Quote:
Originally Posted by Fuzz
It would be interesting to see the actual dollar values of the quintiles, but it seems to me that the first 3 probably cover all the lower class, and probably much more. So you come out pretty even until you get to the high earners, who I'd also assume burn the most fossil fuels, but also have the most means to reduce their usage, which this should incentivize them to do. So, uhm, what is the actual issue here? |
Well, in another case of Azure being completely full of baloney, he very obviously did not read that report, and may have only read what is included in the summary AFTER his last few posts, given that the report directly contradicts his whole spiel about “the CP 1% have it so easy buying up solar panels and EV cars while the lower class struggles to make ends meet and the carbon tax is hurting them!!” What does the report actually show? Yeah, the opposite, that low income families maintain and will maintain a net benefit thanks to the carbon tax right through the year 2030 when the price goes up to $170, while high income earners (that devilish CP 1%!) is at a loss now and having it only get worse.
Usually the quintiles are just a even split of numbers. So you rank every household from 1 to approximately 15M by income, and the first 3M are the 1st quintile and the last 3M are the fifth quintile. This means that the last one is going to include a household making a couple hundred thousand and a household making a billion.
It’s also important to remember that the entire report is based on estimates and modelling. It has plenty of limitations, and the PBO has been forthright about all of them. It’s only meant to help politicians discuss the issue, it’s not meant to be proof of anything (though I doubt some people care about the difference).
What it also shows, which Azure either didn’t read or ignored, is that the majority of households do (in fact!) get more money back than what they spend on the tax, which is totally in line with what everyone has been saying and if Azure was being honest he’d know that. If we want to take the PBO’s estimates at face value, fine, but we also have to recognize that it doesn’t include any potential economic benefits (on purpose), negative impacts of climate change (on purpose), changes households might make on account of reduced employment income (on purpose), or any other real world factors that will absolutely play a role. It does include estimated lost employment income, and tries to apply that across the board. It’s also averages, meaning that one person losing their job in a carbon intensive industry has a bigger impact on the model than 5 houses getting the maximum rebate. And on top of all that, a household where a single person with no dependents making 100k is weighted the exact same as a household with one earner making 100k with 3 dependents despite the differences between them.
Basically, there is nothing wrong with the report if you treat it as it’s meant to be treated. But it has enough limitations and the scope is narrow enough (again, totally on purpose) that everyone from politicians to random plumbers on the internet using it as proof of
anything are wildly out to lunch. The PBO said it himself, though it seems like certain people only want to hold the PBO as an authority when it suits their point, and not (strangely) when it completely contradicts it lol.