I think you are a commie-witch-hunter.
What else could explain it all?
Do you think PBB is auto-generated? IF [anything] > THEN [inarticulate rant with "commie" in it]
It’s like an inchoate version of Babelfish. Translated five times and back again.
“This is a case where neo-liberal think-tanks can even work in support of traditional left green causes.”
And this approach did deliver for London, not least because they all have to share the same road.
Last time I was there, even my high Tory relatives and my super dry ex-Australian Liberal Party candidate mates now stuffing their faces at the Inner Temple all rather grudgingly admitted that Red Ken’s scheme was working out rather well.
And the cabbies love it.
Where does this hatred for warmer winters for the Siberians come from saster?
What is your MAIN problem with CO2-based warming?
Come on people. If you are going to keep repeating these religious mantras like some sort of programmed Babelfish you are going to have to back up what appears to be mindless robotic behaviour.
What is wrong with greater plant yields, more rainfall and warmer winter nights?
Its not concern for nature that is motivating this.
The idea that taxation be used to improve efficiency is an odd one, those that live out of the city are being taxed to the hilt and now another tax for going into the city,
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,19645976-601,00.html
No its not. If by doing something we are creating costs for others, ie negative externalities, then it is obvious that its inefficient if we are not charged for them.
If something has antisocial effects as well as social benefits (e.g. pollution that accompanies factory production) then taxing it is a far preferable alternative to banning it. With taxation you are still harnessing the power of the price system.
I (with reservations and qualifications) agree, Jason. But it’s odd to see you argue for state intervention.
To clarify: a heavy carbon tax would discourage the fossil-fuel industry and give financial incentives for alternative fuel industries.
Why do you say that, wg? I would of course prefer the carbon tax to be revenue neutral (i.e. the revenue it raises should be used to reduce rates of less efficient taxes).
And US Republican-leaning economist Greg Mankiw agrees
http://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2006/05/three-votes-for-carbon-tax.html
“To clarify: a heavy carbon tax would discourage the fossil-fuel industry and give financial incentives for alternative fuel industries.”
Yes it would. That’s true. And if global warming were a bad and not a good thing then tax substitution towards carbon-tax would be the policy of choice. It would be the policy of choice if only to pre-empt other stupid leftist schemes. But if not as a part of a concerted effort to take down Jihadia why do you want to tax fossil fuels in the first place?
CO2…. IS GOOD.
The warming that CO2 is promoting is good. The extra plant growth is good. And the reduction in plant transpiration is good. The reduction in the heat differentials is good.
And the negatives (if there be any) are not going to appear in a hurry. Since the CO2 warming is still insufficient to stop the deep Southern winters from growing colder…. or so it seems at the moment.
Oil tax would be OK. Tax substitution towards oil tax. But with tax breaks for oil coming from new oil fields.
But not to fossil fuels more generally. Oil production in the traditional way will plateau soon. So we will have to substitute towards coal and nuclear. We cannot have anything that gets in the way of coal and nuclear.
Bird, I don’t usually engage with this kind of nonsense, but I will say this. One BirdBrain’s “better plant growth” (sure: I can tell you where THAT spin came from) is another nation’s melted ice-caps and lost polar bear habitat, another reef’s extinguished corals, another’s destroyed rainforest, another city’s cyclone, etc etc etc.
And your ‘but-we-can-grow-bananas-in-Canada’ brand of argument has a hole the size of the ozone layer. The world will still have the same seasons, comrade.
Now go and your homework.
Another nations destroyed rainforest?
If CO2-based-warming went far enough most of the world could be rainforest territory.
As for the Polar bear that’s just a few million to pop a cap in his ass and take him further North or down South. Its just a matter of tracking down the big fella another habitat. Too easy and several millions.
Go through your argument again because you are making no sense whatsoever.
CO2 means more plant-growth. Less heat differentials. Warmer winter mornings (not then NOW but then what would have been) in the far north or the far south. More rainfall. Greater water productivity of plants and on and on.
Its a great blessing.
Try and make some sense.
Make sure you have it sorted as to whether you are talking about CO2-based warming or sun-heating-up-based warming.
Apart from the rainforest and the cyclone comments which are incorrect the other items you mentioned are notable for being a catalogue of things which impose almost no costs on anyone.
The inability to see negatives is one of the main identifiers of psychopathology.
As this article notes, there is no treatment for this mental disorder.
http://www.unknowncountry.com/news/?id=5423
In principle, I am in favour of a congestion tax. However, if the state government were to impose one for Sydney, it would pose a dilemma. Motorists would be taxed for going into the city, but they would also be taxed (by a private company) for using the cross-city tunnel to bypass the city.
In any case, there is a form of congestion tax that the government already uses – land tax or site revenue, which increases for areas that receive more traffic.
The closest thing we have to it is the fact that parking spaces in the city have a hefty levy against them. The problem with variety of other taxes is that they don’t actually attack the issue directly, the issue being cars on the roads at peak time.
As for the cross city tunnel, my opinion has always been that it should have been free but the route through the city should have been charged. Building a route around the CBD but then charging to encourage people to not use it is not a good way of tackling CBD congestion.
“The inability to see negatives is one of the main identifiers of psychopathology.”
Surely if you leftists are simply unable to see the negatives of what you are wanting to do here….. If you have this psychopathology…. well one would think anyway that you might overcome this mental handicap INTELLECTUALLY.
You cannot seem to comprehend that there will be any negatives from this campaign to limit CO2. And it amounts to a mental disorder. We have silkworm exhibiting this mental disorder and also the disorder of projection. His information may be right since its pretty evident from the history of the last nine decades that the left are indeed psycopaths.
Nothing if that result of CO2 increases was going to be the only result of global warming. Are the greater plant yields going to offset the decrease in available arable land area caused by population displacement due to sea-level rises?
Increased storm severity destroying crops, agricultural infrastructures and stripping topsoil is going to offset greater plant yields as well. More rainfall is going to lead to worse annual flooding in China and Bangladesh etc, again decreasing the length of the growing season and thus crop yields.
I would agree that it’s not only concern for nature that motivates activists for global warming activism. What about the purely human toll in conflicts over the decreasing land mass available for settlement?
Which of course will also increase the congestion in the CBD.
1.Are the greater plant yields going to offset the decrease in available arable land area caused by population displacement due to sea-level rises?
Well yes. Because there will be an INCREASE and not a decrease in Arable land.
2…..Increased storm severity destroying crops, agricultural infrastructures and stripping topsoil is going to offset greater plant yields as well.
CO2 would DECREASE storm severity. Whereas warming as a result of a heating up of the sun might do what you are saying CO2-based warming would DECREASE storm severity. And obviously so since it will reduce the heat differential between the equator and the poles.
3. More rainfall is going to lead to worse annual flooding in China and Bangladesh etc, again decreasing the length of the growing season and thus crop yields……
No that flooding is to do with lack of capital goods. And its the restricting of coal use and carbon taxes and such that will reduce the capital goods needed to take advantage of the flooding which in the right context can be a blessing. And its the pricing of water properly that will get people dealing with droughts and floods properly.
4. GMB sez “Its not concern for nature that is motivating this.”
tigtog sez:
I would agree that it’s not only concern for nature that motivates activists for global warming activism. What about the purely human toll in conflicts over the decreasing land mass available for settlement?
No they aren’t motivated by that either. They aren’t motivated by concern for nature OR concern for humans. They are a nihilist movement who wants to hurt humans.
NOW ONTO MR SILKWORM:
“The inability to see negatives is one of the main identifiers of psychopathology.”
But surely if you leftists are simply unable to see the negatives of what you are wanting to do here….. If you have this psychopathology…. well one would think anyway that you might overcome this mental handicap INTELLECTUALLY.
I don’t hammer away at these environmental lies just for the fun of it. You guys, if successful, will wind up murdering millions with your leftist activities this century. Just like you did last century.
Dumb purveyor of cant sez:
“Oil tax would be OK. Tax substitution towards oil tax. But with tax breaks for oil coming from new oil fields.”
I sez:
You heard it here, folks. Instead of setting a non-distortionary tax on pollution that would allow energy sources to compete on a level playing field, Mr Gooseplan Bird wants to tilt the playing field in favour of his ‘industry policy’. And he has the hide to call everyone else leftists!
Jason is on two forums irrationally proclaiming CO2 to be a pollutant.
Which just goes to show what mindless automatons human beings can be.
CO2 is not a pollutant.
Its plant food and therefore the Lord-of-Life amongst the gases.
Dude if you don’t want to tax oil don’t do it. I’m cool with that. You won’t get much of a better price for it. But never mind. The main thing is not to tax coal when we are supposed to be substituting away from oil.
Thats the crazy and damaging stuff you seem to want to put over. In 50 years time when we are largely weaned off oil it won’t matter so much. But its absolutely critical that we don’t have a carbon-tax NOW. Its a life and death matter as explained with great care to you in an irrefutable way at catallaxy.
A tax on oil is neither here nor there. But a tax on carbon is a disaster at this time in economic history.
Now I explained precisely why. And in your frenzy of irrationality you have just chosen to ignore this.
Jason, give up on Bird. You’re wasting your sweetness on the desert air.
No listen. I’m right weathergirl. And you are wrong.
And if its the other way around make your case.
For it IS the case that MY case is out there for all to see and flawlessly reasoned.
Neitzshe thought that once science had undermined everything else it would then shit itself. And this environmentalism would seem to prove him right. Its bad science. It could not possibly be worse science. And it appears more like a biblical horror story for atheist-children.
Make your case.
When you try you will find it to be without merit.
Jason, the example you give is a particularly good one for showing up the difference between a think tank like the CIS and one like the IPA. I disagree with the majority of what the CIS puts out, but there is usually a solid logic to it, and the principle is to support the free market. When this benefits the environment they’re happy to get behind it. Plenty of opportunity for the green/left to unite with them on specific issues.
On the other hand the IPA only supports the market to the extent that it benefits the business interests who are it’s real agenda. Rather than make businesses pay for their externalities, they prefer to deny those externalities exist. Naturally they “demonise the greens” – there’s never going to be any prospects for working together.
You actually haven’t made a scientific case, Bird.
And who should I trust on this matter? Conspiracy theorist Bird, who thinks that just by proclaiming something it is true? Or, on the other hand, the world’s largest coalition of 2,500 scientists from 100 countries, including 104 of the 178 living Nobel Prize Winners in the Sciences? Hmmm…
There are thousands of books I could refer you to that make the case, Bird, but for lighter recent reading, look here:
http://www3.griffith.edu.au/01/griffithreview/home.php
By the way, carbon dioxide isn’t “plant food” any more than air is “human food”. It ain’t gonna make plants grow in the desert either.
(Speaking of desert, what was I saying about wasting sweetness…?)
Why not try thinking for yourself? Few of those scientists are climate scientists. And they simply assert stuff.
I HAVE made a scientific case. You haven’t and they haven’t. They just signed a petition didn’t they.
You make your case on your own. Don’t set me homework and don’t hide behind links.
If you even HAVE a case you will be able to make it all by yourself.
You CAN do that can’t you?
“By the way, carbon dioxide isn’t “plant foodâ€? any more than air is “human foodâ€?. It ain’t gonna make plants grow in the desert either.”
Yeah it is plant food. Since they turn it into glucose which is analogous to us turning our food into fat. But its also analogous to what plants breathe so what is your point.
And many deserts will get more rainfall with more CO2. And plants require less water with more CO2 so yes CO2 will in many cases make plants grow in what today are deserts.
Mostly wrong on all points.
Think seeds and soil, PBB. Seeds and soil. Have a think about that. Think habitat. Think hurricanes and such.
No, Bird has it all worked out. Think of Bird’s view, versus that of the American Academy of Sciences, as well as the coalition of 2,500 climate experts I spoke of. “Few of those scientists are climatologists,” Bird writes, citing nothing. In fact, all of them were in the relevant fields, Bird.
And get this. Recently, science historian Naomi Oreskes reviewed nearly a thousand scientific papers on global climate change published between 1993 and 2003. She was unable to find a single one that explicitly disagreed with the consensus view of those scientists.
Look, no amount of evidence is going to make a Bird think, so I will take my own advice to Jason Soon and retire from this futile exercise.
Commercially people will spend a lot of money to put seeds in a greenhouse with a CO2-enriched atmosphere. They might do it for the first three weeks of life then move them all out of the greenhouse. Just to get all those seeds to germinate quickly and grow up big enough to survive in the harsh cold climate outside.
As for soil you don’t want hurricanes and such. And CO2-based warming (as opposed to the sun heating up warming) means less severe rather then more severe weather events.
And obviously so because of the reduced heat differentials.
It does not good to cite studies. And you won’t find studies that will be stupid enough to contradict the concrete facts I have here. They’ll waffle about and imply this or that. But they won’t be able to marshall serious evidence against what I’m saying.
During the last ice age Australia was one big anti-cyclonic system which whipped the topsoil off of Australia and threw it into the sea and as far away as New Zealand.
When the planet is cold the weather events are severe. We don’t want that do we. We don’t want the topsoil thrown all over the place.
If those non-climate-scientists who really had a case. If they REALLY HAD A CASE. And if they disagreed with me on the concrete facts…..
If it was the case that the CAMPAIGN-AGAINST-WARMER-WINTER-MORNINGS-FOR-THE-SIBERIANS had a case…… we can be very sure that this thread would not have fallen of the front page of Prodeo with my entry as the last entry.
Its about time you members of the Prodeo……..Rodeo got down on one knee and admitted that MY POSITION is the correct DEFAULT POSITION.
And then thanked me .
YES THATS FUCKING RIGHT!!
You oughto thank me.
For bringing this NEW KNOWLEDGE into the inner sanctum of leftist unreason.
weathergirl, as I wrote on catallaxy today, Birdy is an evangelist – he knows he’s right, and he can’t be debated.
I wish I had the luxury of knowing I was right – it would make life so much easier.
Its true that I know I’m right.
But I can be debated.
And all you have to do is come up with a better argument.
Is that too much to ask?
As JS Mill said, ‘Better to be Socrates unhappy than a happy pig’
or Bird, in this case.
“But I can be debated.”
Now you just LYING AGAIN!
The congestion tax is lefist cognitive dissonance par excellence. Just privatise infrastrucutre, you muppets.
A privately owned tollway will always have an implicit congestion charge and doesn’t have the same political/time inconsistency like charging the public system does.
I have a better quote for Bird, Jason.
Better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool, than to open it and remove all doubt.
A privately owned tollway is rightist cognitive dissonance par excellence.
Look this is the situation. The real ‘inconvenient truth’ is that we have been in an ice age for the last 39 million years. And that its been a particularly severe ice age for the last 3 and a half million years. A time where we have had more then twenty glaciations.
Its a bit arbitrary deciding on when a glaciation finishes and an inter-glacial starts. But having said this we know that the glaciations last about ten times as long as the inter-glacials. The interglacials typically last only about 6000-10 000 years while the glaciations last about 60 000 to 100 000 years.
So why is everyone making such fools of themselves?
The only climate scientists that disagree with me are leftists playing silly buggers.
“I wish I had the luxury of knowing I was right – it would make life so much easier.”
Well why not just BE right rather then be sarcastic. Its not as if this is a particularly difficult issue to sort out. On one side you just have bullshit momentum. And then you have me telling you how things actually are.
I cannot imagine why all you people find it so hard to see you have been sold a ridiculous story here. The taxpayer contribution to your education has evidently been wasted.
Well there we go. No evidence that CO2 release is not a good thing. Lock-step blinkeredness was all that there was behind this.
On the main subject congestion taxes are not individual toll roads. One ought not confuse that. And you don’t have progressive congestion taxes for Pete’s sakes. You do it on the basis of the type of vehicle, but most particularly the size of the vehicle and therefore how much congestion it is creating.
Derrida derrida derrida. Way to go to destroying a rational policy. You say you want to hit vehicles for a congestion tax ON THE BASIS OF THE EXPENSE OF THE MODEL?
Everyone has the right to be foolish but comrade derrida is abusing the priveledge.
Bird,
We were talking aobut how the congestion tax would operate in practice. Even though the charging would be flat (or as you say based on size of the vehicle) in practice it would be a progressive tax given the profile of the people who typically drive into the city. DD’s comment about models of cars was giving evidence for this, not saying you should charge them differently.
Damn.
You’re RIGHT! Edney.
I came clean off the beam when he said “must” (which I took as an ORDER!!!) rather when “would” would have sounded like a prediction and perfectly fine induction.
The score is 3 substantial things you’ve informed me on and 2 mistakes you’ve busted me on (I’m not really counting the Quiggin correction. He’s a bigot. But that piece on water pricing was good work for anyone and not just Quiggin.)
Derrida? What can I do to get this egg off my face?
Hopefully this is the shape of things to come. I smell a small govenment leftist. A heretofore nonexistent but much anticipated specious sent to break the mental gridlock of this troubled planet.
Come over to the bright side of the road and bring flute with you. Our conservative church is broad enough even to accept thieves so long as the goal is to steal a little less every year.
Well, there you go, Steve, you’ve just been extended the invitation of a lifetime. Now all you need to do is cut your hair and have a bath and you’re in!
Dude. I was talking to Derrida.
Steve can stay where he is. There was no invitation to Steve. But he should probably take a bath nonetheless.
But Grame, you’ve just admitted that Edney has stomped you three times. Doesn’t that count for something? Shouldn’t he have probationary membership or something? Anyone else in this LP mob who would qualify?
He hasn’t stomped me three times. He’s only stomped me once. He’s just picked me up on a couple of misdemeanors and brought one or two things to my attention. When I was arguing with him I was basically beating him senseless minute in minute out.
Lot of congestion on this thread.
Just sayin…
Now that’s something i’d love to see: A Birdian scale of lefty belief (as exhibited by LP posters and commentators)- ordered from least to most savable.
You think i’m making these suggestions frivolously, sont you GMB? But I’m not. I honestly want to understand exactly what it is you are frittering away your estimable intellect upon.
Wow, for a minute there I thought I had an in. I’m wondering though what’s keeping me out given I didn’t express sentiments all that different from DD. Is it my status as a high priest bully boy advocate of the status quo?
Either that or you’re a COMMIE WITCH-HUNTER…
I agree with Michael G, Bird. It would be interesting to see a list going from ‘most capable of salvation’ to ‘least capable of salvation’ of all the LP participants.
Steve Edney, I’m willing to sponsor your membership of the church if you send me some dough.
Well we can’t be laying down hard and fast rules here. Or the commie witch-hunters will find a way to work-to-rule on them and come in and pervert whatever you are doing.
Still Steve gets points for this thread its true. We have to get cracking with finding a simulated privatisation of the roads.
A return ticket from Kings Cross to Olympic park costed almost $8 today even though the trains are mostly empty. And yet tommorrow at peak hour it will cost the same when its standing room only. This is no market facsimile. This is foolishness. And it will only be corrected when they can whack congestion taxes on all the roads.
Strange how the positive/negatives of CO2 emissions is part of a post on congestion taxes.
It’s pretty poor to argue about CO2 emissions on a lefty blog that has very few scientists writing to it – it’s irrelevant to argue about it here. One’s impact when arguing about it here is zilch.
But about congestion taxes, what other do-able ideas do people have about reducing congestion in the CBD? A congestion tax may well work. On the weekends, there’s little congestion (although Market St is often busy). Maybe one way, if possible, is for employees to stagger their working hours – it may reduce the effects of peak hours. Of course, many businesses wouldn’t be able to do this.
Further to Birdy’s point about the cost of a train ticket, off-peak (after 9am) return fares cost less than than return fares purchased before 9am, so there’s possibly some apparent at a congestion charge there. Of course, demand can be pretty inelastic for people who need to get to work before 9am, but for others it may be different.
All train fares have recently slightly increased, and off-peak return fares have increased more than the general increase, so perhaps the people in the Dept of Transport will be able to get some idea of the demand vs fare “curve” for off-peak train travel.
Maybe they could do some experiments with different fare structures to get an idea of how elastic demand is.