Saru Jayaraman tried. As far back as January, the president of low-pay campaign group One Fair Wage recalls telling Democratic leaders in Washington DC that voters were worried about the cost of living.
I agree, but that’s a different issue than changing people’s consumption. Ignoring that things people consume have increased in price and not doing anything about it is effectively just a lower standard of living. It would be received very poorly if any political party tried to get rid of subsidies for fuel/animal products, you would need levels of state control comparable to the Soviet Union or another socialist country to get people to change their consumption to that degree. In capitalism consumption is many people’s primary identity and it would take a lot of deprogramming to change that. This is to an extent going on and many climate groups are doing a good job getting people more comfortable with the idea of veganism/shifting away from fossil fuels, but saying you have less money in your bank account and that’s a good thing because maybe you’ll change your habits to avoid climate change would have resulted in a 50 state blow out, you will never get people on your side operating like that.
I agree, but that’s a different issue than changing people’s consumption. Ignoring that things people consume have increased in price and not doing anything about it is effectively just a lower standard of living. It would be received very poorly if any political party tried to get rid of subsidies for fuel/animal products, you would need levels of state control comparable to the Soviet Union or another socialist country to get people to change their consumption to that degree. In capitalism consumption is many people’s primary identity and it would take a lot of deprogramming to change that. This is to an extent going on and many climate groups are doing a good job getting people more comfortable with the idea of veganism/shifting away from fossil fuels, but saying you have less money in your bank account and that’s a good thing because maybe you’ll change your habits to avoid climate change would have resulted in a 50 state blow out, you will never get people on your side operating like that.