"Carbon
taxes killed private sector jobs in Sweden" read the headline on Aldyen
Donnelly's recent column in the Vancouver Sun.
There's just one problem: while Donnelly presented an
onslaught of statistics to support her argument that the tax shift led to
reduced employment, none of them actually link Sweden's carbon tax to job
losses.
Given the carbon tax generates a tiny percentage of the
country's revenue, much more plausible explanations are the general shift away
from manufacturing throughout Western Europe, a large national debt and
relatively high overall taxation.
The line of reasoning she used is akin to blaming B.C.'s
budget woes on its carbon tax instead of acknowledging the role of the global
economic downturn.
If carbon taxes really did kill private sector jobs, you
wouldn't expect to find this statement on the website of B.C.'s largest
emitter, Spectra Energy: "We believe that a workable federal climate change
program should . . . provide certainty about costs of compliance, preferably
through a simple, efficient, revenue-neutral carbon tax."
While Spectra Energy (like many Canadians) would clearly
prefer a national approach to dealing with climate change, it hardly sounds
like an industry preparing for its funeral. Rather, Spectra acknowledges the
need for a low-carbon economy and wants to see clear policy in place.
The alternative is allowing polluters to continue to pollute
for free, with no financial incentive to employ cleaner technologies — a
do-nothing strategy resulting in an upward trend in Canada's emissions for as
long as we've been measuring them. Claiming that putting a price on pollution
won't work doesn't give much credit to the private sector, and ignores its
track record of developing solutions to environmental challenges, such as acid
rain, when given the right incentives.
None of this is to say B.C. doesn't still have hard work ahead
to strengthen its carbon tax. The same goes for the federal government's
climate policy, except it hasn't even left the starting gate yet. The fact we
have so much more work to do to deal effectively with climate change is
precisely why it makes sense to learn from the many countries that have put a
price on carbon.
Do any of these models from other countries offer the ideal
template? Of course not — but by analyzing other jurisdictions' successes and
failures and putting them in a B.C. context, we can design a fairer and more effective
carbon tax. It would be applied equally to all sources of greenhouse gas
pollution, at a price that's high enough to spur cleaner technologies and
behaviours. A portion of the revenue would be invested in emission-reduction
projects, such as public transit, and ensuring low-income families are part of
the solution.
Getting all of this figured out in time to dramatically
reduce emissions in the next decade — as the science shows we must, and as the
provincial government has promised — won't be easy. However, the benefits of
building a fair and effective carbon pricing system far outweigh the costs of
doing nothing and sticking our heads in the sand.
Matt Horne is the
Director of B.C. Energy Solutions at the Pembina Institute. Read the
Institute's carbon tax recommendations at www.pembina.org/pub/1961
