Sort of related I think the fairest way to reduce aviation emissions (not great for me because I do a lot of flights though) is to charge an increasing air passenger duty – i.e. it increases with...
Sort of related I think the fairest way to reduce aviation emissions (not great for me because I do a lot of flights though) is to charge an increasing air passenger duty – i.e. it increases with the number of flights you do. That means that if you do a short-haul flight once a year for your summer holiday you don't pay any tax. If (like a friend of mine) you do >100 flight segments in a year you will end up paying a lot of tax which will hopefully disincentivise this kind of behaviour.
There's no reason that air travel should be cheaper than rail. We've gotten here through a perverse set of incentives (including subsidies on fuel), and just taking those away might be enough, but...
There's no reason that air travel should be cheaper than rail. We've gotten here through a perverse set of incentives (including subsidies on fuel), and just taking those away might be enough, but going the one step further and actually disincentivising using such carbon intensive methods of transportation would make the transition much faster.
But if we look at the behaviour we're trying to disincentivise, is it the flying itself, or is it the carbon emissions associated with flying? This is the perfect use case for a carbon tax. A flat fee per kg CO2e, scaled to make trains price-competitive, and that money can be reinvested in alternative forms of transportation.
This would help threefold:
People would choose trains over air travel simply because it's cheaper.
Airlines would start looking for greener aircraft so they can offer cheaper flights.
The money being reinvested would make the train network better and more resilient, thereby making it even more attractive to passengers.
Step 3 feeds back into step 1, and we get a positive feedback loop.
Some distances are impractical to take by train. I wouldn't suggest building a rail network between Portugal and New York, for instance. But intra-country and intra-continental rail should be a no brainer.
I actually can see a good reason why air travel is cheaper than rail – you don't have to build miles of track and maintain it. Of course a lot of airlines make a huge amount of money from their...
I actually can see a good reason why air travel is cheaper than rail – you don't have to build miles of track and maintain it. Of course a lot of airlines make a huge amount of money from their reward schemes (so capping credit card fees is probably a good thing to do here) and benefit from excessively favourable taxation.
I broadly agree. I think it's worth noting that due to the high-fuel cost of takeoff, in terms of efficiency, shirt haul flights are more costly. And more easily replaced with rail travel. Also...
I broadly agree.
I think it's worth noting that due to the high-fuel cost of takeoff, in terms of efficiency, shirt haul flights are more costly. And more easily replaced with rail travel.
Also want to ensure the new system involving your escalating taxes doesn't disincentivize high speed rail development and competitive rail pricing (lol, we wish), but these are just wee details, let's goooooooo!
There are lots of ways that you can structure these taxes – for example investing the tax money in a "rail infrastucture development fund" which then exclusively spends the money on upgrading...
Also want to ensure the new system involving your escalating taxes doesn't disincentivize high speed rail development and competitive rail pricing (lol, we wish), but these are just wee details, let's goooooooo!
There are lots of ways that you can structure these taxes – for example investing the tax money in a "rail infrastucture development fund" which then exclusively spends the money on upgrading track, building new track and buying/improving rolling stock.
For long haul I think you also have to consider the fact that economy seats are generally a bit larger so the emissions are higher. There's also a lot of first and business travel (for context these are usually big enough to convert into a 2m long bed so you can fit a lot of economy seats into a single business/first seat) which should be factored in (and I think higher taxes on business and first class travel is a no-brainer).
Thats exactly it: When using taxes to disincentivize behavior, the money collected needs to be directly allocated into the thing you want instead. Taxes on alcohol and cigarettes should be dumped...
Thats exactly it:
When using taxes to disincentivize behavior, the money collected needs to be directly allocated into the thing you want instead.
Taxes on alcohol and cigarettes should be dumped into Medicare funding for example.
The biggest problem, however, is that if you are not careful, your shiny new infrastructure now relies on the sin taxes of the old. And you run into the nasty funding problems we're seeing with EV adoption.
There should be a phase-out of the reliance on tax revenue, like every time revenues drop 10%, the rate goes up 10% and 10% of the total funds get allocated to something else.
I think the argument here is that by spending the money on rail infrastructure (rather than operational subsidies) you don't end up with this situation where you are dependent on "sin" taxes to...
I think the argument here is that by spending the money on rail infrastructure (rather than operational subsidies) you don't end up with this situation where you are dependent on "sin" taxes to run the services.
Gotta repair/replace that infrastructure someday though. And if there's one thing I learned (in the USA), saving for that long-term infrastructure isn't really a thing, and then 30 years later...
Gotta repair/replace that infrastructure someday though. And if there's one thing I learned (in the USA), saving for that long-term infrastructure isn't really a thing, and then 30 years later it's a funding crisis because we reduced fares/taxes for decades and swept the problems under the rug.
Yes this is also a problem in other places, e.g. Germany, which is why I think reducing fares as much as possible isn't sensible. I do think that in Europe high prices are a function of very low...
Yes this is also a problem in other places, e.g. Germany, which is why I think reducing fares as much as possible isn't sensible. I do think that in Europe high prices are a function of very low capacity, and a lot of people who would like to travel by train, so increasing capacity probably means a reduction in prices plus an increase in revenue.
Sort of related I think the fairest way to reduce aviation emissions (not great for me because I do a lot of flights though) is to charge an increasing air passenger duty – i.e. it increases with the number of flights you do. That means that if you do a short-haul flight once a year for your summer holiday you don't pay any tax. If (like a friend of mine) you do >100 flight segments in a year you will end up paying a lot of tax which will hopefully disincentivise this kind of behaviour.
There's no reason that air travel should be cheaper than rail. We've gotten here through a perverse set of incentives (including subsidies on fuel), and just taking those away might be enough, but going the one step further and actually disincentivising using such carbon intensive methods of transportation would make the transition much faster.
But if we look at the behaviour we're trying to disincentivise, is it the flying itself, or is it the carbon emissions associated with flying? This is the perfect use case for a carbon tax. A flat fee per kg CO2e, scaled to make trains price-competitive, and that money can be reinvested in alternative forms of transportation.
This would help threefold:
Step 3 feeds back into step 1, and we get a positive feedback loop.
Some distances are impractical to take by train. I wouldn't suggest building a rail network between Portugal and New York, for instance. But intra-country and intra-continental rail should be a no brainer.
I actually can see a good reason why air travel is cheaper than rail – you don't have to build miles of track and maintain it. Of course a lot of airlines make a huge amount of money from their reward schemes (so capping credit card fees is probably a good thing to do here) and benefit from excessively favourable taxation.
This FT article is worth a read when it comes to just how essential loyalty programs are to major US carriers.
I broadly agree.
I think it's worth noting that due to the high-fuel cost of takeoff, in terms of efficiency, shirt haul flights are more costly. And more easily replaced with rail travel.
Also want to ensure the new system involving your escalating taxes doesn't disincentivize high speed rail development and competitive rail pricing (lol, we wish), but these are just wee details, let's goooooooo!
There are lots of ways that you can structure these taxes – for example investing the tax money in a "rail infrastucture development fund" which then exclusively spends the money on upgrading track, building new track and buying/improving rolling stock.
For long haul I think you also have to consider the fact that economy seats are generally a bit larger so the emissions are higher. There's also a lot of first and business travel (for context these are usually big enough to convert into a 2m long bed so you can fit a lot of economy seats into a single business/first seat) which should be factored in (and I think higher taxes on business and first class travel is a no-brainer).
Thats exactly it:
When using taxes to disincentivize behavior, the money collected needs to be directly allocated into the thing you want instead.
Taxes on alcohol and cigarettes should be dumped into Medicare funding for example.
The biggest problem, however, is that if you are not careful, your shiny new infrastructure now relies on the sin taxes of the old. And you run into the nasty funding problems we're seeing with EV adoption.
There should be a phase-out of the reliance on tax revenue, like every time revenues drop 10%, the rate goes up 10% and 10% of the total funds get allocated to something else.
I think the argument here is that by spending the money on rail infrastructure (rather than operational subsidies) you don't end up with this situation where you are dependent on "sin" taxes to run the services.
Gotta repair/replace that infrastructure someday though. And if there's one thing I learned (in the USA), saving for that long-term infrastructure isn't really a thing, and then 30 years later it's a funding crisis because we reduced fares/taxes for decades and swept the problems under the rug.
And now we have collapsing bridges everywhere. :(
Yes this is also a problem in other places, e.g. Germany, which is why I think reducing fares as much as possible isn't sensible. I do think that in Europe high prices are a function of very low capacity, and a lot of people who would like to travel by train, so increasing capacity probably means a reduction in prices plus an increase in revenue.
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