Durable growth -- a carbon dividend program would relax economic anxiety and build a resilient economy to reverse recession predictions

Today’s economic insecurity is driven by both technological progress and globalization. As such, it does not lend itself to easy answers. A carbon dividends program provides a rare exception: a simple idea that strengthens the economy and elevates the economic prospects of the nation’s disaffected. The Department of Treasury estimates that the bottom 70% of Americans would come out ahead under such a program. Carbon dividends would increase the disposable income of the majority of Americans while disproportionately helping those struggling to make ends meet. Yet these dividends are not giveaways; they would be earned based on the good behavior of minimizing our carbon footprints. An ideal climate strategy would simultaneously reduce carbon emissions and steer America towards a path of more durable economic growth. A carbon dividends plan can do exactly that. A carbon tax would send a powerful market signal that encourages technological innovation and largescale substitution of existing energy and transportation infrastructures, thereby stimulating new investment. Second, the plan would offer companies, especially those in the energy sector, the predictability they now lack, thus removing one of the most serious impediments to longer-term capital investment. Third, because many regulations would become unnecessary, the plan would give companies the flexibility to reduce emissions in the most efficient way.