Irvine Housing Blog

To restate more clearly (and more politely):

There is room for argument as to what government policies should be, and what the most cost-effective implementations of those policies are.  But if the government only does what the free market would do, then there is really no point to having a government at all.

Perhaps an example is in order.  As a bonus, I’l address a green issue.  Let’s say I establish a business on my land which emits toxic vapors that then contaminate your land, damaging your business.  What’s the free market solution?  I keep contaminating your land.  This actually happened to farmers near the Anaconda Reduction Works around 1900.

So the question really should be “how much transfer of harm is acceptable?”  Greens typically rely on the answer being very small or zero - notwithstanding the fact that zero is practically impossible to achieve.  I think that that is the approximate reason behind the remark about greens not understanding economics.  That is also why I am not a green - my tolerance of harm transfer is inversely proportional to how likely I think I am to be the one onto whom it’s being transferred, and I think it’s very unlikely.

What you speak of is not a issue of ‘free markets’ rather of “Economic Rent Seeking”. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_rent

In your scenario, the polluter is gaining an economic benefit at little to no cost, by damaging adjacent property. 

If you look at the original post from IR that kicked this discussion off is some of the speaking points from the Green Party meeting that he is speaking at.  Perhaps IR will come back and tell us that there is a free market solution for today’s speaking point of “foster(ing) sic, diversity and preserve dignity and human rights”.  It’s a safe bet that their solution is some type of government program or regulation applicable against individuals (or companies) that are not ‘Rent Seekers’. 

And what does any of this have to with environmentalism - which is supposed to be the Greens reason for existence?

“What you speak of is not a issue of ‘free markets’ rather of “Economic Rent Seeking”.”

So you admit that the free market can not prevent rent seeking?  If that is true and you continue to insist that only free market solutions are acceptable, you are saying that rent seeking is acceptable.

If there is any situation where interference with the market is desirable, then the fact that something is not a free market solution does not imply that it is undesirable.

“It’s a safe bet that their solution is some type of government program or regulation applicable against individuals (or companies) that are not ‘Rent Seekers’.”

More generally I think the greens want to provide inventives against a “tragedy of the commons.”  If we value “diversity … dignity and human rights”, then individuals (or companies) who take advantage of their underpricing are rent seekers.

I disagree with the greens on the need for regulation to prevent rent seeking on a global basis, since I believe that appropriate policy will be enacted worldwide on a distributed basis without need of policy here to promote it.  After all, many countries have already done so.  In other words, any people who bear the costs of rent seeking have an incentive to seek local regulation against rent seeking, so we need not make regulations here to protect them, even if rent seeking is currently occuring.

“And what does any of this have to with environmentalism - which is supposed to be the Greens reason for existence?”

I supplied an example showing that environmental degradation can occur - and has occured - in a free market without external constraints on rent seeking.  I thought its relevance to environmentalism was obvious.

If you are asking why we are discussing human rights and social justice instead of only environmentalism, then I can only point out that many green parties have had these as part of their platforms (e.g. the four pillars) for decades, so you were mistaken about the “Greens reason for existence.”