> If someone has gone to the effort to buy responsibly sourced paper towels All paper is sustainably harvested from tree-farms where the trees are grown specif

> If someone has gone to the effort to buy responsibly sourced paper towels All paper is sustainably harvested from tree-farms where the trees are grown specifically for making paper, rather than e.g. old-growth forests. It's also all (to my knowledge) biodegradable. I'm not saying that paper towels are always the better choice. You can also look at other factors such as manufacturing costs, etc. My point was that disposability can be a positive trait. With regard to externalities, my point is that regulations have them too. Yes, you can impose (costly) requirements on industry, but do we ask what the cost is in terms of economic growth (which is lifting many third-world people out of extreme poverty) and technological innovation (which creates greater efficiency)? I don't wish to sound partisan. I think that dealing with externalities is tricky, and it's worth having a discussion about. However, I think regulations to deal with them are often zero-sum solutions. It's worth asking whether: a) there is a positive-sum (generally market-based) solution b) the conditions that created the externality are transient and will resolve in time