Your professor is teaching a class on environmental policy. Write a post responding to the professor's question. Express and support your opinion and contribute to the discussion in your own words. An effective response has at least 100 words.
Dr. Amara Nwosu
Many governments now offer subsidies to households that install solar panels or buy electric cars. Supporters argue that this is the quickest way to change behaviour at scale. Critics reply that the money mostly reaches households that could have afforded the purchase anyway, and that the same sum spent on public infrastructure would cut more emissions per pound. Which approach should governments prefer? Why?
Yusuf
I would keep the subsidies. Whatever their distributional flaws, they create a market where none existed, and manufacturers respond to volume. Every solar panel bought with public money in 2010 helped drive down the price of the panels that are now bought without it. Infrastructure spending does not have that effect on unit costs.
Bea
I disagree. A subsidy that goes overwhelmingly to people who own their homes and can afford a new car is a transfer from renters to owners dressed up as climate policy. If the aim is emissions per pound, insulating social housing beats subsidising a second car in a driveway, and it helps the people with the least room to absorb energy costs.