We need to end the free ride that industrial polluters have been given in the name of a free-market economy.They don't deserve our tax dollars.They deserve our scrutiny. For the economy itself will die if our eco-systems collapse.
In Europe, taxes account for up to four-fifths of the retail price, so even quite big changes in the price of crude have a more muted effect on pump prices than in the past.
The government boasts of its remedies (increasing the income-tax threshold and cutting beer tax, for example), but most are more than offset by the fall in real incomes.
External forces will make blitzscaling harder, too. Compared with the earlier generation of firms, today a reaction is in full swing, including over digital taxes and data and content laws.