3. Oil and natural gas are pumped from federal lands by corporations large and small. How much should the oil companies pay the federal government?
A. Nothing
B. Just the amount negotiated in 1996. We can't change the rules just because the price of these commodities has risen rapidly.
C. A fixed and trivial percentage of the value of the oil.
D. A rising percentage of the value of the oil and gas, related to the retail prices of the products.
E. An amount that is based both on a percentage of the value of the oil and gas and on the amount of carbon produced by burning the finished product.
F. An amount that relates to the medium- to long-term scarcity of these natural resources, so that we have incentives to leave more for future generations, who may develop technologies to use them more efficiently or extract them with less harm to the environment.
G. Your suggestions?
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