The global-warming economics coming out of Washington doesn’t match the global-warming economics of Copenhagen. For instance, according to Senator John Kerry (D-MA) cutting CO2 creates jobs and stimulates the economy. At least that’s what the press release describing his cap-and-tax legislation claims.
But in Copenhagen this view of economics gets turned on its head. In Copenhagen Senator Kerry talks about the need to pay other countries to adopt the CO2-limiting regulations that supposedly create jobs and stimulate an economy.
If the mandates, regulations, and energy taxes needed for carbon caps are so great for the economy, why do we need to promise hundreds of billions of dollars to other countries to get them to adopt the same?
Because the developing world isn’t buying the hype over green stimulus and for good reason—it’s a fiction. Analysis of cap-and-tax proposals by a wide spectrum of analysts (including The Heritage Foundation, the EPA, the Congressional Budget Office, the Energy Information Administration, The Brookings Institution, and the National Black Chamber of Commerce) all show carbon restrictions will reduce national income and reduce employment.
Heritage’s preliminary analysis of the Boxer-Kerry legislation finds national income will drop by over $9 trillion in the first 24 years of the 40-year program and that the legislation will kill over 2 million jobs.
It would be nice if the many American proponents of handing over hundreds of billions of dollars to other countries would come back from Copenhagen with a little bit of the honesty those offers imply—an admission that global warming legislation will be very costly.
