Re:Is everything an MLM
by AnthonyMouse on Sunday April 21, 2019 @12:10PM
(#19712724)
In principle the market has answers for these.
Landfills are a problem because they're subsidized, because we'd rather provide free/cheap garbage pickup than have people throwing their trash in the street or the ocean. The alternative would be to not subsidize it and then penalize throwing trash on someone else's property with 500 hours of picking up trash. Then there isn't trash in the streets because either people don't put it there or there are plenty of people to pick it back up, and trash collection service costs enough that the plastic junk your plastic junk comes in makes it cost more than the alternative that produces less garbage.
Climate change is the same thing. You're releasing CO2 into somebody else's property, which should require their permission. Good luck getting permission from literally everyone in the entire world; might be easier to buy an electric car.
These problems were created by making concessions from the principle that interactions should be voluntary. If you're creating an externality then whoever is paying for that externality should have to agree to it before you can do it, and they're not going to agree to that without being appropriately compensated.
Landfills are a problem because they're subsidized, because we'd rather provide free/cheap garbage pickup than have people throwing their trash in the street or the ocean. The alternative would be to not subsidize it and then penalize throwing trash on someone else's property with 500 hours of picking up trash. Then there isn't trash in the streets because either people don't put it there or there are plenty of people to pick it back up, and trash collection service costs enough that the plastic junk your plastic junk comes in makes it cost more than the alternative that produces less garbage.
Climate change is the same thing. You're releasing CO2 into somebody else's property, which should require their permission. Good luck getting permission from literally everyone in the entire world; might be easier to buy an electric car.
These problems were created by making concessions from the principle that interactions should be voluntary. If you're creating an externality then whoever is paying for that externality should have to agree to it before you can do it, and they're not going to agree to that without being appropriately compensated.