Thanks for the feedback. I wasn't necessarily alluding to a gas tax, but instead whichever system is in place to tax pollution and/or congestion, which I thought was already implied by your proposed carbon offsets scheme for car users (albeit with the caveats I mentioned). As for shopping elsewhere (how far?) for cheaper gas, I'm unconvinced.

“people are willing to give a way for a single dollar” Sure, (feeble) people would do a lot differently for earning their $. So I take it, under your scheme, not accepting money for riding the bike is going to be the new privilege of the rich then… It seems to me that subsidizing publicly available bikes such as in Paris would achieve the same goal, without us having to bear that big brother impingement on our daily routine.

“this is the current model of carbon offsetting”. Not so sure about that. If we're talking at the level of a industrial nations, the carbon tax is coupled to emissions, not under your scheme. In any case, current does not necessarily equate best possible.

“Bicycling does have health benefits that an employer might be interested to promote instead of promoting employees to work from home.”. Well, that's a different issue from pollution. Even then, working from home also has health benefits, not just from the employer's standpoint, whose concern, personally, comes second to my own. But let's get back to pollution: discouraging tele-commuting would actually requires more building space (office space) which comes with a significant carbon footprint.

By subsidizing bike trips, it actually makes it a productive activity. If one stretches the reasoning a tad, some people may actually bike ride more (than say stay at home or walk their dog) to finance the carbon offsets for their car!

Thanks for the feedback. I wasn't necessarily alluding to a gas tax, but instead whichever system is in place to tax pollution and/or congestion, which I thought was already implied by your proposed carbon offsets scheme for car users (albeit with the caveats I mentioned). As for shopping elsewhere (how far?) for cheaper gas, I'm unconvinced.

“people are willing to give a way for a single dollar” Sure, (feeble) people would do a lot differently for earning their $. So I take it, under your scheme, not accepting money for riding the bike is going to be the new privilege of the rich then… It seems to me that subsidizing publicly available bikes such as in Paris would achieve the same goal, without us having to bear that big brother impingement on our daily routine.

“this is the current model of carbon offsetting”. Not so sure about that. If we're talking at the level of a industrial nations, the carbon tax is coupled to emissions, not under your scheme. In any case, current does not necessarily equate best possible.

“Bicycling does have health benefits that an employer might be interested to promote instead of promoting employees to work from home.”. Well, that's a different issue from pollution. Even then, working from home also has health benefits, not just from the employer's standpoint, whose concern, personally, comes second to my own. But let's get back to pollution: discouraging tele-commuting would actually requires more building space (office space) which comes with a significant carbon footprint.

By subsidizing bike trips, it actually makes it a productive activity. If one stretches the reasoning a tad, some people may actually bike ride more (than say stay at home or walk their dog) to finance the carbon offsets for their car!