Should We All Feel Guilt for Climate Change?

Living an affluent lifestyle may rule our activities more than guarding the environment against harm. This sense of privilege takes priority over behaving like good environmental stewards.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Environmentalists agree that the biggest source of carbon is fossil fuels. The list of culprits often begins with fossil fuel companies. Yet, it does not require a degree in ethics to realize that the person who uses a gallon of gas to get to work each day has precisely the same climate culpability as the oil company that sold it to them. People need to get to work to keep themselves alive, of course. They are obliged to add to their carbon footprint in this way unless there is a more climate-friendly mode of travel, such as an EV, or public transport. Does necessity absolve them of climate responsibility? Perhaps. If so, then we add a filter of discretionary carbon pollution. Obvious environmental scofflaws are the oligarchs: Their gigantic yachts have the carbon footprint of many thousand average humans.

Who Should Be Held Responsible?

The same reasoning applies to the billionaire class as a whole, and wealthy people more generally who do more damage than hundreds of average citizens. Indeed, according to an Oxfam report on the subject, the top 1 percent for wealth do as much climate damage as the bottom 66 percent (about 16 percent of the total).

This telling statistic paints the ultra-wealthy as very guilty of environmental damage whereas the majority of earth's residents come across as relatively blameless. There are two possible solutions to environmental atrocities by the affluent. The more draconian answer would be to lock the 1 percent in prison for their environmental crimes where the low carbon footprint of the average prisoner does wonders for the environment. This is nearly impossible in a democracy where the elite class often monopolizes political power.

A less draconian approach, already widely used in social democracies, is to cut down their wealth through heavy taxation, estate taxes, and inheritance laws designed to break up family fortunes by equal distribution among siblings, for example. (Notably, the landed gentry of the past avoided breaking up their estates by transmitting property exclusively to the oldest son to conserve family wealth and privilege.)

The other striking conclusion from the Oxfam report is that most of the carbon pollution is not from the ultra-wealthy but from the 33 percent lying below the top 1 percent (who generate 83 percent of the carbon pollution).

Now, these people are very wealthy by global standards, but many of the people in some developed countries would fall into this category. The median wealth of Irish people is €107,315 (in 2022), which would place approximately half of them into the high-polluting 33 percent band. The same is true of many people living in other affluent countries who prioritize activities such as long-distance flights over trimming their carbon footprint.

Admittedly, most of the wealth—and hence the carbon pollution—is skewed to the top end of this distribution. Even so, many of the residents of developed countries are prioritizing the good life and living far beyond their means as far as carbon pollution is concerned.

The Scale of the Problem

Another way of looking at the scope of the problem is to recognize that if everyone on Earth lived close to the current average footprint of around 6.6 tons of carbon per person, the planet could still be in dire straits. We are producing three times more carbon pollution than we would need to keep global warming below 1.5 degrees Centigrade, according to COP20 guidelines. It follows that residents of developed countries are producing at least five times too much carbon to reach the temperature target.

How could we reduce carbon pollution this much without precipitating a global economic depression and pushing most of the population into abject poverty?

The other side of this coin is figuring out how the poorer countries can achieve greater prosperity without aggravating their carbon load due to increased industrial production. How do we reduce global inequality without greatly expanding the population of those who blow their carbon budget, as people living in affluent countries already do? We need to do more to model environmental responsibility.