World's wealthiest individuals are also the world's biggest polluters

[jgraz]

New climate strategy: track the world’s wealthiest

US researchers have proposed a new strategy to tackle the global climate dilemma: target the biggest polluters in a country, who also tend to be the wealthiest individuals.

Under the framework, a universal cap — rather than different caps for different countries — would be placed on carbon emissions and countries would then be tasked with getting individuals living beyond that cap to reduce their carbon footprint.

“Most of the world’s emissions come disproportionately from the wealthy citizens of the world, irrespective of their nationality,” said lead author Shoibal Chakravarty, a research scholar at the Princeton Environmental Institute.

“We estimate that in 2008, half of the world’s emissions came from just 700 million people,” he added, noting that many emissions owe to lifestyles that involve airplane flights, car use and the heating and cooling of large homes.

http://rawstory.com/08/news/2009/07/06/plan-floated-to

Time to revive those "Eat the Rich" bumper stickers?

[Name removed]

1. Deleted sub-thread

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[Just Saying]

2. It stands to reason that those with the most money

polute the most. The drive the biggest cars, boats, planes, etc. Particularly over a certain level, I think they should be taxed at a much higher rate anyway. We could pay for healthcare AND work on alternative energy.

[drm604]

3. Good luck with that.

Try it and they'll spend millions convincing the masses that you're trying to limit everyone's driving to 2 miles a week.

[tritsofme]

4. Presumably even the poorest American would fall into the "richest billion" of the world.

Not going to be very popular.

[jgraz]

5. Presumably so. However, I think the pollution curve is pretty steep as incomes rise.

You have to keep in mind that, in order to make millions in income, you also have to leech off of the pollution of others. Add that into the direct, individual pollution and you've got a good case for a very steep carbon tax on the ultra-rich.

[lindisfarne]

7. Exactly. Probably the richest half-billion.

Rich or poor or famous
For your truth its all the same
Lock your door the rain is pouring
Through your window pane
Baby now your struggles all in vain

For we who grew up tall and proud
In the shadow of the mushroom cloud
Convinced our voices cant be heard
We just wanna scream it louder and louder louder

[slampoet]

6. When i do the Cliffwalks in Newport, RI I can see the pipes directly flushing sewage into the ocean.

Most of these pipes don't work anymore but think about for how many DECADES/CENTURIES these pipes flushed raw Rockefeller and Great Gatsby Shit right into the same water people walked along as a tourist attraction.

[Thothmes]

9. True, but for every gallon of Rockefeller sewage

that flowed into ocean so did hundreds of thousands of gallons of other folks sewage.

[slampoet]

14. Actually no. The Mansions avoided sewage disposal laws at the time.

as did many who continued and were grandfathered in.

[aquart]

8. These people are insufficiently taxed.

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. Full study here; suggests 267 million Americans need to be capped by 2030

http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2009/07/02/0905232106.full.pdf

To get global emissions in 2030 the same as 2008 (30 Gt CO2 - about 30% less than a Business As Usual scenario for 2030), you'd have to cap at 10.8 tonnes per person (compared with 19.9 tonnes average USA per capita emissions in 2003), which would affect 1.13 billion people - 15% of the world population. That breaks down into, in 2030 population:

USA 267 million (73% of US population)
OECD in Europe 139 million (25%)
rest of OECD 137 million (37%)
China 300 million (21%)
rest of non-OECD 284 million (5%)

[Vidar]

11. Surprise, surprise, surprise!

[Democracyinkind]

12. I would like to suggest " How the Rich are destryoing the Earth" by Hervé Kempf. Foreword by Greg

.... Palast.

Kempf elaborates on ideas presented in this article. Good stuff, as in good read - not saying we should kill the rich or anything but it's an interesting essay/book.

[stray cat]

13. Ready to move to a mud hut without indoor plumbing - of course drinking water will kill you

unsanitary conditions lead to more polluted water - at least infections but your lifestyle will be green.