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The market place cannot stop pollution, because the damage done by pollution is very often too large for the polluting company to ever pay to fix, assuming the
by derleth 13y ago
The market place cannot stop pollution, because the damage done by pollution is very often too large for the polluting company to ever pay to fix, assuming the company even still exists when the damage is found. If the company is long gone, there's nobody on the hook and the damage can't be fixed without using laws and taxes to do so.
And that's assuming we magically know who did the damage in the first place, and that it's something other than 'everyone'.
- yuhong 13y agoPollution is not the same as discrimination.
- pdonis 13y agoAs yuhong pointed out, pollution is not really comparable to discrimination; but I still think it's worth asking the question: who allowed the pollution to take place in the first place? The "market place"? Or some government that nudge, nudge, wink, wink, allowed the polluter to pollute?
- dinkumthinkum 13y agoNudge nudge wink wink? In your view, there should be no need to nudge or wink. Let market have as it will. You can't have both ways here.
- alexeisadeski3 13y agoIn a market, the polluter has to compensate those impacted by it's pollution.
- pdonis 13y agoIn your view, there should be no need to nudge or wink. Let market have as it will. You are misrepresenting my view. The reason for the nudge nudge wink wink is that the government, in allowing polluters to pollute, is acting against the interests of the people it's supposed to represent: it is allowing something that the people, if they were able to make the decision on their own in a free market, would not allow. In other words, in an actual free market, a potential polluter would not be able to get any special favors from the government: they would have to get explicit permission from every person who would be affected. That's how a free market works: you want to build a factory that puts toxic chemicals in my groundwater? Sorry, no sale.
- dinkumthinkum 13y agoSo in your view a free market has perfect actors with perfect information and none of them think "climate change" is a hoax? This is not reality my misrepresentation of your view was better than this one. :(
- pdonis 13y agoSo in your view a free market has perfect actors with perfect information Where did I say that? You don't need perfect information; you just need the freedom to act on whatever information you have, combined with your judgment about what's important. none of them think "climate change" is a hoax? A free market also means we all get to exercise our own judgment, instead of having the government exercise judgment for us.
- djur 13y agoYes, I agree. The government should take a stronger role in preventing industrial pollution. Nobody else is going to step in.
- derleth 13y agoPollution happens just fine when there isn't a government to allow it; mostly, it happens when there isn't a government to stop it.