People prefer higher costs

Thank goodness for this new report from the OECD. Without it, we would have never known that economic incentive-based environmental policy can save money!

A new report finds that the most cost-effective climate change policies are the ones with the least political traction in the United States.

Imposing an explicit cost on carbon pollution is the best way to put countries on a path toward steep emissions cuts, according to new research by the multilateral Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

“Explicit carbon pricing mechanisms, such as carbon taxes and emissions trading systems, are generally more cost-effective than most alternative policy options in creating the incentive for economies to transition towards zero carbon trajectories,” the group said in a new report.

“The use of these mechanisms is expanding in developed, emerging and developing economies, but there is considerable scope for further uptake by governments,” adds the report that compares policies across a number of nations.

In the U.S., carbon tax proposals have very little political traction on Capitol Hill, while cap-and-trade legislation collapsed in Congress in 2010.

The OECD report examines the cost of reducing carbon through emissions trading compared to other national programs that provide tax incentives, regulations and subsidies aimed to boosting renewable power production.

via thehill.com

Actually, this result has been around for a long time. 1970s maybe?

After all this time I can only conclude that, since U.S. politicians:

1. tend to consistently reject economic incentive-based environmental policy and 
2. represent the people (am I right?), then 

People in the U.S. prefer higher costs. Q. E. D.