Taxes CP - Michigan 7 2024 BFHR

Taxes CP – BFHR
Notes
This is the taxes counterplan. Currently, there are two main punishments for violating intellectual property law: injunctions and remedies. If an action constitutes a violation of intellectual property law, a violator might be forced to either stop the violation, or pay compensation for damages.
This counterplan disincentivizes infringement through a different method: taxation. If companies choose to violate the plan’s prohibition, they’re taxed by a significant amount, which is an equivalent disincentive to injunctions or remedies.
Taxes can be useful for governments in many ways, most of which are obvious and well-known:
1. Revenue-raising. Taxes allow the government to raise money to fund public programs, agencies, and resources.
2. Economic influences. Taxation can act as a (mainly) demand-side policy to either stimulate or slow down the economy.
3. Regulation. Taxes can be used to disincentivize particular activity, because it creates a cost. This is what the counterplan does, and is currently not a method used by the federal government. This idea is common in many carbon tax proposals, which suggest taxing carbon production to disincentivize it.
The internal net-benefit says that creating taxes solely for the purpose of regulation is good. It sets a precedent to do the same in the future.
The counterplan competes based on the idea that it is tax law, instead of intellectual property law. It creates no intellectual property protections. Instead, it simply sets a threshold for a person to be taxed---if they violate the plan. Importantly, this means that it is legal to violate the plan a person is willing to pay the price. To access the ideal solvency argument, this price should be ridiculously high.
Any IPR-related DA can be a net benefit to this counterplan. Politics/elections are likely to link, but it probably avoids PTO tradeoff or other agency DAs, which are ideal net benefits. The counterplan’s agent is likely the IRS.
Alternate ideas for CP texts --- I think this is worth experimenting with --- here are some ideas
The United States federal government should expand the scope of its tax laws by [_________], specifically by applying corrective taxation as a cost for non-compliance.
The United States federal government should expand the scope of its tax laws by [_________].
Note from Forslund --- Pranav and Jerry did this entire file themselves --- excellent job. Lots of potential with this cp, and I think there are probably several tricky versions you can write if you add a bit more research during the season.
Regulatory Nukes ---
Threats ---
Regulation BY Taxation ---
Covered under TAX law instead of IP law --- net benefit is to begin to use Taxation more consistently as regulation
Some sort of undesirable action --- Tax it to stop it --- this can be an interesting advantage cp --- if nothing else --- IP bad das as net benefit --- but also can be read as a pic
Top Shelf
1NC --- Shell
Text: The United States federal government should apply corrective taxes as a cost of non-compliance for __________________________________.
Substituting taxes creates an identical effect but solves better by avoiding legal blowback.
Gruodis ’17 [Povilas; June 8; Ph.D. and Lecturer at Vilnius University Faculty of Law, Attorney, JD in Law from Vilnius University; Doctoral Dissertation at Vilnius University, “Tax Norms as a Regulatory Tool of Credit Institutions’ Activities,” http://talpykla.elaba.lt/elaba-fedora/objects/elaba:22914651/datastreams/MAIN/content]
3. Regulatory tax laws are a suitable measure for regulation of the credit institutions. While making decisions on certain behaviour model in the credit institutions, the economic arguments usually prevail, and the activity of the credit institutions is relatively insignificantly affected by morals – values. The regulatory impact of the tax laws on the credit institutions is justified by regulation of economic conditions of decision making rather than classifying a certain behaviour as legal or illegal, therefore, the tax laws allow a legislator to regulate the decision making process itself. Certain behaviour model is forbidden by imperative administrative orders by making it illegal with the help of the laws, however, the causes (economic motives) of the illegal behaviour model are not always eliminated, and this weakens the regulatory impact of the administrative orders and reduces their effectiveness. Regulation of the credit institutions by the tax laws, unlike traditional method of legal permissions or prohibitions, allows ensuring the significantly lower extent of forced nature of legal regulation and decreasing the risk of possible legal conflicts.
4. The tax laws might be used both as individual measure for regulation of the credit institutions and as additional measure for regulation of the credit institutions together with the current legal regulation of the credit institutions. Regulation of the credit institutions by the tax laws might significantly improve the possibilities of a legislator to regulate the risky activity of the credit institutions and to ensure the stability of financial sector. The regulatory impact of the tax laws can be better directed towards all activity elements of the credit institutions than the administrative orders, prevailing in regulation of the credit institutions. More accurate regulation allows ensuring constant and easier effect on the financial condition of the credit institutions, and enables to improve the solvency, liquidity and panic resistance indicators. In case of regulating the activity of the credit institutions, the tax laws allows achieving the same regulatory effect as the administrative orders, however, by keeping the variety of the credit institutions and more freedom than in case of regulating the activity of the credit institutions by legal prohibitions and permissions, therefore, the tax laws should be considered as proportional measure of regulation of the credit institutions. What is more, the price of possible error, made by a legislator, will be significantly lower because of the features of the regulatory impact of the tax laws than in case of regulating the same relationships by prohibitions and permissions.
Using taxes as a new, independent regulatory tool mainstreams them as an instrument to broadly cushion societal responses to inevitable ecological, demographic, and political crises---extinction.
Bachus ’18 [Kris and Frederic Vanswijgenhoven; 2018; Research Manager Climate and Sustainability at the Research Institute for Work and Society, University of Leuven, PhD in Social Science from KU Lueven, MA in Applied Economic Science from KU Leuven, European Master’s in Labor Science from the University College, London; Research Institute for Work and Society, University of Leuven, Master’s Degree in Comparative and International Politics from KU Leuven, Master’s Degree in Applied Economic Sciences from Universiteit Hasselt; Journal of Environmental Planning and Management, “The Use of Regulatory Taxation as a Policy Instrument for Sustainability Transitions: Old Wine in New Bottles or Unexplored Potential?” vol. 61]
1. Introduction
Environmental problems are of all times. Yet, over the past two decades, climate change, air pollution, natural resource depletion and biodiversity loss have reached the status of worldwide persistent threats (Foxon, Reed, and Stringer 2009). There is increasing consensus in the literature that common policy responses, which are in the main incremental, will not provide structural solutions to those problems (Elzen and Wieczorek 2005). Transition theory links those challenges to socio-technical systems, which fulfil a societal function using technical components, infrastructure, regulations and networks of organisations (Geels and Kemp 2000). A transition is a radical and structural change with economic, cultural, ecological and institutional developments taking place at different levels of the socio-technical system (Rotmans and Loorbach 2009).
An important discussion in transition literature concerns the question of whether transitions, niches and regimes can be governed, or even steered, in a (sustainable) direction. Most transition scholars see an active role for government, but not in the classical way as the top-down commander who can steer at will using its toolbox of instruments (Paredis 2013). Rather, government is seen as just one group of actors (Geels, Elzen, and Green 2004), who are part of the regime but simultaneously shape its adaptive capacity (Smith, Stirling, and Berkhout 2005). Government actors exert a substantial influence on the functioning of the socio-technical system as they often maintain and reproduce regime functions in an intensive manner (Smith, Stirling, and Berkhout 2005).
To address the complexity and long-term focus (one to two generations) of transitions, “existing policy instruments need to be combined with new approaches” (Elzen and Wieczorek 2005, 657). In addition to command-and-control (CAC) instruments and communicative instruments, economic instruments are used in environmental policy (Howlett and Ramesh 2003; Perman et al. 2003). Geels (2012) indicates, in the context of transport systems, that economic instruments can be used to enhance pressure on an unsustainable regime. Chappin (2011) applies simulation models to study the influence of carbon taxes on energy transitions. Although these studies point at the potential of taxation, the theoretical dynamics behind the impact of a tax on the transition process are not yet well understood, and available studies on the topic are scarce. This paper aims to contribute to the growing literature of transition governance by means of an exploratory analysis of the potential of taxation as an instrument to support sustainability transitions. We will do so by combining the literature on environmental taxation with the literature on sustainability transitions, and by identifying the conditions for a tax to have that potential. In our theoretical exploration, we will combine two heuristic frameworks from transition thinking, the multi-level perspective (MLP) and the multi-phase perspective (MPP), with the neoclassical theory of Pigouvian taxation, which is the basis of environmental taxation theory.
This paper is organised as follows. The MLP and MPP are explained in Section 2, along with other transition concepts. In Section 3, an overview is provided of the theoretical foundations of regulatory taxation. Section 4 shows the results of the combination of the theoretical strands of transitions and environmental taxation. Section 5 is dedicated to the limitations and barriers to the potential of environmental taxation, and in Section 6, we draw conclusions and provide suggestions for future research.
2. Transition theory: the MLP and the MPP
The MLP on sustainability transitions distinguishes between three levels (Geels 2004; Verbong and Geels 2007). At the macro level, the landscape represents the external environment of the system. Changes at the landscape level influence the socio-technical system (Markard and Truffer 2008). Examples of such developments are global warming, global economic growth, political crises or demographic evolutions (Geels 2002). At the meso level, the regime is the dominant form of functioning in the socio-technical system (Avelino and Rotmans 2009). The regime can be a dominant technology, institution, policy, practice or culture. At the micro level, niches present alternative (sustainable) technologies, institutions, policies, practices or cultures that cause disruptions in the functioning of the socio-technical system. By experimenting and growing stronger, niches can eventually overtake the role of the regime and install a new dynamic balance in the socio-technical system (Kemp and Loorbach 2006; Loorbach and Wijsman 2013). For example, learning effects from experiments with niche technologies such as photovoltaic energy and wind power in the energy system may make those technologies increasingly successful. After the growing phase, they may also become cheaper than regime technologies such as nuclear and fossil fuel power generation. Those niches exert pressure on the regime, which could, in combination with other pressures from the landscape, policies, market developments and cultures, lead to a replacement of nuclear and fossil fuel-based power by renewables, ending up in a new equilibrium that will be more sustainable than the previous one.
A transition presents a radical and fundamental change in the dominant structure, culture and practices of a socio-technical system (Loorbach and Rotmans 2006). The structure of the system consists of institutional, infrastructure, legal and economic provisions that are inherent to the functioning of the socio-technical system (de Haan 2010). Culture is regarded as the shared values, norms and perspectives, which may be cognitive, normative or ideological in nature, and which underlie the socio-technical system (de Haan and Rotmans 2011). Practices are the routines, habits and procedures operated by the actors in the system, which interact with the structure and the culture of the system.
The change that is required for a transition will not come about in a linear way. Rather, periods of rapid and slow (or no) change can alternate (de Haan and Rotmans 2011). This implies that there are multiple phases in a transition process. Loorbach (2007) describes four phases that together depict an ideal–typical transition process, the MPP. In the first phase, the pre-development phase, actors are engaged in experiments (Kemp and Loorbach 2006). During the take-off phase, the second phase, the regime will show signs of destabilisation and niches will get an opportunity to position themselves as a viable alternative (van der Brugge and Rotmans 2007). Rapid structural and cultural changes in the socio-technical system become visible in the acceleration phase (van der Brugge 2009). In the last phase, the stabilisation phase, a new sustainable regime is established (Avelino and Rotmans 2009).
Transitions are driven by various endogenous and exogenous developments. Exogenous developments are changes at the landscape level. Endogenous developments, on the other hand, are events occurring at the meso level (regimes) and micro level (niches). According to de Haan and Rotmans (2011), there are three groups of conditions for change: tensions, stress and pressure. Tensions are changes occurring at the landscape level threatening the position of the unsustainable regime. A regime that functions inadequately or inconsistently will experience stress, which can nurture the downfall of the regime. Regime pressure or selection pressure, finally, will appear when niches impose themselves on the regime's position by becoming viable alternatives or by making the regime's functioning obsolete. Regime pressure, along with the reactions of regime and niche actors, will create patterns of change (Frantzeskaki and de Haan 2009). When tensions dominate, a reconstellation pattern will appear. Stress and pressure will result in the patterns of, respectively, adaptation and empowerment. When certain patterns chain together, they create transition paths (de Haan 2010). Choices made in the past will affect the path along which transitions will move. Actors are confronted with path dependencies, which may turn into lock-ins. For example, the choice of the authorities of some countries to invest in nuclear power plants has created path dependencies in the energy systems of these countries, which function as lock-ins that prevent a breakthrough to an energy system based on renewable energy.
Two governance approaches within transition science indicate that belief in classical policy solutions is limited. The two most well-known governance models in transition literature are transition management (Loorbach 2007; Kemp and Loorbach 2006; Loorbach and Rotmans 2010) and strategic niche management (Hoogma 2000). Both these governance approaches emphasise the difficulties in steering socio-technical change. Strategic niche management sees the main role of government in process management, creating room for niche experimentation, making sure that the process is not dominated by certain actors, and in learning and facilitating other actors’ learning possibilities (Kemp, Schot, and Hoogma 1998). The other governance approach, transition management, departs from the same view, but presents a process management method for policy-makers wishing to influence burgeoning transition processes (Loorbach and Rotmans 2006). Transition management has been criticised, mainly because the term ‘management’ seems to suggest that it is possible to steer transitions by “deliberate intervention in pursuit of specific goals” in a top-down way (Shove and Walker 2007, 764). Although transition management scholars such as Loorbach and Rotmans develop a more nuanced perspective on the ‘steerability’ of a transition than the name ‘management’ suggests, they do assert that ‘goal-oriented transitions’, in which the policy goals guide the process, exist. This view is not shared by all transition scholars. For example, Dewulf et al. (2009) think that a multiplicity of theories is needed for addressing such complex issues as sustainability. Shove and Walker (2007) question the very starting point of transition management that it is possible to deliberately steer socio-technical system change in any direction.
Both strategic niche management and transition management focus on policies that are aimed at the level of the niches. However, they largely ignore that the destabilisation of incumbent regimes can equally be a valuable strategy, because this could speed up the upscaling of niche technologies (Kivimaa and Kern 2016). Policies discouraging certain niche technologies or practices can play a role here (Turnheim and Geels 2012). Taxation will be further examined as a regime destabilisation instrument, as the main subject of this paper. In addition, ‘policy mixes for creative destruction’ will be explored in Section 4.2.
3. Regulatory and environmental taxation
A basic idea in economics is that markets allocate resources in an efficient way. However, this thesis is only valid under the condition of the presence of well-defined and enforceable private property rights (Perman et al. 2003). If that condition is not met, the market is not capable of creating or maintaining a socially optimal or desirable situation, and market failures appear (Bator 1958). One example of a market failure is the existence of external costs or environmental externalities (Perman et al. 2003). Externalities are “benefits or costs generated as an unintended by-product of an economic1 activity that do not accrue to the parties involved in the activity and where no compensation takes place” (Owen 2004, 129). Pollution resulting from production activities is a typical example of a negative externality imposed on citizens, because the victims of the pollution have no legal rights to claim any compensation for the damage suffered. To resolve this market failure, governments can create property rights for ‘an unpolluted environment’ and give them to the victims, or even to the polluter. In the latter case, the polluter receives a ‘license to pollute’ a certain amount. Following the Coase theorem (Coase 1960), depending on the specific circumstances, this situation will lead to an equally efficient outcome as compared to victim property rights. However, from an equity point of view, the two solutions generate entirely different outcomes, as in the one case it is the polluter who pays, and in the other it is the victim (Perman et al. 2003). In theory, the polluter and the victims could bargain and agree on compensation for the damage based on the victim's or polluter's property rights, in which case government interven

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