OPINION:
Actor Robert Redford challenged President Obama to act on climate change by cleaning the air via Environmental Protection Agency regulations and creating jobs in the clean-energy sector, but both are bad ideas for our economy (“Robert Redford challenges Obama to act on climate change,” Web, June 11).
EPA regulations are administratively expensive to write and implement, and creating jobs in new technologies is not something the government does well. It is something that the private sector does well. Mr. Redford would have served the country better if he had challenged Congress to act on climate change by giving business the climate-change legislation it wants. What type of climate-change legislation do Exxon Mobil, BP and ConocoPhillips think Congress should pass? A revenue-neutral carbon tax.
Such a tax would induce business to find ways to lower their emissions without burdensome regulations, and it would stimulate private investment in alternative-energy businesses, thus creating new jobs.
Mr. Redford, advertising for Congress to pass a carbon tax would have been priceless.
JUDY WEISS
Member, Citizens Climate Lobby
Brookline, Mass.
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