aviation fuels for international and domestic flights shold be taxed to combat climate change?

Question

the answer should be in favor of the question

Answer 1

Yea, the true face of "global warming". An excuse to raise taxes.

Answer 2

Yes aviation fuels for international and domestic flights should be taxed to combat climate change. Now a days due to time constraint & convenience and offer of apex fares by various Airlines people have started travelling by air. As a result there has been increase in no. of flights especially during the summer vacations and holidays. During this period the scene of airport is worth-seeing, it becomes worst even than railway platforms. Our atmosphere is getting polluted due to emission of CO2 and other harmful gases in the air. It is, therefore, necessary that aviation fuels may be taxed to avoid many people travelling by Air, thereby reducing emission of harmful substances in the environment.

Answer 3

"Flying is a major source of pollution," Turbine powered aircraft are pretty clean, those running on petrol can be pretty nasty thanks to 100LL. In terms of CO2, they should be taxed, but so should everything else that emits CO2 (including power plants and cars). Aviation is a minor contributor to global warming and also one where we don't really have any alternatives so we should be spending our resources dealing with bigger sources where we do have alternatives (such as fossil fuel electricity that could be replaced by nuclear fission). With short flights of up to around 1000 km high speed trains could provide roughly the same travel time (when boarding, going through security, driving to airport outside of city, etc are taken into account) as planes although to get the full environmental benefit from that you'd have to use nuclear electricity to run the trains (as they do in France), for longer distances there's really nothing that can compete with air travel. As for what the money from a carbon tax should be used for, I'd say we invest it for mitigation work.

Answer 4

There are a number of problems associated with increasing taxation and these are illustrated by looking at the historical record.

Firstly, an increase in tax does not lead to a proportional decrease in the use of a product or service. When we look at the tax imposed on alcohol, tobacco, gasoline etc it doesn't correspond to a decrease in consumption. Taxation of these commodities is at the highest level to date and yet we consume more alcohol and gasoline than ever before. The decline in tobacco consumption is more down to health and social issues than cost.

Secondly, governments have an appauling record on issues such as this and more often than not the revenue raised is spent in other areas. Europe for example has the highest fuel prices in the world - approx $8 or $9 per gallon, the majority of this cost being taxation. The respective gorvernments often claim that this tax burden is to reduce reliance on the motor vehicle. It doesn't work and vehicle usage increases year on year with no indication that the rate of growth has even be slowed by increasing taxation. What it does do is to push up the price of goods and services and ultimately the consumer pays more. Further, for every $4 collected in taxes from the motorist only $1 is spent on transportation. Those who have switched from private car to other forms of transport cite health, social and environmental concerns as being the reason - not the cost.

In short, any increase in taxation is unlikely to reduce the number of air miles flown, revenue raised is unlikely to be used to combat climate change and any increased costs are likely to be passed on to the consumer.

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Unlike road trasnport, there is no viable alternative to air transport. Today people have more time and more disposable income and are ultimately going to take more flights. Globalisation of commerce means that in many cases business is conducted at international level and the opening and expansion of world markets means that goods are sourced from further afield than ever before. All these are leading to a rapid increase in the number of flights and predictions are that numbers will double in the next 30 or 40 years. Taxation on aviation fuels will do little to slow this growth.

Perhaps the emphasis shouldn't be so much on taxation but looking at alternatives. One possible solution would be carbon offsetting. A premium of approximately 5% on the cost of tickets would finance programmes that would completely offset the emissions from aircraft flights. The airlines themselves would raise the money which would be used to fund their own, or third-party, offsetting programmes. There would be no need for government involvement.

Answer 5

Aviation accounts for only about 1% of the emissions, so anything you do with aviation will only solve 1% of the problem. Cars account for something like 30% of the problem, so anything you do with cars will solve 30% of the problem.

Anyway, raising taxes does not help at all. People will just pay more for fuel and keep polluting. How does that help?

Answer 6

And how exactly will taxing fuel combat climate change? All it will do is force people to pay more for flying since the cost will definitely be passed directly on.

Answer 7

What makes you think they aren't. Maybe, the person traveling should have to pay a higher rate the more they travel.
Who has the greater impact - the person who travels once a year or the person who travels fifteen times per year.

Answer 8

No, No don't even ask a question and you want people agree with you. You're wrong man and no taxes should be spent on global warming

Answer 9

Is there no tax on them now? That would surprise me. Everything is taxed except air and that's next.

Answer 10

Taxing anything because of alledged Global Warming or spending those taxes on Global warming is rediculous!

I would no more pay such taxes that donate money to a Buddist Temple!

Answer 11

ABSOf'inLUTELY!!!

Jet engines pump hugh quantities of combustion products and unburned fuel directly into the most vulnerable part of our atmosphere. They get the same m.p.s. (miles per seat) as a 5 passenger mid sized car, yet you pay tax for the gas for your car and they don't!

The people who whine that it's a "green meanie" tax are the same people that whine about everything and overpay for garbage.