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As well as things like climate change right? The problem is imagine if all the investment put into green energy was actually put into just making fossil fuels
by mostertoaster 5y ago
As well as things like climate change right?
The problem is imagine if all the investment put into green energy was actually put into just making fossil fuels and their use far more efficient.
It might’ve had a far better impact on the environment, but it would’ve hurt the pocketbooks of the congressmen who have money invested in these specific solutions. (The other side pushing for more fossil fuels doesn’t actually care they just have their investments there).
An individual is still able to make the best decisions for themselves and the less you allow them to do this, the more danger and misuse of resources you’ll find.
- dash2 5y agoIf you are claiming that individual action would've solved climate change, this seems like a fantasy. Public goods problems are real.
- mostertoaster 5y agoIt does a pretty good job of figuring out the correct price of things.
- dash2 5y agoNo, that's false when public goods exist. The market can't figure out the correct price of carbon, because when I produce carbon, it harms other people than me. Off-topic, but... this is Econ 101! I feel a bit like a programmer would feel when someone says "hey, our car is programmed using an HTML5 supercomputer". It alarms me that an argument which has been known for 250 years, and formalized for 60 years, still hasn't percolated to the educated general public. Markets can't magically work out the correct prices in the presence of externalities. (To head off a nerdy counter-argument: yes, yes, Coase theorem, blah blah. If you think we can automatically negotiate to internalize all externalities, then fine - that seems wildly wrong to me but it's not a logically invalid argument. But if so, markets per se add nothing. Property rights plus individual contract law get you all you need.