Natural Market Forces Can Restore Nature and Cut Taxes

How can we discourage destructive environmental behaviors, pay for ecosystem restoration and reducegeneral taxes, all at once? Let the market do the work—with taxes or fees correcting our present enormous subsidies for environmental degradation. We can call the resulting charges “environmental sin taxes,” or to focus on the mechanisms at work (and to avoid the “t word”), call them “natural market forces.”

I’ll use both phrases in this article. Like existing sin taxes on cigarettes and alcohol, natural market forces would address public costs created by destructive private behaviors. Today, all of society bears the cost of these behaviors—through expensive corrective actions or, more frequently, by accepting ongoing environmental losses as though they are inevitable. Any economist will tell you that it makes more sense to charge the party causing the destruction. Lately, economists are lining up in support of this approach nationally or even globally to address greenhouse gas emissions. But why stop there?

Read the rest of John Lombard's story in CitiesGoGreen magazine's October issue.

Set as favorite

Email This

Comments (0) Add Comment