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This will probably be more than outweighed by the savings in public health due to less pollution. Air pollution kills and harms so many people every year.
by jurgemaister 9y ago
This will probably be more than outweighed by the savings in public health due to less pollution. Air pollution kills and harms so many people every year.
- gambiting 9y agoSure, but I have zero confidence that policymakers will look at it this way. We all know that budgets are largely non-transferable between departments, so just because we are spending less money on health issues I can guarantee no one will transfer this money over road maintenance. That's not how it works.
- sokoloff 9y agoNor should it work that way automatically, IMO. We need a certain amount to spend on X and an amount to spend on Y. If X becomes cheaper, the right thing to do (IMO) is to return the savings to the people, not to spend the surplus on Y or find a new Z to spend it on. If the people want to choose to spend more on Y or Z now that they've seen the savings on X returned to them, that's perfectly rational possibility, but shouldn't be automatic.
- brokenmachine 9y agoIf policy makers cared about health issues due to pollution, smoking would have been outright banned 10 years ago.
- Qantourisc 9y agoThere is a difference between polluting your longs, or the entire city. (Although health-care is still costly to others.)
- brokenmachine 9y ago> health-care is still costly to others That's exactly the point I was making.