{"id":143033,"date":"2023-07-07T14:52:47","date_gmt":"2023-07-07T12:52:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ufu.de\/rich-people-must-save-the-planet\/"},"modified":"2025-05-28T10:40:38","modified_gmt":"2025-05-28T08:40:38","slug":"rich-people-must-save-the-planet","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.ufu.de\/en\/rich-people-must-save-the-planet\/","title":{"rendered":"Rich people must save the planet!"},"content":{"rendered":"

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UfU Information | Issue 9 – July 2023 | Jonas R\u00fcffer<\/h5>\n

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Rich people must save the planet!<\/h2>\n

A plea for more taxes and bans!<\/h3>\n

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A provocative over- and understatement. Bans and taxes in the name of the climate that primarily affect a certain section of the population – for some people, this concept is no longer compatible with moderate regulatory policy, but means interventionism and restrictions on personal freedom. This article will explain why it can nevertheless be worthwhile to analyze our consumer behavior and the right choice of means for transformation, especially with regard to income. <\/p>\n

We consume too much and we consume the wrong things.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

This should come as no surprise to anyone and is nothing new in 2023: humanity (especially in the global North) is clearly consuming too much and consuming it wrong. Too much meat and processed food, too many cars, too much fast fashion and waste – the list goes on and on. Rich societies such as Germany or the USA consume so many resources that they exceed the earth’s capacity several times over. If we want to get a grip on environmental pollution and the global rise in temperature and not hope for a miracle, we cannot avoid reducing our consumption of resources. This should be a broad consensus, at least in Germany, and meet with approval regardless of the political camps. <\/p>\n

However, the way in which this goal is to be achieved is highly controversial. Representatives of market liberalism focus more on technological progress and possible incentive systems, while others argue that only bans and new taxes, for example, will have the desired effect. <\/p>\n

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Premise 1: The problem is not solved through the consumption decisions of the individual. That would be too much responsibility for individuals. <\/strong><\/h3>\n

In order to bring about a change in consumer behavior in Germany, people prefer to work with incentive systems: Think, for example, of the scrappage scheme, the exemption from vehicle tax for electric cars or the numerous subsidies for the installation of climate-friendly technology, such as solar panels. Market regulation of this kind is popular and, in contrast to new taxes or even the introduction of bans, meets with wider acceptance across all political camps of the democratic spectrum and among the population. <\/p>\n

The theoretical basis behind this is not particularly complicated: Each and every one of us knows best by which individual standards, values and, above all, possibilities he or she wants to and can consume. Although we try to steer consumption in a desired direction with the help of seals (e.g. state organic seal), warnings (e.g. tobacco labeling) and subsidies, ultimately no one should be actively restricted in their consumption options unless they have to be (exceptions are, for example, youth protection or similar). <\/p>\n

With this attitude, however, the responsibility for our consumption and thus logically also the associated consumption of resources is ultimately transferred from politicians and producers to the end consumer, who has to weigh up numerous factors such as their own values (e.g. animal-friendliness, environmental protection, health) or financial possibilities with every purchase decision. Viewed as a whole, we all bear individual responsibility for the impact of these decisions on the entire planet every day with our individual consumption decisions. <\/p>\n

The problem with this attitude is that complex problems such as the climate crisis sometimes require stronger market regulation than we have been willing to admit so far. It is not possible to break down complex issues such as anthropogenic climate change or global resource consumption to individuals and make them solely responsible for these issues through their individual consumption decisions. <\/p>\n

For as logical as consumer responsibility may be when viewed as a whole, it is not very effective when broken down to the specific individual case. If only everyone would change their own behavior, if only we would all eat less meat and not buy new brand-name sneakers again because we simply couldn’t resist them when passing by in the pedestrian zone – we wouldn’t have the problems we all have. So are you just missing the right incentives to make a start today? No more vacation flights to Tenerife? Buy a cargo bike and sell your car? Hardly. <\/p>\n

Peer pressure<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The reference to consumer responsibility ignores the fact that people live in a highly interconnected and globalized world. Purchasing and consumption decisions depend on culture, social class, personality traits, group influences, time factors, financial possibilities and many other factors. In particular, group influences and comparisons with groups and other individuals play a role. People compare themselves on a daily basis with their so-called peer group, i.e. people in similar or supposedly similar life situations. Pop culture and social media such as Instagram, Facebook and TikTok take this constant comparison with other people to the extreme and influence our own consumer behavior. The result: being the only person who feels like they are not going on vacation due to the climate crisis, but at the same time looking at friends \u201cand acquaintances\u201d vacation photos from the Maldives on Instagram, is like shooting yourself in the foot for many people. This sometimes leads to absurd comparisons about the biggest yacht, the longest flight in space, the most sports cars, etc., especially in the upper income categories. <\/p>\n

Missing information<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Another problem with consumer responsibility is the lack of relevant information about the impact of their own consumption. Global production chains and their impact on the planet are so complex that holding individuals responsible for their consumption is an impossible task. Of course, it can be argued that most people today know that cheap meat is not particularly good for the planet and that rail is clearly preferable to short-haul flights. But when it comes to the question of whether regional \u201cnormal\u201d potatoes from Brandenburg or organic potatoes from the Netherlands are the better choice for the supermarket customer in Berlin from a climate and nature conservation point of view, the knowledge stops there. So a simple purchase in the supermarket becomes a balancing act between \u201cgood\u201d and \u201cbad\u201d products. The fact is that for most products, including food, expert knowledge of global supply chains and production methods is needed to determine the real impact of consuming these products on the planet and, above all, to identify alternatives. <\/p>\n

Lack of alternatives<\/strong><\/h3>\n

It can also be argued that some of our consumption decisions are involuntary. Why? The first reason is a lack of financial resources – not everyone can afford organic food. Like Greta Thunberg, not everyone can travel to the climate summit on a sailing ship[1]<\/a> and therefore can hardly avoid taking an airplane from time to time. And those who have to bring home a week’s shopping for three children may now be able to use an electric cargo bike, but for many people the car remains the first choice for such decisions due to external influences. <\/p>\n

Low benefit<\/strong><\/h3>\n

When discussing individual responsibility for one’s own consumption, the argument of too little benefit is one of the most common. If a 70-year-old person in Germany had not emitted anyCO2<\/sub> their entire life, they would have saved as many emissions on average as the global energy sector emits in one second.[2]<\/a> For many people, the personal costs of changing their own behavior therefore exceed the global benefits. <\/p>\n

After me, the deluge?<\/strong><\/h3>\n

So is this argument a free pass for unbridled consumption? No. At the very least, the following argument can be made against the argument that one’s own changes in behavior are of little benefit from a moral philosophical perspective: If a certain type of action makes a difference above a certain number (for example, if a great many people stop eating meat), then it cannot be logical that the same action by an individual would have no significance whatsoever. [ 3]<\/a> Perhaps the individual action makes no perceptible difference to the individual, but the moral relevance is not zero. Does the individual action possibly make a difference? We can never completely rule that out. In terms of our consumer behavior, this means that we cannot justify our overconsumption by claiming that a change in our behavior would make no difference to the planet. <\/p>\n

It can be argued that we all bear some responsibility for our consumption if we know that it is bad for the planet. Viewed as a whole, this is also logical. However, there is a case to be made that we cannot solve the problem of our resource consumption by trying to influence people’s individual purchasing decisions through incentive schemes. In view of our remaining globalCO2 budget<\/sub>, we should actively consider limiting consumption by means of taxes and bans. <\/p>\n

Premise 2: Overconsumption occurs mainly among wealthy people.<\/strong><\/h3>\n

This fact is no longer a novelty either, but it has not been discussed quite as often to date. If we examine the consumption and, above all, investment behavior of people by income, the figures speak for themselves: the investments of the 125 richest billionaires in the world have acarbon footprint<\/sub> that is comparable to the total<\/sub> carbon footprint of France (67 million people). [ 4]<\/a> It is therefore worth taking another look at consumption decisions and analyzing them according to the distribution of wealth. <\/p>\n

The distribution of wealth in Germany<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Basically, consumption depends above all on financial means. If you have nothing to exchange or pay for, you cannot consume anything. The same applies: the greater the financial means, the greater the opportunities for consumption and therefore also for changes in consumption. <\/p>\n

The single nurse with three children and an Opel Corsa, who is often used as an example, has a different consumption pattern to CDU chairman Friedrich Merz. While it is simply unrealistic to ask the single nurse why she drives an old Opel Corsa instead of an electric car, it is perfectly reasonable to ask Friedrich Merz whether it was really necessary to fly to Sylt for Christian Lindner’s wedding in July 2022 in his own private jet. [5]<\/a><\/p>\n

What is often exaggerated in the example of the nurse is unfortunately part of everyday life for many people in Germany, either in this way or in a less extreme form. Around 13 million people in Germany are at risk of poverty in 2021. That is a full 15.8 percent of the population. For 33.2 percent of single parents in Germany, the net income was less than 16,300 euros and around 26.6 percent were at acute risk of poverty.[6]<\/a> The bottom 20 percent of households in Germany have no assets, meaning they live from month to month or even have negative assets, i.e. debts. <\/p>\n

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For people living in this income bracket (the bottom 20 percent), the means to change their behavior are severely limited. These people practically live on their income alone and cannot build up any reserves. Advising someone who can barely pay their electricity and gas bills to save money, as this is necessary in the current energy crisis and also good for the climate, is not only unhelpful, but also demonstrates ignorance of this person’s living situation. A not inconsiderable proportion of people in Germany have already reduced their own consumption to an absolute minimum and no longer have any opportunities to change their behavior. <\/p>\n

This abject poverty of many people in Germany can be contrasted with a considerable accumulation of wealth for the top one percent of the population. A look at the distribution of wealth in Germany shows the inequality of our society: <\/p>\n