What Reality Does This Reflect?

I enjoy the statements made by academics. They are so detached from any semblance of reality, especially those working on policy issues. Take the carbon tax issue, or Pigou Tax is you are from Harvard. Now some MIT researchers propose a dramatic tax on carbon, however that is measured. Recall that as I have argued it is a highly regressive tax. The Harvard Prof with their limo does not see it whereas the Harvard janitor with their small home and distant commute see the brunt.

Now an MIT report tries to rephrase the problem. They state:

“By taxing carbon,” Caron says, “we will collect a lot of money that can be used to supplant other taxes that we like less. Why tax something that we like?” And, he adds, by using just a small portion of that revenue — less than 10 percent — it’s possible “to compensate the lower-income people and neutralize the regressivity.”

I doubt if any of these folks ever spent a femto second in the Halls of Power in DC. This "wise" suggestion would be opposed by so many forces it is unthinkable than anything would be accomplished. One wonders what entity funded this work and where these folks will end up. Pity.