A property-based solution towards climate change
Posted by davidmcnab 9 years, 2 months ago to Business
There will be diverse opinions within this group as to whether we are undergoing serious climate change, the effect that any such climate change may have on human activity, and the extent to which past and present human activity may be contributing to climate change (if even at all).
In this context, one can speculate on a solution based on taking privatisation to the next level. Arguably, the first product of nature to become the subject of property rights was land. One of the main issues for inter-tribe relations was territorial boundaries. As eastern and western societies evolved, land property rights were refined to the level of family, then individual.
However, despite the vast quantum leaps we have made in property rights (there is even a patent on the "business concept" of cutting crusts off sandwiches before serving them), other natural resources critical to human welfare remain in communal possession, which could arguably be blamed for our current climate issues.
Maybe it's time for climate-related resources to catch up with human civilisation and join land and water in the inventory of privately held assets. If the sun were floated as a publicly traded company, then the company Sun Inc could charge for solar radiation by the megajoule. Farmers benefiting from sunlight in growing their crops would have to pay. Ditto for people and companies generating solar electricity. Sun Inc would have legal liability, however, for adverse solar events such as sunspots causing interference to electronic communications.
Similarly, the atmosphere can be floated as well. Users of atmospheric resources such as oxygen would need to open accounts with Atmosphere Inc, and pay for every breath. People who fall into arrears would have their atmospheric breathing rights cut off, and would be required to source their oxygen from elsewhere.
On the other hand, Atmosphere Inc would have legal accountability for atmosphere-related natural disasters such as tornados and hurricanes, and would be incentivised to research technologies for reducing or eliminating these occurrences. Conversely, Atmosphere Inc would be able to control who emits what into the atmosphere, and charge according to substances and amounts. They could charge individuals for carbon dioxide exhalations, for vehicle emissions as well.
The concept of international waters need to be brought up to date with today's property rights advances, and placed into private ownership as well. Oceans Inc would own all waters not within respective nations' economic zones.
Between Sun Inc, Atmosphere Inc and Oceans Inc, there would be robust private ownership and management of critical resources. They would enjoy substantial revenue benefits, but also need to mitigate their legal liability. Insurance contracts would drop any "act of God" clauses, and instead budget in the costs of suing these three companies instead. This would be the new era in advanced privatisation, taking these crucial resources out of the hands of looter governments and putting them safely into private hands where they belong.
In this context, one can speculate on a solution based on taking privatisation to the next level. Arguably, the first product of nature to become the subject of property rights was land. One of the main issues for inter-tribe relations was territorial boundaries. As eastern and western societies evolved, land property rights were refined to the level of family, then individual.
However, despite the vast quantum leaps we have made in property rights (there is even a patent on the "business concept" of cutting crusts off sandwiches before serving them), other natural resources critical to human welfare remain in communal possession, which could arguably be blamed for our current climate issues.
Maybe it's time for climate-related resources to catch up with human civilisation and join land and water in the inventory of privately held assets. If the sun were floated as a publicly traded company, then the company Sun Inc could charge for solar radiation by the megajoule. Farmers benefiting from sunlight in growing their crops would have to pay. Ditto for people and companies generating solar electricity. Sun Inc would have legal liability, however, for adverse solar events such as sunspots causing interference to electronic communications.
Similarly, the atmosphere can be floated as well. Users of atmospheric resources such as oxygen would need to open accounts with Atmosphere Inc, and pay for every breath. People who fall into arrears would have their atmospheric breathing rights cut off, and would be required to source their oxygen from elsewhere.
On the other hand, Atmosphere Inc would have legal accountability for atmosphere-related natural disasters such as tornados and hurricanes, and would be incentivised to research technologies for reducing or eliminating these occurrences. Conversely, Atmosphere Inc would be able to control who emits what into the atmosphere, and charge according to substances and amounts. They could charge individuals for carbon dioxide exhalations, for vehicle emissions as well.
The concept of international waters need to be brought up to date with today's property rights advances, and placed into private ownership as well. Oceans Inc would own all waters not within respective nations' economic zones.
Between Sun Inc, Atmosphere Inc and Oceans Inc, there would be robust private ownership and management of critical resources. They would enjoy substantial revenue benefits, but also need to mitigate their legal liability. Insurance contracts would drop any "act of God" clauses, and instead budget in the costs of suing these three companies instead. This would be the new era in advanced privatisation, taking these crucial resources out of the hands of looter governments and putting them safely into private hands where they belong.
No thanks.
The governments of the world would never allow those revenue streams in private hands. And the governments, UN, amd NGOs control too much already.
To recognize property, someone must be able to defend it. How do you defend the sun? The air? The ocean? You can defend space but not energy, nor a freely moving fluid. You can defend an invention of man, or its physical result. But you cannot always defend a feature of the ocean or sky.
That said: you can define a certain seemingly constant condition that affects a parcel of land, or a defined volume of air or water. You can then define a right not to have anyone on the outside change those conditions without consulting you. So when your neighbor puts up a "spite fence," you can sue him.
Pollution, then, becomes the tort of creating a nuisance for your neighbor. A nuisance for which your neighbor, or even someone further away, can hold you liable.
Today we define riparian water rights the same way. One who restricts the flow of water, infringes on the rights of everyone downstream of him. One can assign civil liability to pollution of water the same way. And pollution of air and land.
Remember what Rand said about invention being the first profession to go when a society slides toward mindless savagery?
Anyway, that leads me into a more specialised property rights discussion relating to patents, which demands starting a new thread..
I regret that I cannot buy into this scheme. First of all I do not believe man is capable of countering natural climate change. Secondly I do not believe anyone can own the air, the sunlight or the oceans. "Locke established that private property is absolutely essential for liberty: “every Man has a Property in his own Person. This no Body has any Right to but himself. The Labour of his Body, and the Work of his Hands, we may say, are properly his.” He continues: “The great and chief end therefore, of Mens uniting into Commonwealths, and putting themselves under Government, is the Preservation of their Property. Locke believed people legitimately turned common property into private property by mixing their labor with it, improving it." No man has the capacity to improve these natural resources through his labor let alone control distribution.
Now if your private property is harmed because of someone else's pollution... say for example someone upstream from you dumps toxins in a stream that runs through or along your property then you have legal recourse.
Aren't we already taxed and regulated enough already? Where does it stop? Will we next charge for the space one occupies?
Sorry, I just don't see it.
Respectfully,
O.A.
Let's apply it to the Little Ice Age and the multiple major Ice Ages... what would who do to whom in those eras to ameliorate the effects or punish the perpetrators?
:)
Plants own the carbon dioxide I exhale.
Maybe old dino is too much the simple fossil here.
Now I'm stream of consciousness thinking of corporations taking over the world in SYFY flicks.
This is all silly stuff.
OMG! Look out! His lips are about to move!
I will pose two examples, famous examples of who is and is not "green".
George W Bush
http://www.ecorazzi.com/2007/02/19/presi...
Al Gore, the Climate Change Nazi:
http://jacksonville.com/reason/fact-chec...
As far as anthropomorphic global warming, that whole hoax has been thoroughly exposed so anyone who still adheres to it is either part of that "industry" and making money off it, or has simply failed to do their homework.
If you look back approximately 10-15 thousand years, the whole northern hemisphere was nearly covered with ice. Somehow, that ice melted...and as far as we know, there were no cars, planes, factories, or any other technology belching out so-called greenhouse gases. The warming and cooling is clearly part of a long-term cycle related to activity on the Sun...not puny humans spewing pollution.
likely to be driven into bankruptcy by lawsuits....... -- j
While not as advanced as the author of the piece above envisions, places like California and others charge people a tax on the air. The agency that does this is the Air Quality Management District (AQMD).
Paying for water:
If you use city water you know you are paying for water, but did you know that places like Denver have a tax for the rain water that runs off your property?
Needless to say that if there is something to be taxed, a politician will figure out a way to tax it.
Absolutely non serious paragraph. Short answer is ''just like today?"
Here's where a serious smiley face should go.
I think we're still several million years away from anything close to what you are suggesting.
On a darker note, Monsanto is pushing to own all global crop production at an IP level, by pushing for laws against heirloom seed cultivation across numerous jurisdictions. They are also heavily promoting herbicide and pesticide products which threaten honey bee populations (which, of course, would give Monsanto the kind of monopoly advantage James Taggart was seeking when he got his Washington buddies to crush the Phoenix Durango line). Private ownership of global biomass, such as bees, would empower a company to push back against this.
http://news.mongabay.com/2015/0209-hance...
Now - this is critical to the whole objectivist philosophy: Is Monsanto just a successful biotech firm legitimately pursuing a strategy to generate better returns for its shareholders? Or is it worse than a thousand James Taggarts?
Should farmers affected by bee declines have ability to sue?
And how can affected parties sue when the cause/effect relationships can be blurred for decades, and the damage done before ultimate proof can be produced?
So ironic that Ayn Rand, herself such a staunch defender of capitalism, died from tobacco companies furthering their profit by obfuscating the scientific evidence of the link between smoking and cancer - a link first discovered in the 1920s.