Striking that the Liberals and Conservatives offer the same response to pain at the pump: siphon money out of the public purse instead of Big Oil’s profits.

[dacmot@sunny.garden]

@alessandro, maybe all of it? I'm skeptical on the feasibility of a price cap, but ending oil subsidies and windfall taxes on wartime profits are fair game and way overdue.

@avilewis

[alessandro@cosocial.ca]

@dacmot

How would that be parsed when so much oil is sold via futures - should oil contracts purchased before the price spike be taxed more, or should revenue months down the line be taxed instead? And if we tax windfalls, should we subsidize their lean years?

I also don't want further dependence on tax revenue from an industry that we should get rid of.

@avilewis

[gimulnautti@mastodon.green]

@avilewis Neoliberalism or the worship of business is madness. You bankcrupt the state voluntarily only for them to buy it up and tell you: ”see, we told you it wouldn’t work like that!”.. And then the stock market crashes and out come the hats again.

[karnbot13@mastodon.social]

@alessandro @dacmot @avilewis Show me what their lean years consist of and maybe we'll consider a proposal to "help" them. However, if we find that they used their profits to lobby government for favourable legislation to continue the use of fossil fuels instead of the transition to cleaner energy, then we hammer them with the costs of climate change due to the use of their product.

[gordarnit@union.place]

@avilewis Now is a good time to spend a big chunk of the project money on renewables. Oil is the problem not the answer.

[gordarnit@union.place]

@dragonfrog @icanbob @avilewis Correct Canada does not need tax money to invest in projects, also correct that they would need to tax money back to prevent hyperinflation.

[graydon@canada.masto.host]

@avilewis It's not time for profit caps.

It's time to Chapter 7 liquidate all the oil companies (and anyone else doing fossil carbon extraction) and shut them all down.

Yes, that would mean a whole bunch of other activity so farming would keep working, but we need to do all of that, too.

[felix@pnw.zone]

@avilewis Wouldn't that lead to gas shortages, as the suppliers sell to other countries who are willing to pay more than Canada's capped price?

Are gas shortages an acceptable part of the transition off fossil fuels or is a gentler transition still possible?

[alessandro@cosocial.ca]

@Karnbot13

Oh there's no doubt they funded lobbying! But that isn't just a big oil problem - everybody does it. We need to drop the hammer on all of them, but it's a separate issue.

@dacmot @avilewis

[dacmot@sunny.garden]

Good points @alessandro.

World events are known to everyone. The same way that the Carney government is pausing tax collection, this trigger could be used to increase tax collection on oil companies.

For the rest I'm really just speculating because I don't know how this works in practice. My idea would be to base this additional tax on comparing companies profits of a given year with the average of 3 years prior to the significant event. Maybe not the best way to implement this, but simple.

In any case, as Avi said, cutting the federal gas tax is not a good way to help people financially. It'll be popular because people will immediately see the difference (hopefully). But with little competition, there is nothing preventing retailers from keeping prices high and pocketing the tax. This essentially redirects public funds in the the pockets of those who are already making bank.

As for depending on oil revenues, I'm with you there. One way could be to use it as a lump sum to pay back the debt instead of being incorporated into the budget and spent.

@avilewis

[karnbot13@mastodon.social]

@alessandro @dacmot @avilewis We can drop the hammer on all of them eventually. I suggest we deal with the climate problems caused by their products. Using the government to tax them out of existing at the level they're at, would be a good start. Might even come up with some less violent solutions for dealing with billionaires too

[bazcook@mas.to]

@avilewis - Carney taking the Liberal Party to Tory Lite aside, Its the profiteering by the companies, countries and stock market that is responsible for the hike in prices - especially in North America, where we natively have the product and the ability to refine it for our purposes.
But mention that is some quarters (like Alberta) and you'll be seen as a direct challenge to them.

[dacmot@sunny.garden]

@Karnbot13 I agree with you in principle: we need to get rid of fossil fuels, and the sooner the better.

Unfortunately, such a draconian method could cause further gas price hikes and be very unpopular. Any government implementing this would need to lie by omission to be elected, if they are elected at all, and would almost certainly be ousted at the next elections.

Would it be worth it? Maybe. It could give the jolt we collectively need to change our destructive way of life. I have a feeling however it would be short lived.

@alessandro @avilewis

[sleepy62@social.vivaldi.net]

@avilewis

I really wish he would have announced a 2.5B$ investment in #renewables and #EV charging, instead of yet another #fossilFuels subsidy.

[karnbot13@mastodon.social]

@dacmot @alessandro @avilewis I am not a doomer, I believe we will make the right decisions, if we have good information. We know what the problem is and our conservative\neoliberal governments refuse to do much for anyone other than the obscenely rich, who just happen to own most of the sources of the information. It's funny that it always has to be cuts to the public services and never return to the post WW II tax rates of the 50s. We can't wait too much longer to deal with this though

[janef0421@mastodon.nz]

@dragonfrog @icanbob @avilewis That’s an incomplete analysis. The value of money is determined by the supply of money relative to the amount of value available to be purchased in the economy. As a result, printing money for public investment does not cause hyperinflation, because the additional value created by investment at least partially offsets the increased money supply.

[misterstormwing@jorts.horse]

@avilewis more like war-crime oil revenues.

[dragonfrog@mastodon.sdf.org]

@janef0421 @icanbob @avilewis assuming there's no competition in the economy for the inputs into the project, sure. But there is, in fact, competition for construction labour and materials.

[icanbob@techhub.social]

@avilewis @janef0421 @dragonfrog Here is my take on MMT.

(energyasicit.ca)

[icanbob@techhub.social]

@dragonfrog @avilewis I really love Warren Mosler’s business card analogy which shows that taxes are what gives fiat money it’s value.