In his first budget proposal, President Clinton proposed a massive energy tax based on consumption of British Thermal Units in fuel. When economists predicted it would eliminate over one-half million jobs and cost a family of four some $300 per year, politicians in both parties junked it.

Now the administration has signaled that Clinton might resurrect it, if reelected.

• Clinton's Undersecretary of State, Tim Wirth, pledged in July at a meeting at Geneva that the U.S. would lead the way toward emission reductions to prevent global warming.

• In essence, observers say, he signaled that a new energy tax proposal -- to reduce the consumption of energy -- will be on the table during a second Clinton term.

• Experts say that progress toward stabilizing greenhouse gas emissions at 1990 levels over the next 15 years would require a tax of more than $100 per metric ton of carbon, or its equivalent.

• Industry economists estimate that such a tax would cost about $200 billion per year, or well more than $2,000 per household.

• Reducing emissions by 20 percent would be double the loss of stabilization.

Energy-intensive sections of the economy -- including mining, chemical production and paper -- would be particularly hard hit. a spokesman for the United Mine Workers union predicts 10,000 jobs lost and the extinction of the UMW if the tax is imposed. The cost of everything from heating a home to driving to work would go up.

Source: Jonathan Adler, "Clinton's Stealth BTU Tax," Washington Times, October 14, 1996.