Lots of kids love to find ways to help the environment. Here’s how the environment can help teach them a little about financial literacy.
Lots of kids love to find ways to help the environment. Here’s how the environment can help teach them a little about financial literacy.
🧾 Taxes can help the environment
Countries charge taxes to raise money for things such as schools and the police, but taxes are also a good way to change people’s behaviour. At the moment, taxes are high on things such as whisky, petrol and drinking sugary drinks, because they’re bad for us. Now, governments are thinking about taxes on plane flights and even red meat, because they’re bad for the environment.
🏭 Companies don’t always pay for all their costs
When companies make things to sell, they pay for the raw materials they use to make their products and for their workers’ wages, but there are other costs that they don’t cover, such as the costs that arise from the carbon dioxide they produce, the pollution they put out and the other damages they may do to the environment. Economists call these costs external costs, as they’re paid by others, such as the people who have to move because the sea levels are rising. Fortunately, governments are working together to find ways to make companies pay, with new charges for things such as carbon emissions.
🚂 With climate change, some costs go back a long way
Not every country started polluting the planet at the same time, or at the same rate. Places such as Great Britain had big factories and lots of steam trains, burning lots of coal, long before other countries got them. These factories made Great Britain rich, and some say that means countries such as Great Britain should pay a bit more to stop climate change.
💸 Spending now could save money in the long run
Fixing the climate is costly, but not fixing it might cost even more, as the earth gets harder to inhabit. In a similar way, investing in old fuels, such as coal and oil, could be a bad idea, because, although they are cheaper to use and make more money, in the future they might be worthless, as the world moves on to cleaner energy.
👪 We can all use our money to make a difference
RoosterMoney is proud to be part of the NatWest group, the banking sponsor of COP26. They plan to make their operations climate positive by 2025, having already made them net carbon zero by the end of 2020. Sounds impressive? You can do your own bit too, by choosing to walk or bike places more, choosing to eat less meat, and thinking about how you spend your money. If you buy something, you can make sure the packaging can be recycled; if you help your family choose a holiday, maybe go somewhere you don’t need to fly to.