From: brian@quake.sylmar.ca.us (Brian K. Yoder)
Subject: Re: Environmental Cost Assignment (was Re: Save the Planet and ...)
Organization: Quake Public Access
Distribution: na
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 09:12:34 GMT

In article <19781@sunfse.ese.lmsc.lockheed.com> tilley@sunfse.ese.lmsc.lockheed.com writes:
>In article <C0FGr5.4xI@quake.sylmar.ca.us> brian@quake.sylmar.ca.us (Brian K. Yoder) writes:
>>In article <72137@cup.portal.com> gb@cup.portal.com (Greg A Buechler) writes:

>>Oh...you don't think that free markets reflect full economic costs?
>>Pray tell us how this is.

>Perhaps because some of the costs are common, and therefore not private
>property?  

True enough, there are some problems with this...that's why I think private
property ought to be extended to such areas where scarce resources are 
in demand.  Common property causes many of the environmental problems which
exist.  That's one reason why I think that the government ought to get out 
of the property ownership business.

>>>Not just autos, everything is to some degree paid for at costs far 
>>>below their tru economic cost if you factor in the environmental cost/
>>>damage.  

>>Costs according to whom?  If I own a bit of land with trees on it, part
>>of the the price you charge for the lumber will be from the decreased
>>value of the land without the trees.  This is the case with any
>>freely owned and traded resource.

>How about the decreased habitat value of the land around yours?  

iWhat about it?  If damages can be proven, a suit can be filed, or a 
mutually agreeable settlement can be reached.  If you can't prove it
then you have no valid complaint (unless, like Al Gore, you want to see 
people considered guilty until proven innocent when accused of environmental
crimes).

>How about
>the damage from increased erosion from your land?

If the land has decreased capacity to grow things (trees, grain or whatever)
then it's value may drop.  Of course, this depends on a great many other
things like whether it's going to be taken out of lumber production for some
other use or something like that, in which case a little erosion is no big 
deal.

>Erosion from logging is considered a contributing factor in the severity of
>the Eel River flooding in northern CA in 1964 (the "high water mark" signs
>along the "Avenue of the Giants" are impressively high).  Erosion from placer
>mining in the 1800's in CA (and subsequent Central Valley flooding) led US
>courts to outlaw hydraulic mining.  You can see the results of this mining
>along I-80 near Gold Run, CA.

Well, as i said, if you can prove that this or that act caused this or that 
damage then go ahead and sue (or settle).  It might well be that in order
to prevent floods, lumber companies may be required to build flood control
dams too, but again, this rests on the idea of private property and proof
of harm.  It seems that you want to go beyond this kind of thing, am I right?

>>>The cost of lumber should include the full cost of extraction, reforest-
>>>ation, the polution by the trucks moving the lumber, the waste from the
>>>mills, etc.  

>>Surprise...violations of property rights aside, they already do!

>Critics of the USFS charge that the annual cost of public land logging to
>the taxpayer (including road building costs, administrative costs, etc.) is
>$1.7 billion (the USFS excludes the cost of logging roads and a few other
>items and claims expenses of $0.8 billion, but the logging roads would
>not exist except for logging).  The USFS shows logging receipts of $1.3
>billion (a $0.5 billion loss).  Not even the full cost of extraction and
>replanting is paid.

OK, so owkr with me to get the government out of the business of owning
natural vast tracts of land.  I'm sure you would agree that no businessman
would be so foolish as to do something like this (and couldn't afford to
if he wanted to).

>Society recognizes the economic necessity of impact to common space (such as
>pollution).  While I hard time swallowing some specific studies that attempt
>to assign commons cost to certain products, the notion that these costs
>should be "reasonably" assigned is one that I agree with.  

Assigned by whom?  Collected by whom?  To be used for what purpose?  Assigned
by what calculation method?

>Cost, after all,
>simply provides information to an economy and I see no reason why the economy
>should be denied information about impact to common space.

But how much is that impact "worth"?  Who decide how much an acres of forest
is worth?  Greenpeace?  Earth First? Users of lumber?  Backpackers?  Timber
companies?  My point here is that the kind of system you seem to be advocating
is NOT a way of informaing the market...it is a way of putting the market
under the control of a political process.

--Brian