As I indicated last time, one of the problems with the Polluter Pays principle is that economists seem to have been particularly dilatory in finding appropriate ways to implement it. As a result, so many products whose manufacture cause excess carbon emissions, noxious air pollution or the fouling of lakes, rivers and even aquifers, escape penalty when sold, distorting the business
Read more(from the Planetary Health Weekly, Vol. 9, No. 42, October 19, 2023) What would it take for the counter-elites, including those frustrated elite-wannabes as well as progressives seen in the riots and anti-government demonstrations, to return to the massive organization efforts such groups did almost a century ago to turn off the wealth pump and push us in the direction
Read more(in the Planetary Health Weekly Vol. 9, No. 37, September 14, 2023) Part of the problem in making sense of the conflicts over climate change and the biodiversity crises is that there is not only a polarisation of opinions, but these opinions are based on very different principles. I have been concerned for some time about morality in the business
Read more(in the Planetary Health Weekly, Vol. 9, No. 41, October 12, 2023) Polluter Pays is the idea that any party, such as a business, that causes environmental damage or pollution is held responsible for any costs borne by the community at large including specific victims. If a chicken farm pollutes a river so that fishermen downstream lose their livelihoods the principle
Read moreCredit: Turchin and Korotayev, 2020 One way to confuse people is to use fancy words that are unfamiliar. That is much of what constitutes the educational process
Read moreContinued from Part A (PHW July 3, 2023) The Plughole Problem appears in relation to most aspects of climate change and the biodiversity crises; you may have recognised it as a regular theme of mine. It’s the obsession with new ideas while ignoring the old harmful ones which still go on causing trouble – finding new taps to open while
Read moreCheck out the 16 slides by Ms. Ramos Let’s explore the concept of nation states. John Mearsheimer, a political science professor at the University of Chicago presents a theory that states are the principal actors politically and have no higher authority over them. All states have some offensive military capabilities with difficult to discern intentions that are hidden inside the state bureaucracy
Read moreCredit: taxjusticenow.org Last month’s blog expressed concern that the United States could be doing a replay of what happened to health and health status in Russia after the downfall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Mortality there increased and life expectancy has only now returned to about where it was before the breakup. U.S. life expectancy is where it was in
Read moreAs you may have noticed there’s been a good deal of hullabaloo about plastics in the environment recently, with various meetings and conferences aiming to produce ‘a binding international plastics treaty’. All very laudable and at the least attracting attention to the worldwide problem of plastic waste that affects virtually all living things, killing and debilitating many of them. Reading
Read more“The Plughole Problem – Part A” Milner on Biodiversity As you may have noticed there’s been a good deal of hullabaloo about plastics in the environment recently, with various meetings and conferences aiming to produce ‘a binding international plastics treaty’. All very laudable and at the least attracting attention to the worldwide problem of plastic waste that affects virtually all
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PLANETARY HEALTH WEEKLY 