EE

Mal abgesehen davon, dass man vor einer Mehrheit, die Diebstahl im Supermarkt befürwortet (und sogar selbst durchführt), eine dafür hätte, Supermärkte zu enteignen (und noch früher, sie stark zu regulieren), würde dieses hypothetische Szenario einfach dazu führen, dass alle Supermärkte entweder schließen oder so starke Sicherheitsmaßnahmen einrichten, dass die Preise deutlich steigen (zusätzlich zu höheren Margen, um den verbleibenden Schwund zu kompensieren). Niemand ist “vom System her gezwungen, das Spiel mitzuspielen”. Unternehmen können sich einfach aus Deutschland zurückziehen und ihr Geld woanders investieren oder die Branche wechseln.

You’re comparing apples to oranges. The Nature paper includes all associated emissions for the food (using “air-freighted asparagus” as an example) while the EPA explicitly excludes non-CO2 greenhouse gas emissions and emissions from production and distribution of both the fuel and the car. On top of that you compare the most efficient car of 2022 in a mixed (city+highway) environment (yes you mentioned efficiency) to the upper limit of what the Nature paper estimates (if all additional energy expenditure was compensated by additional food intake), while the realistic estimate is 0.15 and 0.08kg CO2 per km for walking and cycling respectively.

So there might well be a factor of 10 between cycling to the supermarket and taking your car in terms of GHG emissions. We just can’t tell from the sources you linked. And while it’s an edgy position to take “I’m just adding to the carbon problem for personal health and entertainment purposes” your claim might well convince people that moving away from a car based society would not have any impact on CO2 emissions. I also think you could make your point that rich people have a way outsized impact without all choices of normal people being exactly the same.

It can guide policy decisions (e.g. “Is it more important to subsidize/mandate sustainable meat production or phase it out all together?”), can make voters think differently about topics, which in turn influences politics (in democracies) and can be a simple way to put into perspective the impact of millionaires and billionaires compared to average people.

Also I’ve heard people justify flying a lot because the “carbon footprint” is made up by the fossil fuel industry, which in my eyes is the same argument as “My country only makes up X% of greenhouse emissions so we shouldn’t implement a carbon tax/invest in renewable energy/… until China/the US do”.

And remember, biking or walking is no more environmentally sound - per person-km travelled, using a typical western diet - than a fuel-efficient automobile with a single passenger

Because of the extra calories you burn? Do you have a source for that?

Yeah in Season 3 Episode 1 everyone can rate everyone else and it has some really unsettling consequences on people’s behavior.

Which long-term lower-tech solutions are you talking about concretely?

Especially when it comes to “security” laws, the EU often seems to be on a concerning track, while it seems to have good ideas for many other areas (consumer protection for example). Does someone have a good explanation for this phenomenon?