A simple explainer on global warming positions

Here is Chris Hayes calling for lower gas prices, here is the White House.  I do understand the median voter theorem!

But let me explain how a lot of the Right wing sees this issue.  They believe the Left was never entirely serious about the climate change crusade in the first place, but wanted to use it to achieve certain political goals.  “Why go along with this charade if the Left is going to pull the plug on the effort anyway?”  A lot of the Right is less naive about climate change than you might think.  They won’t come out and say all this, but they also think the Left is at least as dishonest about the issue, albeit in a more self-deceiving, ostensibly more sincere fashion.  The Right sees messages like this and then they feel “Ah, we were right!”.

To be clear, I believe that economists should present good policies to internalize externalities in simple, straightforward non-Straussian fashion.  Someone has to!  So we ought to stay the course.

But if you are trying to understand the debate, and why it is not as morally one-sided as you might think, I find this a useful framework.

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