Democrats know that their cap and trade energy policies will devastate the economy.
Barack Obama even admitted it on the campaign trail saying cap and trade “would cause energy prices to skyrocket”:
Cap and trade policies would likely cost American families $700 to $1,400 dollars per family per year according to the video above. The Department of Energy estimated GDP losses would be between $444 billion and $1.308 trillion over the 21-year period. Cap and trade also could cost the US 4 million jobs. In Missouri and the Midwest where energy is “cheap” it would cause electricity rates to double.
And, it would likely do nothing to help with the make-believe global warming junk science.
It’s so bad the New York Times is even reporting on the disastrous cap and trade policies proposed by democrats.
The New York Times reported:
From the wheat fields of the north-central region to Kansas City’s necklace of industrial parks to the brick street fronts of St. Louis, Missouri’s reliance on cheap electricity is deeply ingrained.
But few pay attention to the origin of their little-noticed savings: 21 coal-fired power plants that emit more than 75 million tons of carbon dioxide annually and generate 80 percent of Missouri’s electricity. Even residents who endorse wind and solar energy have grown accustomed to the benefits of state policies that favor coal by putting a premium on low-cost electricity. So the idea of federal climate legislation that could increase electricity bills by putting a price on emissions of heat-trapping gases like carbon dioxide is unsettling.
For Missourians, said Robert Clayton, chairman of the state’s Public Service Commission, “the consequence of using more power hasn’t been great.”
Missouri is hardly alone. Nebraska, Indiana and Iowa are also states where coal turns on most of the lights.
That is why, even before Representatives Henry A. Waxman of California and Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts, both Democrats, proposed legislation that would put a price on carbon-dioxide emissions, Senate and House Democrats from coal-using states began to push back.
…Estimates of the effects of the proposed federal climate legislation on electric rates vary. The central thrust of the Waxman-Markey bill is to make carbon-dioxide emissions expensive by capping them and creating allowances that utilities must acquire to function…
Jaime Haro, AmerenUE’s director of asset management and trading, said his company paid $30 to produce a megawatt of electricity. The coal burned emits roughly a ton of carbon dioxide. If federal legislation effectively prices emissions at $30 a ton — estimates have varied from $20 to $115 — “my costs could double,” Mr. Haro said.
Those costs probably would be passed on to customers.
Of course, the cost increase would be passed on to Missouri consumers.
And, of course, the poor would be the hardest hit.
You’d think this would bother democrats just a little bit.
You would think.
Related… The CBO reported that ethanol policies pushed food prices higher.
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