One of the most pervasive pieces of fossil industry propaganda is that decarbonisation will "make us all poorer" by destroying the value of fossil fuel assets. But it turns that its just another fossil industry lie:
Research published on Thursday finds that the loss of fossil fuel assets would have a minimal impact on the general public.Which is obvious, when you think about it. Normal people don't have huge share portfolios. We don't own oil companies. Instead, like everything else, those assets are owned by billionaires and bonesaw-wielding Saudi autocrats. Destroying that wealth doesn't hurt us, and in fact seems positively beneficial in terms of limiting the power of those billionaires and autocrats to undermine democracy and destroy the world.“We find that the bulk of financial losses associated with rotten, polluting assets is borne by the wealthy,” said the co-author Lucas Chancel, a professor of economics at Sciences Po in Paris. “Only a small share of financial losses is borne by the working and middle class because they have no or relatively little financial wealth.”
The study, published in the journal Joule, found that in high-income countries two-thirds of the financial losses would be borne by the most affluent 10%. In contrast, governments could easily compensate for the minimal impact on those on middle and lower levels of wealth.
But then, I guess that that's what they're afraid of...
