U.S. political pressures guarantee that the version that happens will be hyper-protectionist and collapses climate negotiations — turns the 1AC.

The problem is that real-world carbon tariffs would almost certainly be a bastardization of the ideal. Those twisted tariffs are far more likely to be economically damaging and to ignite the trade battles that critics fear.

It will be almost impossible to set carbon tariffs at the “right’’ level. Suppose that the United States cuts its emissions by adopting an economy-wide cap-and-trade system that increases the costs of producing a ton of steel by $30. Imagine, though, that rather than imposing its own similar system, China requires that all new steel factories meet certain technological standards.

How will US regulators decide if those Chinese rules are commensurate with the US system – particularly if they have little ability to see inside the Chinese economy and know exactly how those rules are being implemented? What if the Chinese government provides tax breaks or cheap fuel to offset the cost of meeting the new technology standards – will the United States impose higher tariffs to compensate? And what will they do about complex products like iPods and bicycles whose manufacturing history is extremely difficult to determine?

In the face of such an opaque situation, US regulators will face heavy political pressure. There will be strong calls for them to simply slap the same penalties on imports as the cap-and-trade system does on domestically produced goods – regardless of whether those imports are already subject to emissions-cutting costs (other than from cap-and-trade) at home. Such tariffs would likely go far beyond leveling the playing field – they would protect US industries for protectionism’s sake. That would violate global trade rules and could set off international battles that would damage the US economy along with global climate negotiations.

Instead of pursuing tariffs against foreign producers, the US government should focus on the industries that it already governs. It would be fairly simple to give particularly vulnerable US firms rebates that offset most of their cap-and-trade costs. Indeed the House legislation attempts to do just that. (It goes too far, though, “rebating’’ so much money that it will ultimately provide illegal subsidies to many firms.) Such a scheme is far harder to abuse since the US government has detailed knowledge of its firms’ compliance costs. That makes it the right way to go for the foreseeable future.

In the long term, though, big rebates will prove too costly. All major countries will eventually need to take similarly strong steps to control their emissions. (If they don’t, climate policy will be a failure, even with carbon tariffs.) That would remove any need for rebates or tariffs. In the meantime, a carbon trade war with dubious benefits is the last thing we need.

Sparks trade wars AND collapses modeling. Libecap 15 — Gary D. Libecap, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, the Bren Professor of Corporate Environmental Policy at the Donald R. Bren School of Environmental Science and Management, an Economics Professor at the UC Santa Barbara, a Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research in Massachusetts, a Senior Fellow at the Property and Environment Research Center, a Member of the Research Group on Political Institutions and Economic Policy at Harvard University, Former Anheuser Busch Professor of Economics and Law at the University of Arizona, 2015 (“The Misguided Rush to Climate Change Action,” Hoover Institution, Jan 21st, Available Online at http://www.hoover.org/research/climate-change-busybodies, Accessed 07-18-23) 

If it is a large country that emits a great deal of GHGs, such as China, India, or even Russia, then noncompliance is an important concern because it can undermine the effectiveness of the global effort. Complying economies must cut back more and the populations involved must bear additional costs if targeted reductions are to be achieved. Proponents often point to carbon tariffs to level the playing field and to insure that noncomplying countries cannot take advantage of lower energy costs in exporting to complying countries.

This is obviously a huge challenge. There are legitimate measurement problems in determining carbon content of imports, and parties are very likely to disagree. The potential for trade protectionism under the guise of treaty enforcement is a reasonable possibility. Given the documented advantages of the recent growth in international trade, the costs of the disruption of trading arrangements due to disputes over compliance and measurement of carbon content could further reduce income and wealth globally and the incentives of all parties to participate in any global agreement.

Trading patterns, particularly among large countries, such as the U.S. and China, are very complex. If some products are found to have excessive carbon content and tariffs are applied, retaliation in other trading areas could arise. Imagine if Chinese or Indian steel is found to be produced in a way that violates climate accords and the U.S. applies tariffs, and the Chinese or Indians respond by cutting airplane imports from Boeing or the Chinese reduce their holdings of U.S. government bonds or purchases of U.S. agricultural commodities.

The point is that trade sanctions are not much of a solution when large countries are involved. Consider once again the apparent resilience of Russia in the face of trade and financial restrictions from the U.S., the E.U. and other countries following its invasion of the Ukraine. The international collective action problem is enormous and the thorny issues at hand are not presented honestly by proponents of climate action.