By Greg Rehmke. This is a guest post by Greg Rehmke, program director of Economic Thinking, an organization that fosters better understanding of economic principles. Natural coral and oyster reefs around the world are considered “rainforests of the oceans,” home to rich and diverse ecosystems. Shipwrecks, offshore oil platforms, and artificial reefs teem with species…
Tag: Property Rights
Nuclear energy . . . the Great American Outdoors bill . . . Anesthetics can change climate?
Nuclear energy may be safer than we think, says a new study from the Global Warming Policy Foundation. A reason to support the Great American Outdoors bill, just passed by the Senate: it would fund maintenance of our national parks, says PERC’s Brian Yablonski on Fox News. Religious diversion? The Vatican recommends divestment from fossil…
A Property Rights Solution to Endangered Salmon
Writing for PERC, R. David Simpson gives an intriguing example of salmon preservation: Native American tribes in Oregon considered bidding on a dam license (to change its operations in ways that would protect salmon). The result: a productive relationship with the dam owners—a cooperative effort to protect salmon. Here is an excerpt from Simpson’s paper:…
How I Became a Free-Market Environmentalist in France
By Max Falque. The managing director of ICREI, the International Center for Research on Environmental Issues, Max Falque is based in Aix-en-Provence, France. He tells the story of how he changed from a French bureaucrat to a proponent of environmental protection using private property and markets. From his essay, “Why Did I Become a Free-Market…
Monday’s Links
Banks and investment funds “go green,” signaling their virtue. The terrifying effects of groupthink. HT Matt Ridley. Proposal in Takoma Park, Maryland, would ban all gas stations by 2045. And that’s just part of it.
Let Environmentalists Bid
In this guest post by Shawn Regan, a research fellow and the director of publications at the Property and Environment Research Center (PERC) in Bozeman, Montana, looks at the fact that to acquire rights to natural resources in the West, you must use the resource. This is an obvious barrier to many would-be environmentalist bidders.
Trump’s ESA Changes: A Good Start
Environmentalists’ knee-jerk reactions to the Trump administration’s regulatory changes under the 1973 Endangered Species Act (ESA) were as predictable as they were misguided. Environmentalists claimed the changes violate the law and gut protections—leaving vulnerable species otherwise on the road to recovery at risk of annihilation.
Sadly, the mainstream media, which seems to treat as revealed truth every study, press release, pronouncement, and tweet from environmentalists, especially if it’s critical of the Trump administration, parroted these claims.
Based on environmentalists’ and the press’s reactions, you would think the ESA had a glowing track record of success in bringing species back from the brink of extinction, but nothing could be further from the truth. Actually, the ESA has been a costly fiasco.