The Economic Rhetoric of Carbon Pricing

Authors

Jeff Todd

Abstract

Economists overwhelmingly prefer the carbon pricing instruments of carbon taxes and cap-and-trade programs as the most cost-effective way to reduce greenhouse gases and combat climate change. By contrast, US lawmakers have largely eschewed carbon pricing, and legal scholars have mixed views about implementing it. In order for legal scholars to better understand economic studies on carbon pricing and incorporate those studies into their own climate change scholarship, this Article turns to the rhetoric of economics. Economists view problems like climate change through the metaphor of the market, so they embrace carbon pricing because it is a market-based approach that corrects the market failure of GHG emissions most efficiently. One potential downside is that the dominance of the market metaphor and preference for mathematical models and numeric data might blind economists to questions about the distribution of carbon pricing’s costs and benefits, which may be regressive and thus result in an unjust transition. Economic discourse is permeated with other tropes like metonymy and irony, however. For example, some economic studies have made abstractions about wealth more concrete by showing how carbon pricing is far less regressive when households are categorized by consumption rather than income. Further, the body of economic studies offers dominant, counter, and new narratives that should be considered together to create a richer understanding of carbon pricing’s impacts. These economic studies show that carbon pricing is not only efficient but also not as regressive as commonly assumed—and may even be progressive, particularly since carbon pricing laws can be structured to recycle revenues in a way that balances efficiency and equity. The rhetorical analysis in this Article therefore provides insight into the disciplinary practices of economics, aids legal scholars in assessing economic studies, justifies reading multiple (even conflicting) economic studies together, and shows how economic studies support making carbon pricing a more integral component of climate change law and policy.

Recommended Citation

Jeff Todd, The Economic Rhetoric of Carbon Pricing, 90 Brook. L. Rev. 421 (2025).
Available at: https://brooklynworks.brooklaw.edu/blr/vol90/iss2/2