One man's market distortion is another man's pricing in of manifest but indirect costs. To take an obvious case, it might be very cheap for my neighbour to hea

One man's market distortion is another man's pricing in of manifest but indirect costs. To take an obvious case, it might be very cheap for my neighbour to heat his house with coal. Then one day laws are introduced which say he has to abide by emissions standards, and in order to do that, buy an expensive clean-burning stove, and expensive specially refined low-sulphur coal. If that ends up making it cheaper to use natural gas instead, no doubt the coal company (and the neighbour) will say the rules represent an artificial distortion of the market. But I would say the rules are there prevent him transferring the true costs of burning cheap coal onto my family (and the other families nearby) and their health.