Item — HN Reader

The tax you propose is not as simple as you suggest :

Do you tax on material weight ? But bigger sized systems tends to be easier to repair/recycle than nano electronics. They also often last longer.

Do you tax on raw materials ? That would exclude all the junk made abroad. Or on components ? That would make a gigantic and perpetually changing list to maintain, creating an incentive to always create alternatives only needed to game this tax.

Hope does that address the externality “not infinite material rarefaction” ? Making thinks more expensive just make them less affordable for a part of the population while the other part can not care much especially for cheap disposable(!) small devices.

I don’t have the perfect solution but IMHO we need regulations, not tax. Creating an obligatory (long) warranty would push the society in the sustainability direction. I don’t need 2$ led lamp, an even slimmer keyboard or a 120hz screen, just want it to last way more (or being able to make repair) that 2/3 product cycle time frame defined by the corp business team. Who want to say to their children “enjoy this tech while there’s still some rare earth left” ?

1 comments

> Do you tax on raw materials ? That would exclude all the junk made abroad.

You can adapt the tax to fix that problem. See how VAT systems handle imports and exports. If your stuff needs eg lead, you either prove that you dispose of it properly, or you pay the tax.

> I don’t have the perfect solution but IMHO we need regulations, not tax.

Why? Wouldn't your argument also work for a 'good enough' tax?

I agree that a tax also needs some careful thinking about what the exactly the externalities are that you want to tax. But it still leaves more flexibility to consumers and suppliers than a blanket regulation like 'mandatory long warranty, whether you want it or not'.

> Making thinks more expensive just make them less affordable for a part of the population while the other part can not care much especially for cheap disposable(!) small devices.

I don't understand this objection. Could you please explain?

Obligatory long warranties also raise the price of goods.

> Who want to say to their children “enjoy this tech while there’s still some rare earth left” ?

Are you suggesting we are going to run out of rare earth elements? Fat chance. We are sitting on a giant ball of matter, we are not going to run out of any elements. We might be running out of easily mine-able deposits of something, but either the price will go up a bit or someone will invent a new technique. (The former often leads to the latter.)

> I don’t need 2$ led lamp, an even slimmer keyboard or a 120hz screen, just want it to last way more (or being able to make repair) that 2/3 product cycle time frame defined by the corp business team.

That's a valid preference, and I suggest you put your money where your mouth is.

> See how VAT systems handle imports and exports. If your stuff needs eg lead, […]

It is way harder for a customs officier to distinguish if a package contains some trace of lead, gold, bore, cobalt, disprosium, neodyme… in some micro chip than classifying in “raw material, “alcool”, “processed food”, “weapon” etc.

Making thinks more expensive to prevent usage is pointless and that’s why countries put speed limits in place. Speed is dangerous (see ek=1/2mv2) and a “speed tax” would only reduce a road accidents to the proportional inverse of its users wallets. As the e-waste and elements rarefaction have impacts that last way longer than a road accidents, we need to absolute regulations to avoid those externalities. Relatives regulations (taxes) are good to balance some parts of the economy, not to prevent problems.

Of course I would stand for tax it can do a “good enough” job.

> We might be running out of easily mine-able deposits of something, but either the price will go up a bit or someone will invent a new technique.

What makes you suppose the price will go up only a bit ? What makes you expect a material price will stay bellow the economical threshold of its extraction ? I dream too of new clean techniques but the history showed us those inventions relies on way more energy and/or also have externalities on resources and environnement. I’m sure you’ll find plenty in battery material alternatives and oil replacement/new extraction techniques. Fracking [0] is my Favorite one.

0 https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/interactive/us/D...

Many countries effectively have a speed tax at least for small amounts of going over the speed limit.

I'm not sure why you keep harping on about people's wallets? Yes, rich people can afford more stuff. What else is new?

The economic theory of taxing externalities does not rely on all people having the same size wallet.

Have a look at eg London's congestion charge: it's not a problem for that system, that some people are richer than others.

You can also look at Singapore's congestion charge or Singapore's Certificate of Entitlement system. Or look at the very successful US sulphur dioxide cap and trade programme: it's not a problem that rich people can in theory just pay to emit more sulphur dioxide, the system still works.

> What makes you suppose the price will go up only a bit?

In the long run, the same reasoning that made Simon win his wager: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon%E2%80%93Ehrlich_wager

> What makes you expect a material price will stay bellow the economical threshold of its extraction ?

Sorry, I don't understand. The price will generally be above that threshold, otherwise why would anyone bother extracting the stuff?

> Fracking [0] is my Favorite one.

Fracking is great, yes, I agree. One my favourites as well:

The extra natural gas that the US got from fracking allowed them to reduce their carbon emissions in the 2010s, despite lack of political support for such a goal! Holier than thou Europe meanwhile increased their carbon emissions, because fracking is verboten over there, so they burned more coal and oil instead.