Been a while since we bashed ethanol.
But the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is now doing it for us. The Wall Street Journal explains in an unsigned editorial:
CBO also estimates that cutting carbon emissions by one metric ton via ethanol runs to $754. To put that number in perspective, the budget gnomes estimate that the price for a ton of carbon under the cap-and-tax program that the House passed last summer would be about $26 in 2019.
(Some reports say it doesn't reduce carbon emissions at all.)
Which, of course, begs the question, why do we subsidize ethanol (and require its use) at all?
And the answer is: Powerful farm-state Senators and the EthanolIowa caucus.
Time like these I think a benevolent dictatorship would be preferable to what we have now. Or maybe just following the Constitution.
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