earlier replies
Replying to @davidbaron
taxing negative externalities makes a lot of sense, especially if you're looking to change practices, but they're still paid
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and it's interesting in the case of carbon taxes in particular to see who pays (oil companies, retailers, consumers etc)
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Distributional aspects can be corrected by other policies that change distribution. But don't know what you mean by "still paid".
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using a carbon tax as an example, you could see the same arguments being made "oil companies will pay for their pollution: cont.
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on the flip side if demand were perfectly inelastic and there were no suitable substitutes, consumers would bear the entire cost
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Things about "who bears the cost" of a very specific policy aren't interesting since basically *all* policy effects distribution
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Distribution needs to be considered globally, not one policy at a time.
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e.g., having police to protect against theft increases wealth inequality.
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Rather than using that to argue that police should be paid for only by the rich, we should consider the overall distribution...
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... produced by the sum of government policies (which are hopefully good for their own reasons) and adjust appropriately.
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Replying to @davidbaron @blassey
That is, fix things up at the end with an appropriately graduated (& maybe negative at points) wealth, income, or consumption tax.

Jan 26, 2017 · 11:06 PM UTC