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this post was submitted on 04 Apr 2026
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Climate
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There is a massive issue with adjusting for trade though. If you just imagine a country lets call it Green, which has no emissions, and a another country Black, which is fully run on dirty fossil fuels. Now when both countries trade, the Green country imports emissions and the Black ones are lowered. It can be that dirty processes have been outsourced to the Black country or you can just have the Green country do things better.
When you take the EU and China you can see both. There are absolutely dirty processes outsourced to China, but at the same time things like electricity are dirtier in China then in the EU.
Yeah I'm saying it's the opposite, the green country is outsourcing dirty work to the dirty country
I didn't downvote you btw
Then the Green countries emissions increase for any import from the Black country, when you adjust for trade. The issue is that it is any import and not just dirty outsourced ones.
Say the Green country sells a 1000 chairs to the Black one and the Black country also sells a 1000 chairs to the Green one. Then you still have an increase in emissions, when you adjust for trade, in the Green country and falling emissions in the Black one. I certainly would not call that outsourcing emissions, as both countries could have just kept their chairs. This sort of trade happens all the time in the real world. You for example can buy German cars in Japan and Japanese cars in Germany.
This is how a net goods exporter like the EU, can have an increase in trade adjusted emissions.