Documents obtained this week from the U.S. Treasury Department reveal the Obama administration's plans for a massive global-warming tax through "cap and trade" legislation that has already passed the House. The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) requested the Treasury documents (PDF) under the Freedom of Information Act and was given an edited version of five records that indicated the cost to American taxpayers would be from $100 - $200 billion per year.

This is just an estimate, since the Treasury had blacked out the end of the following sentence: "It will raise energy prices and impose annual costs on the order of...." Opponents of the plan maintain that the average household would end up saddled with an estimated one to two thousand dollars in added energy consumption costs annually, costs that are corroborated by the Treasury's estimate since there were 105,480,101 households as of the last census.

If passed, cap-and-trade legislation would set up government rationing of industrial carbon dioxide emissions. Obama's plan involves granting, selling, and/or auctioning carbon dioxide-emission permits to the industrial sector, which will translate to higher prices for household and business energy consumers.

"The cost of a cap-and-trade plan to businesses and consumers will be huge, which the Treasury Department internally acknowledges," said CEI Senior Fellow Christopher Horner. "The documents represent what the administration expects 'cap and trade' to cost, and raise. It's a candid perspective that must be told with as much openness to the American public as administration staff discuss with each other. Therefore, we call on the Administration to immediately release complete, un-redacted copies of these documents for all to see. No more hiding."

Environmentalists disagree with CEI's conclusions, claiming that Obama plans to use cap-and-trade revenue to cut taxes. Tony Kreindler, spokesman for the Environmental Defense Fund, explained, "That math ignores the redistribution of revenue back to consumers. It only looks at one side of the balance sheet. It would only be true if you think the administration was going to pile all the cash on the White House lawn and set it on fire."

The Treasury Department goes even further. "The reporting on the Treasury analysis is flat out wrong," said Alan B. Krueger, Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy. "The reporting and blogging on this issue ignores the fact that the revenue raised from emission permits would be returned to consumers under both administration and legislative proposals."

Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are not convinced. "The current administration claims to be the most transparent in American history, yet it's been hiding a report showing its cap-and-trade energy plan would cost up to $200 billion every year," argued Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.). "American families can't afford a new $1,761 yearly energy tax, and our economy surely cannot afford the 1-percent drop in productivity this big-government bill would cause. The best step we can take right now to lower energy costs, boost the economy, and clean our air would be to rely on a technology we created: nuclear power."

Others warn this legislation would likely offshore more American jobs, since countries like China and India do not levy greenhouse-gas taxes. In a February interview with the New York Times, Energy Secretary Steven Chu said, "The concern about cap-and-trade in today's economic climate is that a lot of money might flow to developing countries in a way that might not be completely politically sellable."

TrackBack URI for this entry

Comments (6)

Subscribe to this comment's feed

Bonnie said:

Cap and trade I could live with We place a cap on the number of liberals we allow in the country. We tax these liberals. If the number of liberals continues to grow beyond the cap, we increase the tax. As a last resort, we can trade our liberals for another country's conservatives. (I am jesting... maybe!)

September 18, 2009

Isaac said:

... Ah, HELLO out here. How about cutting the overhead down? A couple of suggestions I can offer that are paid for by tax dollars are a cut in pay for government employees that are non-labor and how about cutting off GWB completely.

September 18, 2009

Bonnie said:

Let me get this straight "The reporting on the Treasury analysis is flat out wrong," said Alan B. Krueger, Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy. "The reporting and blogging on this issue ignores the fact that the revenue raised from emission permits would be returned to consumers under both administration and legislative proposals." Revenue? From what? "selling, and/or auctioning carbon dioxide-emission permits to the industrial sector" Industrial sector? What is that? Businesses Okay, so this is a cost to business, correct? Yes Business costs have to be offset, don't they? Yes How does a business offset cost? By raising prices Who pays these hight prices? Consumers So ultimately the consumer pays these costs? Correct So what is happening is that money will be taken from the consumer's left pocket and returned to his right pocket? Yes! Well, kind of... there are administrative costs... Administrative costs? By who? The government

September 18, 2009

C.A. Bouthillier said:

Global Warming fraud being used to set up the biggest fraud of all The Global Warming fraud is being used to set up the biggest fraud of all. The Fraudulent Global Warming: With the alkaline blood types in particular, the body uses compensation or buffer measure to bring down the blood pH and that mechanism is to retain carbon dioxide (CO2). It is not the fraudulent “Global Warming”, an “increase of carbon dioxide in the environment” that is causing humans to die off. The fraudulent “global warming” science explains that the elevated CO2 level in blood is caused by increasing CO2 levels in the atmosphere/environment particularly in the last 50 years. This is used for evidence the “carbon cycle” is causing the alkaline blood types O and A to go into extinction first, followed by blood type B. The last disclosure of blood type distribution was about 50 years ago, when the alkaline blood types were at a higher prevalence and the acidic blood type B was at a lower prevalence in populations. //// The upcoming disclosure of blood type distribution reveals decreasing blood types A/O prevalence and increasing type B prevalence will “prove” that CO2 levels are rising. (See above section on current blood type distribution in the United States.) In truth this is evidence populations are dying off, have been in negative population growth, with much of the world in the final extermination phase for generations now. The last remaining nations, the Western nations, were set up in the final extermination phase in 2005. Like the United States, these western nations’ populations peaked in about 1979-1980. The remaining blood type AB, the only normal healthy blood, will be the ones to survive; hence -- “survival of the fittest”. From: http://www.unveilingthem.com/P...ciency.htm C.A. Bouthillier

September 19, 2009 | url

Flu-Bird said:

Green and greedy By far GLOBAL WARMING is the biggist fruad ever perpatraited on the world AL GORE is the worlds #1 liar and hypotcrit and OBAMA is your typical tax and spend demacratic liberal CAP & TRADE is a sinister plan by the eco-nazis under the green swatika STAMP OUT DEEP ECOLOGY

September 19, 2009

Thomas Paine said:

The two headed monster rolls on to the NWO The Leviathan (Dems and Republican monster), rolls on. The Republicans role is to promote the global war on terror, thus consolidating military power for global elite domination. The Dems are responsible for the Global Warming plan. Thus consolidating the rest of the economic pie under global elite domination. Both threats force us to cave in to World Government.

September 19, 2009