The lifestyle of the 42m richest people are emitting more greenhouse gases than the poorest 3.8b. This is a fact worth reposting across Reddit.

As I stated in a follow up comment of course the individual level is important and I'm not trying to trivialize it. It is very important that individuals can adjust their life style to a more environmentally friendly way of life. But the biggest part of the problem will require top down economic reform regardless of individual choice. This may negatively impact short term quarterly revenues and profits, which is the driving force for our overly capitalist system, and do away with many of the companies causing the problems to begin with by completely transitioning and overhauling our system to one not reliant on fossil fuels. In the long run though this will result in a more stable economy where we aren't risking our own demise. It also means our individual choices will have less of a negative impact. Me running my A/C won't be as much of a problem because the electricity for it isn't coming from burning fossil fuels. Me driving a car won't have as much of an impact because it's electric and the electricity powering it doesn't come from fossil fuels. The majority of people operate on what is economically expedient for them. So in order to change the impact on a scale that is significant enough to make an impact then we need to change what is economically viable. This will not happen willingly from executives and shareholders of companies. And for the people who are unwilling or unable to change their impact on the environment because of what is economically viable for them a change of what is viable is required. This can only come from top down systemic reform.

/r/LateStageCapitalism Thread Parent Link - nature.com