Carbon taxes look like a useful tool; I wonder what the unforeseen drawbacks and consequences might be.

Will people redefine what carbon is; who will suffer, how many people will lose jobs due to electrification of many industries (auto MFG for one, the UFW, is concerned). What happens to the third world where they use charcoal for cooking?

I think there is much more to be thought out.

>Will people redefine what carbon is;

Yes. It will become a political football because of its immense power to economically marginalize wide swaths of society.

If a carbon tax won’t pass in liberal Washington I don’t think there’s much hope for the rest of the US, TBH.

This is the best solution for today’s world. I wish I could upvote this a million times.

Except it simply won't happen because people will not stand for everything becoming more expensive and inconvenient. They will not vote for people who will enact these policies.

This is why revenue neutral carbon taxes are key. At tax year end, you pay out all carbon tax revenues divided between every taxpayer.

Individuals are still incentivised to make climate friendly consumption choices, but on net the population is no worse off financially.

Exactly this. The very policy we need that would be best is untenable because society has been built around cheap, dirty energy.

Yeah, I'm afraid we're didn't do the right thing when the Saudis extorted the world for more expensive energy. Instead of making dirty deals with them, we should have sought policies to end reliance on them, but we couldn't and no one could. But were in the same place. And we can thank Jane Fonda for killing the one thing that could have removed that albatross from out necks.