Cap and Trade: YOU, not someone else, are going to pay more, period.

Here is what this Common Sense Curmudgeon has been thinking about this weekend:

Let's think about cap and trade. Start at the bottom - the oil companies get hit with higher costs, so who do they pass that onto? Fuel companies get hit with higher costs on top of that and put the excess onto whom? Trucking companies who bring goods to stores charge more because their fuels are costing more, and that goes onto whom? Stores pay more for their goods to be delivered so the cost increases to protect their profits. Who is going to pay for that? YOU are.

It's pretty simple and easy to think through once you open your mind and think about everything that is going to increase in price for the consumer. Is every company going to absorb their own increases and take lower profits and/or pay their workers less, cut their benefits? Highly doubtful, don't you think? Who would want to do that? Would you want that to happen to you? Are you willing to pay this price for less carbon dioxide in the air?

So YOU are going to pay for it and if you can't figure that out yourself, take a look at the issue yourself and see if you see things differently. Even if you are the most dedicated environmentalist, friend of the earth and all of its creatures, cap and trade will not work because, in the end, most Congresspeople will not vote for something that will damage their state's economy or raise voter costs even if some believe that they can pin the increases on the old tried and true "business did it," it was someone other than us. So, while the politicians may pass something by the end of summer (50-50 chance), it will do nothing for the environment but it will cost most of us thousands in increased consumer costs per year. But I don't think you need someone else to tell you what is going to be happening over the next few years and beyond...but I will...prices are going to rise and rise and rise with little or no reduction in greenhouse gases.

Oh, and I have mentioned this ad nauseum: Wall Street, big business, and some environmentalists will all get rich on this post-mortgage, environmental-ponzi scheme. Remember, my friends on this blog have been telling you these things for months. Soon we will know, unless we tell our Congresspeople to kill this stupid idea while there is till time and the majority of Americans still have jobs and can afford groceries!