Removing lead from petrol was a good thing. The free market would not have done that.
The free market would never take care of the ozone hole problem.
These are two examples where I think the market fails. If someone can prove me wrong that would be nice.
Am interested in hearing your opinions.
Im not really informed on the whats and how's about military pollution. is it just bomb ranges and exploding ordinance not being good for the environment or what. Ive heard a little about how the military sold a practice range and the exploding shells caused the ground the be poisonous or something. If so its the fault of whoever was dumb enough to buy the land after them and since they are not trying to make money or pollute by skipping corners to cut costs and they are just trying to train to be able to protect us should we really be so eager to sue? I might be quilty of moral relitivism but its just a thought.
Stranger: Any area where the government is a monopoly makes government intervention in that area absolutely necessary, particularly the production of security. However, that doesn't justify the monopoly.
Any area where the government is a monopoly makes government intervention in that area absolutely necessary, particularly the production of security. However, that doesn't justify the monopoly.
I agree. I work for the Coast Guard and our unit does pollution response on the inland rivers of Ohio, West Virginia and Kentucky. Since the government claims ownership of the rivers they would likely be a disaster (even more polluted than they already are) if the government didn't do something to mitigate or prevent pollution. However, if the rivers could be owned privately I think they would be in far better shape than they are now. The Coast Guard doesn't have the resources or the incentive to keep the rivers as clean as private property owners would.
*guilty
Josh: Nobody has answered the ozone question adequately
Nobody has answered the ozone question adequately
If, on a stateless planet, pollutants are damaging the ozone layer such that higher incidents of cancer arise, would the planetary inhabitants pollute away until cancer ate up the entire population? I doubt that. I think as awareness grew of the problem, cultural values would grow against the use of the pollutants and greatly limit the use non-coercively via societal norms.
Josh:Nobody has answered the ozone question adequately
Are you quite sure it's a problem? It's recently been shrinking as much as 30 percent by some estimates.
The reason I ask is because I pretty much eviscerated the claim that "the free market" put lead in gasoline, and I don't have the time to tilt at straw-men forever. My presumption (call it an educated guess) is that if we did any serious research on this matter, we'd find a similar pattern of abuse.
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David Z
"The issue is always the same, the government or the market. There is no third solution."
Lilburne:If, on a stateless planet, pollutants are damaging the ozone layer such that higher incidents of cancer arise, would the planetary inhabitants pollute away until cancer ate up the entire population? I doubt that. I think as awareness grew of the problem, cultural values would grow against the use of the pollutants and greatly limit the use non-coercively via societal norms.
I can't agree with you here, I think that due to the sheer size of this issue the market can't handle it. If you think about what would be necessary to cut CO2 emissions by the required amount I think it quickly becomes clear that the prisoners dilemma and the transaction costs involved prevent any sort of market solution. In order to fight this sort of problem it would be necessary that a potential poluter must contract with every individual that his polution might harm. However, this just doesn't look feasible to me, especially since everybody polutes to some extent or another.
Now, whilst I think the government may be necessary for governing this particular commons, that doesn't mean I advocate government.
"You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows"
Bob Dylan
GilesStratton:If you think about what would be necessary to cut CO2 emissions by the required amount
What is the required amount?
Stolz25: GilesStratton:If you think about what would be necessary to cut CO2 emissions by the required amount What is the required amount?
I was sort of speaking hypothetically.
I would say, to pollution in general as well, that sure, as long as human beings exist, environmental problems will as well, but given that it is a fact that governments are sink-holes for pollution, simple reforms to minimize or transform it out of existence would do wonders.
Also, there is a movement out there called free-market environmentalism, which stems from the original conservation movement - which was inherently about conservation and I would say, very capable of connecting to markets.
existence is elsewhere
GilesStratton: I can't agree with you here, I think that due to the sheer size of this issue the market can't handle it. If you think about what would be necessary to cut CO2 emissions by the required amount I think it quickly becomes clear that the prisoners dilemma and the transaction costs involved prevent any sort of market solution. In order to fight this sort of problem it would be necessary that a potential poluter must contract with every individual that his polution might harm. However, this just doesn't look feasible to me, especially since everybody polutes to some extent or another. Now, whilst I think the government may be necessary for governing this particular commons, that doesn't mean I advocate government.
Isn't that something we just kind of have to deal with, though?
I mean, thinking about the nature of human beings, we're very similar to parasites and there are only a few examples I can think of where human beings reach equilibrium or benefit the environment itself.
I mean, I guess I understand why people don't like that fact, but I think it's one human beings just have to learn to live with. The fact is that this planet is a host for us and that's all. We're parasites, we will pollute and eventually destroy this planet. There's no changing that unless we go through sudden extinction.
The solution I can think of? Space travel. We can't stop ourselves from polluting completely, but we can get to a point where we're like a small mosquito on an elephant where we can suck from the universe but never actually make much of a dent in it as a whole.
My point was really more that whilst I think voluntary mechanisms and institutions can solve the problems posed by most commons, I just don't think that the Ozone layer or the atmosphere is one of these. This just isn't something consenting individuals can solve on their own. For me global warming and Ozone depletion are of relatively little interest, warmer weather is always great as far as I'm concerned (except for during the ski season) and well, I just don't care about the Ozone layer because a little extra radiation whilst I'm by my pool doesn't bother me. If you want to advocate some sort of government to solve this problem you're going to have to make a value judgement. If you consider the long term interests of humans to be of such importance and global warming to be a considerable threat, or you just think that nature should be preserved for its own sake then you have to go ahead and advocate some sort of coercive system. Because without coercion you're not going to get the Dutch guy with his windmill by the coast and wooden shoes and the big industrialist to agree on a solution, let alone the 7 billion odd other people that inhabit this planet.
Actually now that I've given this more thought, I think you've hit the nail on the head. Given what we know about governments and markets from the Austrian and Virginia schools of economics I'd say that the solution would be worse than the problem in this case. I mean, for one thing we don't know enough about global warming to make any sort of judgement right now anyway. Now, let's say that the entire world is in a state of anarchy and all of a sudden a bunch of people get together and form some sort of coercive institution to deal with the problems of global warming. If scientists one day realised they were wrong about climate change and turned around and said "hey, look guys, we're awefully sorry but we messed up big time" I don't think that the interventions would be particularly easy to turn around, as Mises has said. I also think this sort of intervention is particularly prone to rent seeking and in fact I was speaking to a friend about this the other day regarding the Portuguese minister of the environment and the wealth he had mysteriously acquired.
GilesStratton: Actually now that I've given this more thought, I think you've hit the nail on the head. Given what we know about governments and markets from the Austrian and Virginia schools of economics I'd say that the solution would be worse than the problem in this case. I mean, for one thing we don't know enough about global warming to make any sort of judgement right now anyway. Now, let's say that the entire world is in a state of anarchy and all of a sudden a bunch of people get together and form some sort of coercive institution to deal with the problems of global warming. If scientists one day realised they were wrong about climate change and turned around and said "hey, look guys, we're awefully sorry but we messed up big time" I don't think that the interventions would be particularly easy to turn around, as Mises has said. I also think this sort of intervention is particularly prone to rent seeking and in fact I was speaking to a friend about this the other day regarding the Portuguese minister of the environment and the wealth he had mysteriously acquired.
On top of that I think it's worth adding that even if governments did have perfect information and there was no public choice problem, the environment would still, sooner or later, degrade as long as human beings continue to exist. I say this simply because human beings really seem to take more from the Earth than they give.
I don't want this to be confused with the type of green rhetoric that you might here from someone else, however, I am by no means misanthropic. I'm fine with the idea of human beings as parasites and I think others should accept it as well. I think this because I'm interested in the prolonging of my future generations and I don't think that human beings will survive much longer - at least not relatively - if we don't accept that this planet is temporary for us and work further towards colonizing space.
Wilmot of Rochester:human beings really seem to take more from the Earth than they give.
Where there is no property there is no justice; a proposition as certain as any demonstration in Euclid
Fools! not to see that what they madly desire would be a calamity to them as no hands but their own could bring
There is a pollution problem. It's poisonous, and claims millions of lives. It destroys property, silencing the affected before they can warn others. It's also known to cause emotional and psychological breakdown.
The danger to our environment is statism.
inquisitiveteenager:The free market would never take care of the ozone hole problem.
The free market would also never commit genocide.