Many people justify the free market economy -- no silky strings attached -- with the idea that sure, the market will punish the segment of the business community that degrades an environment. Eventually the externalities will be factored in by an educated society or not. Perhaps this educated populace has weighed the pros and cons of a profitable, yet unsustainable business and yet the company survives. That’s not the traditional I’ve heard, but it doesn’t sound too far fetched, right? I mean, coal companies have polluted the public atmosphere for a good century (+) and we haven’t seen the surge of decentralized, clean energy or energy boycotts and conservation programs that you’d expect to see if there was a consumer revolt. So we’ve weathered some terrible electricity sources in the past. But our light bulbs are looking somewhat brighter for the future.
But back to the traditional argument. From what I’ve heard, market advocates figure consumers will say, ‘shux, I don’t dig your profit motives, Company A. Company B, call me your patron.’ And so the market self-regulating wheel spins round hypothetically. Company A, just like the early horse--Hyracotherium-- which galloped across North America about 54 million years ago, will adapt. The day will come when Company A sees just how unprofitable it is to pollute. There is an amount that they can pollute in the interest of the economy. They’ll find that homeostasis. It’s not duping the consumer. It’s not putting profit over people. It’s merely a loyalty to stockholders, who have a stake in management.
Risk-benefit analysis and to a smaller degree Cost-benefit analysis (weighing the total expected costs against the total expected benefits of one or more actions in order to choose the best or most profitable option) scare the bejesus out of me not because they blatantly fuel profitism, but rather that each devalues life. Sounds like a cliché argument. It is. The two theories literally compare (often a flawed estimate) money and something impressionable.
And so, getting back to reality and using both RBA and market solutions as evidence that this sort of callous conservatism fails communities seeking to safeguard their homes and workplaces. Company A consumes resources or shoots emissions into the atmosphere. The market punishes them. They lose money and everything is dandy, right? Except in this equation, AGAIN the company doesn’t factor in externalities. There’s nothing to stop this initial attack against the public and after all is rather done, it doesn’t pay for it’s own pollution.
That’s where a bill like the Superfund Act has come into play since the 1970s. Designed to limit corporate liability while still paying for damages, the public is stuck with the bill. The federal government covers the tab of two waste cleanup sites per state. In my state, this means that you and I ...
1)pay for metal waste deposits that built-up behind the Milltown dam decades after copper, silver and gold mining had stopped.
2)pay the EPA to cleanup Libby, Montana after a company packed asbestos into each home in the community.
Businesses dig this act of Congress. They have a swell little safety-net and the potential to use a whole system (humans, macro and micro invertebrates, etc.) much like airport emesis bags.
Luckily, there is a way to twist the free market logic into something more beneficial to society.
While reading The Monkey Wrench Gang, I devised my own little market solution -- a sort of market retaliation, but one that’s justified by such a vibrant belief in consumer response and choice. Property and production, being as important to artificial numbers like GDP as they are to individual citizens, are the targets of such a retaliation. So… what do you think?
Well, it's certainly more profitable to not care about the environment. You have to pay for recycling and such, and companies produce a lot of extra waste. If only they could focus on moral profit of not being irresponsible with pollution and waste rather than the bottom line with the dollar sign.
~ *~
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It depends. Some companies can actually reduce their waste and make more profit. I remember seeing a program about a textile company in... Switzerland, I think, that doesn't pollute at all... the water going into the company is just as clean as the water coming out of it.
~C
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I've been hearing and reading the words of Amory Lovins who is an adviser to companies like WalMart who want to 1)improve their image to consumers and 2)reduce expenses through conservation. He says it's more profitable to reduce the consumption of oil than it is to dig it up and whatnot. Dig.
The Once-ler: Well, what do you want? I should shut down my factory, fire a hundred-thousand workers? Is that good economics, is that sound for the country?
Free Markets are not magic, they are just a natural decentralized control mechanism. Markets find better solutions that serv real needs better than centralized planning in most complex systems. We often get government imposed privatization rather than free markets:
http://www.progressiveu.org/035958-shock-doctrine-rise-disaster-capitali...
In order for market forces to protect the environment business activity has to be made liable for the damages it causes to the environment.To some extent that has been happening slowly since the forties.
The Superfund Act came about because some companies were being driven out of business by the costs of cleaning up their past polution. Eliminating these polution centric activities was a good result, but the defunkt companies filed bankruptcy, and there was no money for the clean-up. The government stepped in and has been cleaning up the worst cases since there was no responsible party left in many cases, or the mess was made doing government projects, and thus the government was responsible.
I am sure some companies have been bailed out, but that is how our lobbiest motivated legislators operate. In any event the public enjoys a cleaner planet because of these tax dollars spent, and we often spend taxes with nothing to show for it.
You may have missed this environmental blog entry:
http://www.progressiveu.org/232705-environmentalist-squirrel
Mike is one of the better bloggers on this site I highly recomend his entries:
http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/embryowassup
"My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind."
-Albert Einstein
"In order for market forces to protect the environment business activity has to be made liable for the damages it causes to the environment.To some extent that has been happening slowly since the forties."
Yep, whether that's factoring in the negative externalities into the consumer bill (which I support) or consumers/citizens sliding the pendullum towards intimidation in order to sideline a business that fails to safeguard products, we certainly have an increasingly loud voice in what's on the market, I reckon.
I will not water down the argument of unethical businesses. I'm not going to shout 'oh no the sky is falling, the sky is falling' when an industry doesn't play by the rules that have been established to protect consumers. Said businesses don't exactly deserver to be in the marketplace.
The Once-ler: Well, what do you want? I should shut down my factory, fire a hundred-thousand workers? Is that good economics, is that sound for the country?
I'm always down for populaist terrorism, so long as its well thought out. When it comes to things like terrorism, you have to be very, very careful in your planning to make sure that the target a) hurts only the business and not the worker and b) does cause the problem that you're trying to address in the first place (I often see this with acts by the ELF, when they blow something up and it burns releasing oodles of unfriendly gasses into the air).
--Mike
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Well said. Populist terrorism--that's got a nice ring.
The Once-ler: Well, what do you want? I should shut down my factory, fire a hundred-thousand workers? Is that good economics, is that sound for the country?
Terrorism is not something to be tossed about lightly. If you manage to hurt somebody, no matter what or how noble your cause, I and a very large segment of the population will be pushing for the death penalty. Unless you really mean to cause TERROR, I would recommend you stay away from that word and that activity.
Now a little sabotage is a different matter. I was really torqued at Home Depot for a while for their policies of allowing illegal aliens to gather on their parking lots as day labors. As revenge it amused me to go to their carefully sorted bins of nuts, bolts and washers and pick out about 10 or 15 lbs of them in assorted sizes, metric and standard, and dump them all into the same unsorted bag. And then decide that I really did not want to purchase them after all so I just left them there. After Walmart got caught with illegal aliens on their cleaning staff I took the grand tour of their store a few different times and filled a shopping cart to the absolute brim with as much small little doodads as possible from lots of different departments and abandoned the cart in the aisles. Those things are essentially sabotage. They cost them money but are otherwise a fairly safe form of protest.
My wrath is basically saved for companies that blatently violate the law and get away with it.
What you do doesn't make you an activist; it makes you a dick. Terrorism isn't about causing mayhem or sabatoge. It's about drawing public attention to something.
--Mike
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Good article. I guess I'm looking for a group of like-minded populist terrorists...which is why I'm thinking of doing some "actions" with Earth First! Ideally, we would be blowing up the dams which are causing the whole salmon/sea-lion issue in the first place...but we would have to be willing to be responsible for the people who die as a result (people on oxygen tanks at home, for example.)
Also, the immediate problems such as not having electricity to cook with would, undoubtedly cause mass riots...so these are things to consider.
I'll start small; maybe smashing some sea lion traps and releasing said sea lions...and then work my way up to larger, Earth-Warrior type actions...what I lack in bravery I make up for in love...
love ya,
Carrot
ps. Great writing! Keep up the good work!
Be careful, my friend. I've been reading quite a bit about the FBI's work to sabotage groups with such ideas. There was a wild civil disobedience tree sit gig in San Fran in 1990 where two of the organizer's vehicle was bombed. The state slapped charges against the pair. That's the type of resolve that's fighting contemporary Monkey Wrenchers.
The Once-ler: Well, what do you want? I should shut down my factory, fire a hundred-thousand workers? Is that good economics, is that sound for the country?
You are frigging nuts!
This passes for progressive thinking?
Have you considered the wall of death and destruction that is going to come sweeping downstream when one of those damns is blown?
You are willing to murder thousands of innocent people who just happen to live down stream because a few misguided kooks killed a few sea lions? It was sad but what is even sadder is your seriously misguided sense of perspective.
I really think the moderators ought to get involved in this thread because I doubt Progressive U wants to be known as a place where terrorism is openly advocated.
"Get involved"?
The Once-ler: Well, what do you want? I should shut down my factory, fire a hundred-thousand workers? Is that good economics, is that sound for the country?
Well, Green Underbelly, you've raised alot of good questions. To get off the topic of Populist Terrorism...I really agree with what you've said. Changes can be made in our society but they dont have to be so radical. We need to inform people who aren't aware of the things you've taken notice to so that they can be just as outraged as you and I. And I'd have to agree with Jackbenimble, it probably isnt a good idea to bomb the damns, that is only protesting destruction with destruction. It doesnt make any sense. America is a place where there is no need for terrorist action because there are other ways of making your point. But our freedom, and the Earth's freedom, is definatly being squashed by corporate giants. Way to say what needs to be said.
To clear up the issue, I advocate democracy first. I'm in the process of writing a blog clarifying exactly what types of judicial and legislative authorizations (against the public interest) to corporations are rapidly making me more skeptical of mass rule. These acts eliminate the role of citizens and independent regulatory agencies (in MT at least) that contribute to weakened and thrown out environmental assessments.
The Once-ler: Well, what do you want? I should shut down my factory, fire a hundred-thousand workers? Is that good economics, is that sound for the country?
So you are willing to kill people to get your way the other 1% of the time?
Have you talked this over with your parents?
Perhaps you should seek help.
That accusation reminds me of the badgering of Jeffrey Lebowski during his first meeting with The Dude.
If you've read the Monkey Wrench Gang, you're probably aware that one character, Dr. Sarvis, is passionately anti-violent. But thanks for the assumptive stigma. I'll tell my parentals.
The Once-ler: Well, what do you want? I should shut down my factory, fire a hundred-thousand workers? Is that good economics, is that sound for the country?