Election 2019 and the Con Carbon Tax Deniers

As everybody knows Andrew Scheer and his climate change denying Cons are on a crusade to try to destroy the Liberal government's carbon tax plan.

A tax Scheer blames for everything, and I mean everything.

And he isn't the only Canadian Con leader who feels that way.



So do all of the above, who also spend their time portraying carbon taxes as a deadly threat, instead of the best way to fight climate change, and prepare us for a greener future.

So I'm glad to see some members of Canada's eminently respectable Ecofiscal Commission are trying to set the record straight. 

As a group of economists, we still believe that facts should matter when it comes to making important policy decisions. Unfortunately, not everyone involved in the Canadian climate policy debate appears to agree. Myths and rhetoric are pushing the real facts to the sidelines. The result is a mix of confusion and polarization that is poisoning our public debate, and we are losing patience.

And who can blame them for losing their patience?

When they have to deal with a brutishly ignorant beast like this one...



Ontario Premier Doug Ford recently claimed that carbon pricing will be a “total economic disaster” for the country and cause a “carbon-tax recession." Despite the fact that this claim strongly contradicts almost all of the available empirical evidence on carbon pricing, we’re hearing it repeated more often.

Who of course couldn't be more wrong.

Economists are virtually unanimous in the view that carbon pricing reduces greenhouse-gas emissions at the lowest possible cost to the economy. Other policy approaches – such as intrusive and prescriptive regulations, or generous production or consumption subsidies – will cost the economy far more to achieve the same outcome.

But like his fellow climate change denier Andrew Scheer, seems determined to prevent Canadians from collecting generous rebates.

Under the federal policy that begins this spring, roughly 80 per cent of households will receive rebates that actually exceed the amount they will pay in the carbon tax.

By trying to make them believe that the Liberals are as corrupt and dishonest as they are.



Which of course is laughable.

While the serial liar Scheer likes to claim that some big companies are getting a special break.



When in fact they're not.

The carbon-pricing systems in Canada – including Alberta’s policy, the planned federal backstop and Quebec’s cap-and-trade system – were explicitly designed to protect business competitiveness by reducing costs for large emitters. These policies still create financial incentives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions – but by improving performance rather than reducing activity or shifting it to other jurisdictions.

Companies still have a powerful economic incentive to reduce emissions because their costs will fall by doing so. That’s the essence of a carbon price.

And it's just another Big Lie.

But then of course it's easy to attack policies when you have none of your own...



And Scheer is counting on ignorance as well as human greed to win the next election.

But I think he's in for an unpleasant surprise.

I believe that the more Canadians are educated about the situation, and the more they see the writing on the wall.  

The more they will realize that Justin Trudeau is on the right side of history...



So that the carbon taxes the Cons thought would destroy him.

Will instead destroy them....