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The debate on plug-ins begins

Alan Durning's article makes a lot of good points about the need to do more than just improve the efficiency of our personal transport. It's a great article, but it also contains a few inaccuracies that I feel obligated to clear up before the global warming deniers (among others) try to use them.

I can tell from the comments on Alan's post that some readers are under the mistaken impression that his conclusions are a reflection of the EPRI/NRDC (PDF) report cited, but many are actually counter to that report. For example:

Why gutting commodity subsidies should be the focus of Farm Bill reform efforts

Thomas Dobbs is Professor Emeritus of Economics at South Dakota State University, and a W.K. Kellogg Foundation Food & Society Policy Fellow.

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Tom Philpott wrote an article in which he challenged some of the key assumptions underlying Farm Bill reform efforts of the past year ("It's the Agronomy, Stupid"). He contended that gutting commodity subsidies would not solve the U.S.'s long-standing oversupply problems, and that we need the money currently in the "commodity" title to remain available for eventual support of conservation and other measures reformers hold dear.

The following day, a guest post by Britt Lundgren appeared in Gristmill, contending that Philpott missed the real point of the Farm Bill debate. The real point, said Lundgren, is "whether or not the current suite of farm subsidies are actually an effective and productive way to support agriculture in the U.S."

I find myself largely in agreement with the contents of Lundgren's post, but I want to address more directly Philpott's contention that "it's the agronomy" that matters. I disagree. "It's the economics" that matters in assessing the consequences of the U.S. farm program's heavy emphasis on commodity subsidies.

California sues over lead-tainted toys

The state of California, which never met an environmental fustercluck it didn’t want to litigate, has filed a lawsuit accusing 20 companies — including Mattel and Toys R Us — of making or selling products containing “unlawful quantities of lead.”

Notable quotable

"Coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel, is the crack cocaine of the developing world." — Alan Zarembo, L.A. Times, 18 Nov. 2007

Metro is succeeding, but like all public transit systems, it needs our support

It was a bad headline and a bad take on an important issue from a writer at a publication that ought to know better. Last week, M.J. Rosenberg, writing at TPM Cafe, penned a quick post entitled “Question for Paul Krugman: Why Does the DC Metro Suck?” In the space of a few short words, […]

Midwestern governors sign greenhouse-gas reduction pact, and more

Read the articles mentioned at the end of the podcast: Breaking News: Climate Changing Is It Hump Day Already? We Love It When This Happens! The Consent of the Governors Don’t Cry Over Labeled Milk Stakes on a Plane Read the articles mentioned at the end of the podcast: Thanks for the Recipes Bough Wow […]

Moving toward responsible agriculture

North Dakota senator Kent Conrad calls the farm bill a "legislative battleship that you cannot turn around quickly." As of mid-November 2007, this year's $286 billion farm bill appears to be having engine trouble. It is stalled in the Senate, and there is talk of a presidential veto.

Should farmers be able to receive more than $250,000 in subsidy payments? What should the funding be for biofuels, for school lunches? Most of these arguments are about the speed of the battleship, or which flags it should fly, not the direction.

For generations, that direction has been the maintenance and continued acceptability of high-input, industrialized agriculture -- "production agriculture" to its defenders. The farm bill is the legislative and financial instrument by which we attempt to turn an agriculture that is economically, socially, and ecologically unsound into something that is politically acceptable. This is getting harder and harder to do.

Busting ethanol market bad news for investors

The U.S. ethanol boom has been brought up short by market glut, making corn-based fuel “2007’s worst energy investment,” a Bloomberg News Service article declared today. President Bush made ethanol a centerpiece of his energy plan and lavished it with subsidies; ethanol distilleries that went up quickly in anticipation are now having to shut down. […]

On organic Christmas trees

Dear Umbra, Is there such a thing as an organic Christmas tree? How chemical-intensive is conventional Christmas-tree farming? If I want a Christmas tree, what’s the most eco-friendly way to go? Your fan, Lisa Seattle, Wash. Dearest Lisa, Since you are not only a fan but also my senior editor, who told me you are […]

Pro-business vs. pro-market

Much of the debate around the big issues of our day -- from energy to healthcare -- hinges on whether one is "pro-market" or "pro-government," with Cato and the Wall Street Journal op-ed page lining up on one side and any number of PIRGs on the other.

Unfortunately, neither side appears to understand the pro-market position. Herewith, my attempt to add a bit more rigor to the debate.

So what does a market look like? At the most basic level, a market is defined by its characteristics. There are various definitions out there, but they all come down to the same basic tests:

1. No barriers to entry
2. No barriers to exit
3. Price transparency (e.g., prices reflect costs)
4. No participants can independently affect price

Meet these tests and Adam Smith's magic starts to work, whereby the self-interest of each participant leads to social benefit for all in the form of better products and services, at lower prices. Why? Because life in a perfect market sucks! If you're running a firm in a market as defined above, you don't sleep well at night. New entrants keep cropping up. If you can't stay competitive, you're going to lose your money. Tiny changes in raw material costs have big impacts on your profits, which you are completely powerless to change. This causes you to do two things: