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> The book talks about the environment - and damage to the environment can definitely be quantified and you should definitely be able to agree on limits (or sue
by blackbear_ 5y ago
> The book talks about the environment - and damage to the environment can definitely be quantified and you should definitely be able to agree on limits (or sue) with your neighbours. A third party judge could agree on the decision.
It is much harder than that. You can certainly sue a local company for obvious pollution (which is must be visible in the short-term), but who to sue for the dying coral reef, melting glaciers, bee extinction, or the increase in the incidence of lung cancer? We can measure these things, but who pays for them, and how much?
Even Friedman agrees (implicitly) this issue is above free markets, via carbon pricing, meaning that:
> Who gets away with it depends not on real costs but on politics.
- BurningFrog 5y agoI think DF will acknowledge most of those points, but also point out that current non market political systems don't handle them well either. IOW, these problems may not have a great real world solution...
- jokethrowaway 5y agoIt is definitely a hard problem; we're not solving it at all in the current system. Look at how big oil colluded with the government and pushed for plastic we can't really recycle. If we can measure it and trace it back to polluting companies, everyone should be able to pool their collective power, via their dispute resolution agencies, and demand a trial, imposing fines, limits and what not. It's not going to be easy, but it won't be harder than it is now: corruption should be harder with competing dispute resolution agencies and customers can actually walk away and stop paying them if they don't act in their interest.