On this subject, can I also endorse Chris Hamnett's comments, and add the
following three points:
1) May I recommend checking out John Bowers work on environmental
economics, in particular <Sustainability and Environmental Economics> for
alternatives to CBA madness. Another good source of alternative economic
thinking is Aubrey Meyer at ([log in to unmask])
2) I first came across Bowers work some years ago in a publication for
the British Association for Nature Conservationists which criticized David
Pearce's Blueprint for a Green Economy. This inspired me to write a paper
criticising the notion that so-called 'green' taxation was environmentally
friendly . I mention this only because of what the other postings on this
issue have also referred to, namely that we do tend to accept uncritically
(or at least fail to challenge sufficiently strongly) neoclassical economic
analyses of environmental issues. I have found, when being asked to comment
on this particular paper at job interviews etc., an almost universal prima
facie assumption amongst my interlocutors that green taxes _are_ good for
you, when in fact 'green' tax theory is based on exactly the same premisses
as Larry Summers' analysis (basically, the argument was: if they work[raise
revenues], they won't clean up the environment; but if they clean up the
environment, they won't raise revenue - At the time I wrote it, I had had
fairly close dealings with Chris Smith, then a Labour Shadow Minister - I
sent him a copy, he sent me a non-commital reply and Labour have endorsed
'green' taxation principles anyway).
3) Finally, I have taught issues surrounding the use of CBA to
bureaucrats from developing countries. It was my impression that CBA
symbolised 'modernisation' for them, and that what they wanted from the
course were skills in applying CBA, not arguments for why they should
approach this technique with extreme caution. Ironically, Larry Summers
chief supporters may well be in the countries that are currently
'under-polluted'.
----------
>From: chris hamnett <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Cc: [log in to unmask], Tim Forsyth <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Re: Larry Summers and env economics
>Date: Wed, May 19, 1999, 1:09 pm
>
> I'm sure that many members of the forum share Sian's horror at the
> ideas put forward by Larry Summers. Unfortunately they are not at all
> unusual. All he was doing was applying fairly standard neo-classical
> economic analysis of marginal costs and benefits etc. The problem is
> not with Larry Summers but with this kind of economic analysis which
> at Lutzenberger pointed out, can lead to outrageous conclusions and
> policy prescriptions. I'm quite sure that some neo-classical economist
> somewhere has suggested sending children back up chimmneys to free up
> the labour market and encourage good attitudes to work.
>
> Far more damaging has been the imposition of a free market economy in
> Russia using shock therapy and the impact of free market speculative
> capital flows in the South East Asian financial crisis. And there is
> the global pollution rights agreement whereby, as I understand it,
> the US and other western countries are able to buy the atmospheric
> pollution rights of the Eastern bloc and keep on pumping Co2 into the
> atmosphere. Larry Summers statement is merely a bizarre manifestation
> of a deeper and more insidious form of narrow economic calculation.
> This is what needs to be challenged.
>
> Chris Hamnett
>
> ----------------------
> chris hamnett
> [log in to unmask]
>
>
>
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