I refer to Barry Brooks' contribution:
At 08:48 24/09/00 -0700, you wrote:
>Consider...
>
>High taxes on fuel aren't the best way to encourage conservation. High
taxes on fuel will cause suffering and poverty, but people who can't afford
to heat their house can't afford to replace it with an efficient house
either. Instead, we need to support lower costs for efficient houses and
cars, and make laws against the production of wasteful goods.
>
>Barry Brooks
I agree with most of the above, except for the further bout of legislation
mentioned.
The main problem (at least in the UK) is that no-one has an accurate idea
of what are the costs of different transport and energy systems. If more
information were known then taxes could be more fairly applied and feedback
from the public would be more apposite. We're now in a paradoxical
situation (in the UK particularly) in which pretty well all motorists know
that some form of rationing has got to be applied in the coming years, and
yet they are united in opposition to the high fuel taxes that the
government imposes. Until more accurate information is known, then all
discussion about energy use and taxes will be largely useless. At the
present time we can have no accurate idea of the relatively wastefulness of
different goods and services.
Keith Hudson
