Ezra Klein has an interesting catch on the new Washington Post poll, which asked people which asked people whether they'd be willing to pay a certain amount each month in additional electricity costs if it supported a cap-and-trade program that "significant lowered greenhouse gases".
When the monthly cost is $10, 56 percent supported cap-and-trade and 42 percent opposed it; when the cost is $25 per month, sentiment shifts to 44 percent in favor and 54 percent against.
Ezra drew a graph on this but let me draw my own, even wonkier one:
The indifference point works out to $18.75 per month, or $225 per year; that's when as many Americans apparently oppose cap-and-trade as support it. Meanwhile, the CBO recently estimated that the Waxman-Markey bill under consideration by the House would raise the average household's electricity bill by $175/year or $14.58/month as of 2020. That would qualify it as popular, although only barely so, with about 52 percent supporting and 45 percent opposed.
Obviously this is a highly speculative exercise for any number of reasons -- the margin of error in the polling, the margin of error in the CBO estimates (which the same conservatives who loved what the CBO had to say about health care suddenly find ample reason to doubt -- although truth be told, the economics of climate change tend to be pretty fuzzy), and so forth. But the sticker shock on this particular bill doesn't seem too bad, even if Americans aren't willing to dig too deeply into their pockets to tackle climate change overall.
6.25.2009
The Environmental Indifference Point
@ 2:00 PM
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when you play with numbers you are the one Sir Nate.
let's say ...I would pay 50$without blinking an eye.
May I say :first ?
yes.
:)
That's an interesting post. The thing is I believe the 175$ a year is only the first year and goes up fairly sharply in future years. Also it probably isn't accurate to say the impact on climate change is "significant," it will probably be quite small, Jim Manzi say's a tenth of a degree Celsius by 2050 I believe. Would most people call that significant?
Doesn't say much for the moral rectitude of most Americans. They can't stomach a lousy $200/year to make a better world for their progeny?
Maybe we deserve to drown in our own filth. Unfortunately, it will be the lower and middle classes who will do the drowning. Too bad it can't be restricted to those who are opposing the movement against global warming!
Progressive calculation:
It's okay to soak the poor as long but not the middle class.
Why are so many progressive idea turning out to be regressive?
Why do sustainability and affordability seem to be mutually exclusive?
Ben Jones, two assertions of yours are incorrect. First, you claim that prices will get higher after the first year, but I totally disagree. The first year or two would be the toughest because of the transition, but after the coal plants are shut down and the clean power sources are built, energy cost will actually go down. The high costs account for the transition of energy sources, but once in place and once the technology hits economies of scale, costs will be reduced.
Secondly, what makes Jim Manzi an expert on climate change? Isn't he the guy who sold the crappy Lotus Notes email program to IBM? And this is just one part of reducing air pollution and reversing global warming, and yes, one tenth of a degree decline is a good thing when the ice caps will melt with a 2 degree increase.
but after the coal plants are shut down and the clean power sources are built, energy cost will actually go down.
It is maddening how lines are thrown around like this so casually...almost like something no bigger than, "After I stop by the grocery store and pick up a few groceries, I should have plenty of food for myself and any company I might have this weekend."
Yep, no biggie. No biggie at all. /sarcasm
Do you even understand the ramifications of making an overhaul to the energy sector like is being proposed? Hell, we're still a long ways - make that a loooooooooooong ways - from being able to replace conventional energy sources with renewable ones on a sizeable scale. Yet, you're just like, "Oh no biggie, it'll just happen and costs will drop and we'll all live happily ever after."
These liberal fantasies can only seem real in some kind of la la land. I shudder at the thought.
The most irredeemably worthless polls are the ones that ask, "what WOULD you do if ...?" or "how much WOULD you be willing to spend ..."
The difference between what people SAY they would do when responding to a pollster, and what they actually DO when the situation arises in real life, is almost always enormous.
Thus, this poll, like all others which ask similar questions, indicates nothing whatsoever.
See, I would really like to thank Dr. Who for pointing out the painfully obvious, who cares about progress if it's going to be hard to do...Now that's the American can do spirit...I can see it now, do you understand the ramifications of putting all your old paper documents on computers, it's going to take initial manpower and cost, why would we do that...
Every once in a while you see an interestingly odd argument against any action on climate change: "[such-and-such policy] will only reduce the effect by a tenth of a degree"
These arguments simply don't make any sense when used by people who are not advocating far more drastic policies towards carbon emission reduction.
First, global warming being a global problem, policies restricted to the United States cannot be expected to solve the problem alone - we should add in the effects projected for policies to be adopted by other nations.
Second, attempting to stop every policy would lead to far larger and worse changes:
http://globalchange.mit.edu/resources/gamble/no-policy.html
Third, this policy might not be the only thing we do - we have to start somewhere.
Forth, they suffer from the fallacy of small numbers. If I told you I would reduce the level of cynaide in your bedroom to less than 200 parts per million, you'd be thanking me, because that small an amount of cyanide produces a significant effect: it kills half the people exposed to it. Just because a value is small does not mean that it is unimportant.
That wasn't my point, John, to be "against" progress. I'm all for going towards more renewables, etc. but my point was that to speak about it in a one-sentence throw-away line doesn't do the issue justice.
Saying something along the lines of "but after the coal plants are shut down and the clean power sources are built, energy cost will actually go down" as if it's akin to something as simple as "after I eat dinner, I will probably no longer be hungry" is doing a disservice to any debate on the issue.
Let me ask you this, John. First, don't you agree that before we shut all coal power plants down, we need a system that will provide an adequate level of energy/power generation to make up for it? How much would we be capable of replacing right now? How much in 10 years? How much in 50 years? Will we ever be able to completely wean ourselves from coal power without considerable sacrifices in standard of living (or a considerable reduction in the US and global population)?
So far, the answers to those questions by liberals have been hollow. We're a long ways (decades, if not a century or more) from replacing non-renewable energy with all renewables, and there's no guarantee yet we won't be able to do it without making significant alterations in the amount of energy we produce and use.
So don't get preachy to me about being doubtful about progress when the progress being suggested is far from being proven as a viable alternative.
When these questions are asked, do the polls make it clear that these price hikes will be maturing in 10 years? I don't think anyone in America honestly thinks that energy prices in 2020 will be the same as in 2009. But the questions are asked in a misleading way, creating the implication that these changes will go into effect immediately and your wallet will get hit instantaneously.
What's also maddening is that North Korea has threatened a "fire shower of nuclear retaliation" against the US and has threatened to wipe us off the face of the earth, yet we hear nothing from the president and 538 is worried about the "environmental indifference point."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31539524/ns/world_news-asiapacific/
We have assholes in the world with a 2 million man army who have threatened to obliterate and annihilate us, and we continue to blather about health care and climate change bills. Wake up, people!
I guess the 175$ a year will go to 2020, but that is before the law mandates serious cutbacks in carbon usage. Waxman-Markey may or may not pass, but I think this poll shows that the American people aren't really willing to pay the costs to make the kind of anti-global warming agenda liberals generally want.
Do you even understand the ramifications of making an overhaul to the energy sector like is being proposed? Hell, we're still a long ways - make that a loooooooooooong ways - from being able to replace conventional energy sources with renewable ones on a sizeable scale. Yet, you're just like, "Oh no biggie, it'll just happen and costs will drop and we'll all live happily ever after."
Does it register in your thick skull that the ramifications of doing nothing to curb fossil fuels(which is the GOP policy) will utterly destroy the world?
Do you really think that coal and oil will last forever and that the earth can accept that pollution indefinitely?
Well, you are a non-thinking conservative so you probably do.
What is funny is that unless you are in the 5% of the richest people, those policies you defend are hurting you as well.What these greedy pieces of shit don't understand is that when the oil runs out they are just as screwed.
What's also maddening is that North Korea has threatened a "fire shower of nuclear retaliation" against the US and has threatened to wipe us off the face of the earth, yet we hear nothing from the president and 538 is worried about the "environmental indifference point."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31539524/ns/world_news-asiapacific/
We have assholes in the world with a 2 million man army who have threatened to obliterate and annihilate us, and we continue to blather about health care and climate change bills. Wake up, people!
Holy shit! You mean a third world dictator is spouting threats?
OMG! Since Doctor Who is a coward let's put everything off the table and just nuke north korea!
It is funny when the study that shows conservatives are more fearful and scared of nearly everything show up and prove it.
You do realize that North Korea stopped its program in the late 90's and only started it back up when Bush started the juvenile "axis of evil" crap and refused to talk to them don't you. ANother wonderful legacy of Bush.
Does it register in your thick skull that the ramifications of doing nothing to curb fossil fuels(which is the GOP policy) will utterly destroy the world?
Bullshit and hyperbole. Destroy the world? Come on, dipshit, even you can't be that stupid. Worst case scenario I've heard from even the most ardent believers who throw out the most radical climate change models - which show full melting of the polar ice caps - results in a 200-foot rise in ocean levels, displaces several million people, and makes life veritably unpleasant in a whole host of other ways, but it doesn't "destroy the world." And that's assuming the most radical changes come true, which many skeptics doubt is even possible. I still maintain that the earth went through periods of major climate change long before fossil fuels were in use. There's little we can do to change the climate. We can cut down pollution and use as many renewables as possible, and that's great and all for the environment and for our sustainability - and I'm all for it - but it will have a negligible impact on the climate.
Do you really think that coal and oil will last forever and that the earth can accept that pollution indefinitely?
Nope, never said that. I know it will run out or at least so low that it can't provide energy to support life as we know it. I never doubted that. Of course, you're too much of a dick-waving jackass to care and actually read what I said. You just salivated at the opportunity to hurl vitriol at another "knuckle-dragging conservative." Re-read what I said. All I complained about was the simplistic use of words as if the conversion to renewable energy will just happen as if it's no big deal. It's a huge deal, beavis, and will take a century or more to complete. Even then, we (our "progeny", at least) may need to get used to a lower standard of living because the energy available by what is produced from renewable sources won't be as ample as what we've been used to with fossil fuels.
One immutable fact, though. You, sir, are a liar and a moron.
beavis,
You have a big mouth for a self-aggrandizing prick.
You're just a blowhard and probably lacking a decent education.
STFU and let the grown-ups talk.
With an attitude like that, beavis, if N. Korea does attack, I hope to high hell it's your city and the bomb lands squarely on your house.
I'm far enough inland and away from big cities, I don't have anything to worry about. I'm not a coward, nor am I "scared." You're just spouting ridiculous bullshit. I'm just pointing out we've got a nutjob willing to go down in flames and take a few million Americans with him, and we're scrubbing our nuts over $50 extra costs per month for a family of four over climate change and health care bills and whether or not its acceptable and if people are willing to pay that price.
Climate change and health reform will take a back city if San Francisco or LA gets incinerated. Better to be aware of it now and plan for a potential attack than simply bury our heads in the sand and talk about these other, "more pressing" topics.
I guess you're another asshole fileld with 'white guilt' and hatred for "American imperialiusm."
Yep, we're the reason for all the ills in the world. Trace it all right back to the good ol's US of A. We're the source of all evil in the world.
Prick!
"progressives" are morons. This cap-n-trade is nothing but a regressive tax. Hypocrites.
#1) man's impact on the climate is next to nothing.
#2) this law won't reduce total carbon on planet Earth at all. I guarantee total carbon output increases--not decreases--in the next 25 years. Book it.
"progressives" are being dominated by ideology. I am interested in what works, and the truth. This does not work and everything we are being sold here is a lie.
Nate, you are not smarter than Warren Buffet and he trashed this regressive tax. This recession is now Obama's recession.
@Nate -- typo in your first sentence: "which asked people which asked people whether. . ."
@Nate -- typo here, too: "significant lowered greenhouse gases". You mean "significantLY".
Never mind. People, simply ignore beavis. I see he's just a bitter, ignorant troll. I thought this guy was serious and then went to the other thread where he completely lacks a fundamental understanding of the money supply and impacts that has on price.
I invite you, along with me, to forget this imbecile and overlook anything he says. I don't want to do this, but I've been meaning to download that Greasemonkey script that hides comments from certain users that's being pushed by that Opus fellow. If I do, beavis will be the first name I put in there.
typo alert: aside from the two that Juris mentioned:
sent4iment shifts to 44 percent
But on the topic of the post, I agree with the commenter who said that "what WOULD you do?" polls are basically worthless...
Can you do any analysis based on income levels and if they have any correlation with their electricity use/cost? At the lower income levels, the cost increase may be less (because they have smaller houses etc) and their willingness to pay extra may be lower too.
Ok how about this angle
If you start having to pay more for energy maybe people will start focusing on conservation more (Conservation is hopefully an issue that everyone can agree with)
So I'm more of a Democrat here
Then we go to healthcare. If the government is giving you healthcare at X rate. Where is the incentive to improve your health. To me there is one and thats why we need some sort of Auto Insurance idea mixed in.
So I'm more of a Republican on this issue
As for what I would do. I'm driven by numbers. I think I would make more of an effort to conserve and possibly invest in some more expensive energy saving items for my house.
I will tell you there is no way I am buying a Prius (even used anywhere from 15,000-30,000) when I can get a used or even new car anywere from say 8,000-18,000. Gas Prices need to be consistently at $10+ per gallon before it makes sense to swtich over.
I do support a small gas tax here in Virginia because the index is messed up but not $4 a gallon. At that point you run into the regressive problem again.
For anyone interested in seeing beavis' motives and the attitude that lies beneath, here is a collection of all of his posts - 10 pages worth - that highlights the litany of hate and vitriol he emanates. I urge you to read this as a warning to take a huge grain of salt with anything this bitter, angry bastard has to say.
http://www.backtype.com/url/beavis.myopenid.com
If he gets too carried away with his big mouth, my next step will be to post his home address on here and other places on the web through a little hacking job I'm familiar with at myopenid.com.
Beavis, you've been warned.
Progressives are screwing their own people here. Poor, union workers, blue collar jobs.....incredible. The left is screwing their own people here.
Hypocrites.
Progressives are screwing their own people here. Poor, union workers, blue collar jobs.....incredible. The left is screwing their own people here.
Hypocrites.
I agree with you, Beano, but keep in mind you can't reason with people who think all of the groups you talk about - poor, union, etc. - will be even more screwed by either an ocean that rises 200 feet or the next Ice Age. Even if those are plausible events, I don't think humans have any control over them. But they do. And that lets you know what you're up against in making an argument against radical changes that could have deleterious effects on personal wealth of the poor and middle class.
So tell me progressives, if this capntrade law passes, what is stopping American companies from moving jobs and manuf overseas to where they don't have such laws? In fact, these countries probably have NO LAWS against pollution and in the end, we will get MORE not less pollution.
How can you progressives not see this? Global C02 won't decline. This is me taking all of your claims at face value....
Wow, the doc and the cook are amusing.
So, you're arguing that humanity has no impact on the climate. That is false, though the degree of impact can be argued back and forth. Greenhouse gases are so named because they can demonstratably be shown to retain heat. CO2 is formed by combustion of material, and, especially in the burning of fossil fuels and plant matter, this releases CO2 into the atmosphere.
Ergo, humans impact the climate by adding more CO2 to the atmosphere. QED.
So tell me, Beanocook, if your strawman argument of "TUK R JARBS OVERSEAS" is real, doesn't that imply that you have no pride in America, no desire to try to keep the best damn country in the world from having her "purple mountain's majesty" covered with haze, her "alabaster cities" from being eaten away by acidic rain?
What businesses would move overseas, anyway? Service industry? no. Tech industry? That stuff's already overseas or going to stay here.
Manufacturing? What, Government motors cars?
What JOBS would we lose in trying to protect our country, and setting an example for the rest of the world?
You want the US to lead and feel good about it? Then start pushing for new nuclear reactors to replace coal plants! Start demanding means for cleaner companies to benefit for keeping our land beautiful!
Or go back into your little cave and wait for the rapture or whatever it is you're wasting your life on.
As for the "OH NO KIMJONGILLLL!" stuff:
The North Koreans do need to be taught a lesson, but most of them are simply trying to survive a repressive government. N. Korea couldn't reliably hit the US with its current capabilities. Japan, however, is entirely possible as a target. But if Korea launches anything, even China is going to drop their protection or run the risk of everyone else with nuclear weapons looking their way. North Korea gets one shot at most. Then they burn under masses of conventional bombs.
What's amazing to me is always just how much low-hanging fruit there is on efficiency. You can mandate higher mileage all you want, but what really made people switch to smaller cars and public transportation was the high price of gasoline last summer.
We could cut our building heating/lighting energy in half and have it pay for itself in 5 years without cap-and-trade, 2-3 years with it. Lots of simple little things that people don't do because energy is so cheap.
Last year, 40-50% of the new electricity generation capacity built in this country was renewable, mostly wind. Solar modules are at $3/watt wholesale, which is at grid parity for about 15-20% of the electricity market. And it will be $2/watt in 3-4 years, with no bottom in sight.
Furthermore, new rock cracking technology has made an enormous natural gas deposit from New Jersey to Tennessee available, which will make the U.S. the "Saudi Arabia of natural gas". Electricity from natural gas emits half the carbon of coal.
Cap and trade will bring out these and many more low-hanging fruit. We won't have to start making tough decisions until we're at the 50% mark. It's a lot easier and cheaper than people think.
Siiiiigh...
I could provide you two conservative hacks with a complete bibliography on the causes and effects of our actions/inactions on global warming/renewable energy. It's the topic of my thesis research. But, you know, I just cannot suffer the ignorance of fools today.
I will say this: most experts believe that the consequences of global warming are already taking place from our industrial activities post WWII. There is evidence that suggests that once momentum is built up the effects will cascade at an alarming rate.
I loathe the human capacity to be reactive and not take action to mitigate damage unless there is abundant, tangible evidence that climate change is occurring. We do not have the luxury of learning from this particular mistake.
One way or another, we will pay a price for our industrial activities and their effects on the planet. Questions is, do you want to address it now or wait until it becomes a global calamity?
I can forgive the obtuse, ignorant, stubborn perspective of conservatives who don't want things to change. Those who believe that capitalism is a never ending bounty of unending resources and consumers. But only for so long. The argument against climate change is over. Global warming is not a theory. And if you are not on board with finding solutions to it, YOU are the problem that needs to be eradicated. YOU will be the ones responsible for the loss of species, biodiversity, rising sea levels, climate refugees, economic collapse, resource wars, and the host of other maladies that will befall humanity. YOU are criminal.
I, for one, grow weary of having this debate.
For the record, I am not a big fan of cap and trade. I am in the camp that the trade part of that equation is no different than the Roman Catholic practice of trading indulgences. The carbon is still put in the sky. It is an imperfect compromise at best. It is also one of the better ways to transition to a carbon neutral world available.
But penances notwithstanding, there really is no purgatory to be had here.
wv: imisms. Gaffs made by Don Imus?
You want the US to lead and feel good about it? Then start pushing for new nuclear reactors to replace coal plants! Start demanding means for cleaner companies to benefit for keeping our land beautiful!
Drowzee, you are such an ignorant sheep.
I, and many other conservatives, have been arguing for nuclear power for the last 30 years or more. Nuclear is a wondrous technology that was shamefully portrayed as dangerous by left wing liberals.
Nuclear is the only carbon free base energy source we have. I am a bigger "environmentalist" than you are, I promise. I am totally for building hundreds more nuclear power plants that would replace our current coal plants. This would do more to reduce C02 than any idea from the left.
Further, I would create an national infrastructure to support electric plug-in vehicles to access this new supply of, carbon free, nuclear power.
This idea does way more than anything the left supports. The left is largely opposed to nuclear. Has been for decades. Only some softening in the past decade. I promise you will come around to my position and other mainstream conservative positions on this in the near future. Why? Because it works and your idea doesn't.
you have no pride in America, no desire to try to keep the best damn country in the world from having her "purple mountain's majesty" covered with haze, her "alabaster cities" from being eaten away by acidic rain?
Again, you must take everyone for a fool. C02 and particulate pollution are not the same. The US has largely defeated particulate pollution, US air quality has improved for almost 40 years in a row. Haze once plagued American cities, in the 60s and 70s. That problem has been reversed. C02 and this cap-n-trade bill have nothing to do with haze. It is about the baldfaced like that C02 is causing global warming---of which stopped completely in 1998. We are no longer warming, we are in fact in a cooling trend. Man has a negligible impact on the climate.
I called my Dem congressman and I was told he was getting pounded by calls, against this regressive tax. You are going down and soon you will think like me.
Dear God...
@Dr Who - Come on man, knock it off. You're not even trying anymore. If you want to call everyone here an unthinking vagina-mongrel, just get it out of your system and move on.
You can call me an ignorant dipfuck all day if it makes you feel better, but it damns your cause and makes you look less passionate and more screwed up nutty than testicular torsion.
The administration may be reaching the same point liberal bloggers have come to. If there's absolutely no way I can please you, why the hell would I keep trying?
So I'm not going to try to reason with you. I'm not going to debate your tortured logic. It's pointless. I have already read the studies and I know you're making claims based on intentionally flawed data and outright corporate propaganda.
By the way, your mom told me to say hi. She really knows how to give it up for a woman who has been dead so long. Meow.
Now pipe down, the grownups are talking.
xoxoxo
Adam said...
What's amazing to me is always just how much low-hanging fruit there is on efficiency.
Just ONE example:
In 2007, electricity production in the US was estimated at 4.167 trillion kWh.
Transmission and distribution losses are estimated at 7.2% in the US (compared to 7.4% in the UK). That means we had to produce about 300 billion more kWh of electricity that we actually used.
If we reduce transmission and distribution losses by as little as 10%, we need to produce 30 billion fewer kWh of electricity to get the same amount of electricity to the consumer.
If we can reduce transmission and distribution losses by 10%, who does it hurt? Come on CONs and TROLLs, it HAS to hurt someone, doesn't it? Who does it hurt?
Mike in Maryland
My Blogger ID is http://www.blogger.com/profile/02848893412251095965
Mike in Maryland said "If we can reduce transmission and distribution losses by 10%, who does it hurt? Come on CONs and TROLLs, it HAS to hurt someone, doesn't it? Who does it hurt?"
Wait, hang on, gimme a second, um... You're a communist!
[/nailed it!]
Good work as always. Only one quibble - it's not really an "indifference point", which is the point at which someone considers either alternative to be of equal value. It's really more like a "tipping point", where the overall weight of public opinion shifts from favorable to unfavorable.
On Cap and Trade: The trick here is to make sure that the price the big polluters would have to pay to relocate to a no-rules country and ship over all their products is greater than the price they'd have to pay in carbon credits + emmissions reductions in the US. Given that constraint, any corporation who decides to flee instead of using the system properly is insane and throwing their money away, and the shareholders will have their hide before the government has to do anything about it. It's just a matter of picking the right costs, and that's what the C+T market is for.
On Cap+Trade as a "Regressive Tax": The overall effect is regressive, but only because oil and "dirty coal" electricity is cheaper than renewably-generated electricity (so the guy who can't afford to buy green power probably has the corporation passing the costs on to him). And yeah, this is a problem. One solution immediately springs to mind (tax credit for buying green energy?) but I don't know if we can do the math on that 'til we see how the C+T market shakes down. Remember the other side of the coin: consumer-side, the companies who are selling their credits are getting a savings, and can use it to make their green energy cheaper (possibly to the point that it undercuts the beleaguered petrol-burners). Of course, this assumes that there's clean energy to meet demand, which brings me to my next point...
On Power Plant Alternatives: I will note that there has already been passed a law that, by minting some 800 billion Washingtons out of thin air, was supposed to (among other things) provide money to build new renewable-energy-based power plants &c. We also have 10% unemployment, which means there is a workforce available who will be more willing than usual (as per textbook supply/demand) to work on such projects. A concerted barn-raising effort would get us pretty close in a world where a few million wind turbines are enough to offset the nation's entire electricity bill (the math on this was done in the 2008 election by one of the minor candidates in case you want to look it up).
On the Doctor's North Korea non-sequitur: Yeah, but 538.com is a political statistics website. If there's no numbers to crunch, there isn't really a lot for Nate and the gang to say. Esp. since the topic is not exactly controversial; the current administration is already working in concert with the UN to remove KJI's ability to put his money where his mouth is (if he ever had said ability to begin with).
On Global Warming: I wrote a long rant here, but then realized that I am totally uninformed on the topic. I'd like to be convinced one way or the other, but have not seen any evidence other than ice core charts from 2005 (which imply things directly contradicted by statements in this thread e.g. BeanoCook's "global cooling trend" since 1998). My current opinion is that out of the huge quantity of papers that exist on this topic, which ones you cite usually depend on what animal appears on your lapel pin, and someone needs to make a cogent enough argument for a pleb like me to understand.
On "Shut up and let the big people talk": Implying that one's detractors are incapable of rational thought is a good way to make sure that no actual discussion takes place.
I know that no one is reading this now that the newer posts have gone up, but I don't understand why the graphs have to be linear. Extrapolated out this says that if the cost were $100 a month, there would be 0% support which probably isn't true. Also, if we backed down to $-20 a month (where we get paid to take action) there would still be 20% evildoers that opposed it, and I find that even harder to believe.
More likely there is a two phase distribution, and when the price drops to $2-$5, the support will max out at 80-90%. This would definitely be more interesting with more data points.
Christopher said... "On "Shut up and let the big people talk": Implying that one's detractors are incapable of rational thought is a good way to make sure that no actual discussion takes place."
Maybe go back and re-read what Dr Who has been saying, and not even just in this post, in all of them. He speaks without facts (similar to Beano who apparently convinced you of a cooling trend, not the actual truth), attacks everyone and runs valid discussions off the rails. There is no chance of actual discussion from Dr Who.
Your questions, however, are valid and valued. People are saying things and you want citations. That is intelligent skepticism and the people making claims, asking you to believe them, should know that many readers need them to show their work.
So let us see where facts and figures are coming from. (And kudos to those who already have.)
@10kZ: That comment was also directed at the good Doctor, for what it's worth.
@uberfrosh
You are correct here. Whenever a dependent variable is constrained (between 0 and 100, in this case), OLS is not the correct model to use for the extremes (although it is a good approximation when you are tinkering in the 35--65 range as here). It would be much more appropriate to use a logit model (or probit or cloglog or log), which constrains the dependent variable (public opinion, here) to the range 0--100.
The short answer is that interpolation (as Nate is doing) is more robust than extrapolation. [Mark Twain had a humorous (as always) view on this when he read that the Mississippi River was shrinking a few feet per year.]
Well Nate, if all this is true as you say and it really isn't going to cost that much, then tell us why...
Even as Democrats have promised that this cap-and-trade legislation won't pinch wallets, behind the scenes they've acknowledged the energy price tsunami that is coming. During the brief few days in which the bill was debated in the House Energy Committee, Republicans offered three amendments: one to suspend the program if gas hit $5 a gallon; one to suspend the program if electricity prices rose 10% over 2009; and one to suspend the program if unemployment rates hit 15%. Democrats defeated all of them.
From The Wall Street Journal "The Cap and Tax Fiction
Democrats off-loading economics to pass climate change "
Nate...
Your analysis is completely flawed and misrepresents the CBO's study. At no point does the CBO state that the average household's electricity bill will increase by $175 per year. That is their estimate for the TOTAL NET COST of the legislation...
Taking into the account the gross cost associated with complying with the cap ($110 billion); the allowance value that would flow back to U.S. households ($85 billion), both in the form of direct relief and indirectly through allocations to businesses and governments (all of which would eventually benefit households in people’s various roles as consumers, workers, shareholders, and taxpayers); and the additional transfers and costs discussed above (providing net benefits of $2.7 billion), the net economywide cost of the GHG cap-and-trade program would be about $22 billion—or about $175 per household.
The total increased cost burden to households will be borne partially through higher electricity costs, partially through higher fossil fuel costs and partially through higher costs of all goods that use energy for production, storage and transport.
'k so on the Global Warming tangent I've picked up a couple things, starting with a graph based on weather service numbers - as all of this information is recorded in the newspaper record &c either the graph is totally accurate or a bald-faced lie, with the latter being far less likely.
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png
Seems to go against the "global cooling trend" comment as per BeanoCook.
Also, for reference, the aforementioned ice core graph from 2006:
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a316/JoINrbs/DSCF0016-2.jpg
The only decent argument I've heard about the above has something to do with ocean stratification and algae blooms - I'm not an oceanographer so I didn't understand it, but the general explanation was that the warming trend started before the CO2 spike, and we're just ass unlucky to be here when it happened. Which is really more of a "we're doomed and there's nothing we can do about it" argument than an "everything is fine" one, come to think of it.
@Keith: Now that is interesting. Are the minutes to these things on CSpan or anything like that, where the public can actually see them? I'd be interested in seeing how that hatchet-fight went down.
[[slightly off-topic, but it has been mentioned above]]
Regarding the myth of global warming:
CO2 and CH4 are both greenhouse gasses (fact); that is, they reflect infrared EM waves and are transparent to higher-energy waves (e.g. visible light), thus allowing sunlight to penetrate the layer and allowing infrared light to become trapped.
Human beings are responsible (both directly through some types of power generation and indirectly through increased demand for cattle, although neither is an exhaustive list) for increasing the amount of CO2 and CH4 in the atmosphere (fact).
Thus, we are not at all culpable for any of the recorded increased global average temperature.
I'm sorry. I missed the logic for that last step.
@Ole Forsberg...
1 - I don't see what any of your supporting points has to do with your conclusion. It read like "One plus five equals chocolate doughnuts".
2 - Let's say there's a meteor on a collision course with earth, and it's going to kill us all (or maybe just a few hundred million people). Should we harness the power of human technology, or should we just say "hey, it ain't OUR fault we're going to die, this is a naturally occurring event."
It IS happening. We may have the power to stop it.
Shouldn't we try?
Shouldn't somebody at least call Bruce Willis and see if he's willing to help?
@Keith...
Wall Street Journal is an extremely right wing newspaper. I'm not calling them liars, but they have a strong republican lean.
@Christopher...
I really appreciate your input on this discussion... that's all.
@10kZebra
I am glad we agree.
@Ole Forsberg...
But that's truly the logic opponents are using. It's strange. They can't ALL be on the fossil-fuel payroll, there's too much cash left over at the end of the day for that.
But I was seriously asking, does 1+5=chocolate doughnut? I should call in to Rush. Meh, he's deaf, he can't hear himself, let alone logic.
@10kZebra:
There was a (science-oriented) Catholic theologian who was asked (presumably during the Reformation) what he would do if the Vatican declared 2+2=5. He said he would agree with the Vatican.
This seems to be the logic many are (unfortunately) using.
PS: This theologian continued by saying "and I would count 1, 2, 3, 5, 4, 6, ..." (which many are *not* using).
So I just read that the way this legislation got out of comittee was with "compromises to agracultural states". That is no good. I may be a coolaide drinker, but I completely disagree with Obama's policy on agra-subsidies.
The reason this ties in is a recent set of studies showing that alfalfa and soy feedstocks produce drasticly lower methane from cows than their current corn feedstocks (I'm looking up the reference now). As has been shown, farmers will feed cows whatever is cheapest (even crushed up chickens that had been eating crushed up cows). Why oh why are we making corn so cheap.
Sorry, thats alphalpha and grass instead of soy and corn:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090621/ap_on_re_us/us_burpless_cows
To all:
Dr. Who may be caustic, but in this issue he is right. Most people are seriously underestimating the challenge of large scale energy market transitions.
That said, we are talking about taxes here. The money doesn't actually leave our economy, it goes to the government and is spent on government programs... without this we'd just have either higher taxation or greater debt, so that point is utterly mute in the large picture.
But I do agree with Dr. Who that this is going to be one hell of an undertaking, which will probably take ~7 decades.
Currently wind power accounts for ~1.5% of our grid energy profile, hydro and nuclear power account for ~26% of our grid energy, and biofuels account for ~3% of our petroproducts demand.
For the grid, most good damable regions have been exploited, so hydro will have a tough time increasing its penetration. New nuclear is WAY too expensive to compete without completely absurd levels of government subsidies, so it will be a very long time before nuclear increases its penetration (more's the pity). Solar is still a decade away from being truly competitive, and currently accounts for only ~0.01% of the grid energy in the U.S. So hoping that solar energy will carry us forward is somewhat foolish; and continuing to press for more biofuels will result in more industrial agriculture displacing natural land (VERY bad in terms of greenhouse gasses) or more people starving to death (very bad in any terms).
While people have brought up natural gas, the U.S. likely has less than 15 years worth of retrievable natural gas - total. With Russia forming a natural gas cartel (similar to OPEC) with Iran and Qatar, it would be foolish to increase our dependence on natural gas.
That leaves wind as the only current market-viable "green" energy platform in America... and the good wind regions are becoming saturated. Transmission expansion is difficult, as it involves literally thousands of personal lots, hundreds of townships with their individual zoning issues, dozens of parks and rivers, etc... It can take as much as a decade to get through the beurocratic mess to get started on a 200 mile high voltage line, and there have been projects where the litigation for a 300 mile transmission upgrade cost more THAN THE SPACE STATION. So if the good wind regions are saturated (and they are fast becoming so), then it's going to be tough for wind to continue to grow as well.
That isn't to say we shouldn't try. But we need to know what we're looking at. It's going to be difficult.
Global warming proving to be a hoax.
We don't need this bill!
http://tinyurl.com/moqe2e
petekent01 (on twitter)
PeteKent said Global warming proving to be a hoax.
Okay, now you're just being a fool. Either you're an idiot or you think the rest of us are... sure, only 99.5% of scientists agree that climate change is real AND caused by the activities of man, but then there's PeteKent, forever towing the conservative line, even if it means the mass destruction of life on earth (not the entire destruction, but your money won't be much comfort when fresh water is more valuable than gold.)
Man I wish this was my site sometimes. Boy howdy would I run things differently.
And to the conservatives, check this, the Gospel of Judas is as valid a Biblical text as any. Atheists say that means they all have equally zero value, but Christians have to look at the facts, it's a solid book, byotches... Read Misquoting Jesus and then renew your blind, dogmatic adherence.
Then I'll give you my address so you can come punch me in the face in person... that make you feel better?
Forgive me if I sound passionate, it's just that I think life on earth should be preserved.
@ Pete Kent
That completely assinine article lists ~700 scientists that deny global warming...
There are literally hundreds of thousands of scientists who understand the issue sufficiently and are concerned about the eventual effects of global warming.
The last geographer who was a member of the flat Earth society died several hundred years after Magellan. The fact that there are a few unrepentent dumbasses in the scientific community doesn't in any way discredit the very real data which is incontrovertable.
At this point, "global warming denier" is almost perfectly synonomous with "uninformed idiot". The data is there, if you but pull your head out of your ass long enough to review it...
There are very real questions and concerns about the cost of mitigating climate change vs. the costs of adaptation. We can, and should, have that debate... but as for the debate concerning the reality of global warming, we've had that debate and your side lost. You lost because you were absolutely wrong. Now shut up and stop trying to re-fight the philisophic debates of the middle ages. Science won, and it values empirical data over passion and uninformed belief... Get over it, and join us in the discussions that we need to have in THIS century.
Glenn Doty said... At this point, "global warming denier" is almost perfectly synonomous with "uninformed idiot". The data is there, if you but pull your head out of your ass long enough to review it...
Hey hey hey! Civilized people don't use that kind of language, Buster! If you want to use such speech you must at least be accurate. Instead say "pull your head out of your PeteKent".
Sheesh, am I the only defender of common decency left anymore? Boob vagina.
LOL.
:)
@10kZebra
Don't really care if you think the WSJ is right wing or not. Your numbers for how little Cap and Trade will cost are baseless and wrong, but it's the only thing the left can say to ram it through. But hey, that's what I expect from the entitlement redistributionist mentality. Never fail to gin up a good crisis to pass your treehugging agenda. For my next magic trick, I'll invent he Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid ponzi schemes and tell everyone it will only cost them 3% of their paycheck! Thanks Dems for continuing to bankrupt the middle class piece by piece so you can "feel good" and win votes!
Obama advances two arguments for cap and trade.
One that it is needed to decrease our dependence on foreign oil. The other is that there is global warming.
Here is what I wrote about that in another thread:
Obama claims we need to end our dependence on foreign oil.
Well, then, let’s drill for our own!
Oh, but that too will run out?
Okay . . . .
But long before the last drop is extracted or chunk of coal mined, the cost of extraction will rise steadily as more and more remote sources are plumbed. This will cause the price of fossil fuels to rise and will naturally engender the very alternative energy industry Obama wants. And it will do it without imposing a tax on any of us or killing our exports and reducing our jobs!
Also, as noted in that thread :
The tide is turning on Global Warming Pseudo Science. The latest Inconvenient Truth? The skeptics are winning out. There is no manmade Global Warming ( http://tinyurl.com/moqe2e )
How curious that the left accused the Bush administration of ignoring science for political reasons. It seems it is actually the modus opperandi of the Left!
Even if I admit, arguendo, that GW is real, the self-imposition of a tax system on our country will do nothing to solve the global problem.
Consider that as India, China, Brazil, Indonesia, and Africa (nothing is ever expected of the Africans, but lawlessness) continue to pollute and don't impose a tax on their own selves, United States exports become relatively more expensive and less competitive.
We lose jobs and wealth to the developing world and at best have a speculative impact on the environment.
This is folly and madness only a very stupid or evil man would propose such a thing.
Which one is President Obama?
If , as I noted in my above, there is no global warming and the whole thing is turning out to be a hoax, and we will have years to find cheaper alternative sources for the plentiful fossil fuels we have right here, and it will cost us jobs when we can ill-afford to lose them, why, then, are we doing this?
The statistics do not lie: the earth has been cooling since 2000 and the polar ice caps are replenishing. Climate cycles last 100s of years. A bit of anecdotal evidence is not meaningful.
Also Dotty is lying when he says there are 100s of thousands of scientists that support his theory of GW. There are not that many "scientists' in this whole vast, chilly world!
Read what these hoaxters write --all hot air and no facts or citation.
petekent01 (on twitter)
@Keith said "Don't really care if you think the WSJ is right wing or not.
If you're supporting it as fact, isn't that proof enough?
Don't try to insult me, I get death threats weekly at my job, your ad hoc, ad hom attacks don't pass muster.
So this is proof the detractors have no case. I asked if we should try to save the earth, no matter what the cause of its woes, and the answer is that I'm a bleeding heart liberace... That doesn't help the discussion, it only makes the right look desperate, out of touch and willfully ignorant.
@PeteKent... really? There aren't that many scientists in the world? You do know we're not talking about Intelligent Design scientists, right?
I understand wanting to tow the party line, but you do realize that this is our one and only planet on the line, don't you?
Is there any one policy of Obama's on which the PeteKent's, Dr. Who's and Keith's agree? I'm doubtful, which is why I don't see any point in trying to persuade them, but if there is, I'd sure love to hear it.
An unflinching capacity for self-deception should not be mistaken for the truth.
10kZebra said...
@PeteKent . . . I understand wanting to tow the party line,
10kZebra,
Considering that the 'party line' that PK tries to tow is so lightweight scientifically, philosophically, morally and ideologically because of all the holes that have been blown in that party line, I'm sure he has no problems towing that line.
However, the phrase is 'toe the line', an idiomatic expression meaning to conform to a rule or a standard. Considering how lightweight all the GOOPer lines are because of the holes blown in them, I can understand why those lines blow all over the place, and why PK and others have a difficult attempting to toe the line. I must give them credit for the fancy footwork they perform to keep their toes from crossing that line, though, since the line they're trying to toe keeps moving so much and so fast.
Mike in Maryland
My Blogger ID is http://www.blogger.com/profile/02848893412251095965
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