Richest 0.1% (8M) produce more carbon pollution than 3.5B

77 points - today at 3:01 AM

Source

Comments

thenewnewguy today at 3:48 AM
Their methodology is extremely suspect in my opinion, as they attribute "shareholder emissions" to anyone that owns 10% or more of a company. Direct quote from their doc:

> a person with a 20% share in a company has 20% of its emissions allocated to their shareholder emissions

While shareholders obviously hold a greater degree of control over a company's emissions than a random consumer, assigning 100% of the blame for oil company emissions to the owners and 0% to people buying oil seems insane.

Also, filtering only for owners that control a 10% or higher stake masively skews the results as large portions of companies are held by the general public in much smaller quantities via 401ks, pensions, etc.

Ericson2314 today at 3:50 AM
This is mostly a distraction because so much Carbon pollution is within supply chains, and therefore not wise to ascribe to individual consumers.

The exceptions are driving and flying. 8M is more than the private jet users, I assume. Getting rid of ICE driving is going very well (outside fossil-Luddite America).

Getting rid of flying is harder, but I fully support a rail bridge across the Bearing Strait. I'll take long sleeper trains working remote before I get to my old world vacation proper. This is good for circadian rhythm too.

Frieren today at 3:45 AM
Inequality breaks capitalism. Spending so much money as the 0.1% spends in luxury makes no sense. To let millions die of preventable diseases, or even hunger makes no sense. The fact that as a society we let them do that is a failure that needs to be corrected.

It is not their money. It is our resources that they are wasting. We need to better provide for our fellow humans even if that costs the rich a percentage of their luxuries.

And let's not forget about the top 0.01%. The smaller the percentage, the more depraved the rich are, and the more they use their money to influence politics and increase poverty and suffering.

atleastoptimal today at 3:39 AM
Is that really a surprise? Most of the world bikes or takes a train. The richest 0.1% have fleets of taxis, private jets, etc.